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NOTES AND QUERIES. no s. XL MAR. 20, im

districts of the metropolis. The question of the possibility of linking-up the wires then in existence to different countries of Europe and Asia was raised ; and to show how feasible this was, the engineer to the company arranged a special demonstration at Mr. Gurney's residence. Wires were laid under the Kensington high road from the Park specially for the purpose, and on the day appointed messages were received from and dispatched to the limits of tele- graphic communication at the time, by the operators at the instruments in Mr. Gurney's drawing-room. Among other places a mes- sage was received from Teheran. Having failed to trace any reference to this feat in The Times, Engineer, or ' Annual Register,' I appeal for the assistance of your readers.

BETA.

JOSEPH HARRIS was elected from West- minster School to Trinity College, Cambridge, in 1730. I should be much obliged by any particulars of his career. G. F. B. B.

EDWARD MEDLEY, son of John Medley of Westminster, was admitted a scholar of Trinity College, Cambridge, 3 May, 1765 Particulars of his career and the date o: his death are required. G. F. R. B.

ENGLISH TOPOGRAPHICAL POTTERY. About 1773 the Empress Catherine of Russia commissioned Messrs. Wedgwood & Bentley the Staffordshire potters, to manufacture a vast cream-ware service, each piece to be enamelled with a different view of English scenery. Mr. J. L. Roget, in his ' History of the Old Water-Colour Society,' state in a foot-note to vol. i. p. 34 that the late Miss Meteyard (the biographer of Josial Wedgwood) had lent him a manuscript copj of the catalogue of the Russian service Where is this MS. now ? Has it ever been printed ? and if so, by whom ? A list o the views on the pottery and its presen location would be interesting.

T. CANN HUGHES, M.A., F.S.A.

Lancaster.

" QUID EST FIDES ? " Can any one teL me where the questions and answers begin ning with "Quid eat fides? Quod nor vides," may be found ? O.

' ST. CHRISTIAN,' MIRACLE PLAY. Wa there ever a Miracle Play entitled ' St. Chris tian' ? Sharp ('Coventry Mysteries,' p. 10 quotes from a MS. list of Mayors, " Thi yeare [1505] they played the play of St Crytyan in the Little Parke." Hardi Craig ('Two Corpus Christi Plays') think

t. Catharine was intended by this, as a lay on this subject had been performed a 1490 or 1491 in the same place. I find, owever, in Inq. P.M. 19 Hen. VIII. 46-45 P.R.O.), that the play of 1505 is described s " magnus ludus vocatus seynt Xpeans ~!hristeans) pley." M. DORMER HARRIS. 16, Gaveston Road, Leamington.

Hcplua.

BURIAL HALF WITHIN AND HALF WITHOUT A CHURCH.

(10 S. xi. 108.)

IN the north wall of Brent Pelham Church, Serts, is the tomb of the local hero, Piers Shonks, who fought with, and slew, he Pelham Dragon, as Salmon ('Hist, of Herts,' 1728) says " Anno a Conquestu 21." The tomb is in an arched recess of Tudor date, containing a slab of Petworth marble emblematically carved. It was opened in 1835 or 1836, and at a considerable distance down in the wall some large human bones were found. Mrs. Hudson, an extremely interesting octogenarian living at Barkway, told me that about 1836 the tomb was opened by Mr. Brand and Mr. Morris, both of whom, she believed, were churchwardens, and they each had a finger-bone out of the tomb. One joint was as long as an ordinary man's ringer, and the bones were double- jointed. Morris " never had any peace with his bone," and had to put it back in the tomb. Brand also appears to have suffered, although not to the same extent ; but Mrs. Hudson said " he never knew the going of his bone," or when it disappeared. Further details will be found in a pamphlet entitled ' A Hertfordshire St. George ; or, The Story of Piers Shonks and the Pelham Dragon,' 10 pp., 1905, a copy of which is in the B.M. W. B. GERISH.

Bishop's Stortford.

Stephen Langton's tomb is now half inside and half outside the chapel of St. Michael in Canterbury Cathedral ; but this position is said to be due to the building operations of Prior Chillenden, who died in 1410. In the old chapel the tomb occu- pied a position before the altar there.

JOHN B. WAINEWRIGHT.

I remember two well-known instances of this curious practice, although the persons concerned were not excommunicated.

In Canterbury Cathedral there is a small chapel, eastward of the S.W. transept, generally known as that of St. Michael.