Page:Notes and Queries - Series 10 - Volume 11.djvu/526

 434

NOTES AND QUERIES. [io s. XL MAY 29, im

something to do with this. After the battle of Naseby, for instance, he took it upon himself to send a personal letter to the Speaker, in addition to the reports of the general and of the Commissioners. He thus refers therein to the Commander-in- Chief :

" Sir, this is none other but the hand of God, and to him alone belongs the Glory, wherein none are to share with him, the Generall served you with all faithfulnesse and honour, and the best commenda- tions I can give him is, that I dare say he attributes all to God, and would rather perish than assumne to himselfe, which is an honest and a thriuing way, and yet as much for brauery may be given to him in this action, as to a man. "

I presume it is on this statement that MB. PICKFOBD bases his opinion that Cromwell gave Fairfax " the chief credit for the victory of Naseby."

JOHN T. PAGE.

BERGERODE (10 S. x. 407; xi. 218, 338). The derivation of Bergerode from the A.-S. beor (shallow) and grade (harbour) is open to the somewhat awkward objections that there is no such adjective as beor with the sense of "shallow," nor any such substantive as grade with the sense of " harbour."

I beg leave to repeat what I have so often said before, viz., that the " Anglo-Saxon " forms postulated by many of our county historians are pure fictions, having no connexion of any kind with any form of English, either of the oldest or most modern period. WALTER W. SKEAT.

Provided the word under discussion is authentic, and is not an accidental Teutonic importation (cp. Bergedorf, Herzegerode, Wernigerode, &c.), it may perhaps be compared with another Lancashire word, Ormerod=the royd, ridding, or clearing of Orme. H. P. L.

EARL FEBBEBS (10 S. xi. 209, 335). I thank MB. HUMPHREYS for his reply, but my query was directed to portraits capable of authentication, and not to the numerous, and doubtless more or less imaginary, alleged presentments of the Earl which have appeared from time to time. ' Earl Ferrers as he lay in his Coffin at Surgeons' Hall ' is contained in ' The Annals of New- gate ; or, Malefactors' Register,' vol. iv., 1776, as is also a representation of ' Earl Ferrers shooting Mr. Johnson his Steward ' ; whilst a modern variant of the latter, drawn by Phiz (Hablot K. Browne), appears in The Chronicles of Crime,' by Camden Pelham, Esq., 1841, vol. i. p. 183.

It is curious how philosophically members of the family took this unfortunate occur- rence in later years. In ' Music and Friends,' by William Gardiner, 1838, vol. ii. p. 481, the author mentions Thomas Moore, the poet, as living at Castle Donington, and proceeds :

" Lord Tamworth came one morning with his hounds, and invited us next day to Staunton Harold for dinner. This is a noble mansion, and his lordship showed me the room in which his ancestor shot his steward, which has been closed ever since that event."

From the context this would appear to have taken place between 1807 and 1811.

W. B. H.

In Evans's ' Catalogue of a Collection of Engraved Portraits,' vol. i. 121-2, there is the following list :

3849. Ferrers, Laurence Shirley, Earl, Vis- count Tamworth ; of Chartley, Staff., and Stanton, Leic. ; exec. 1760, 8vo, 6dL

3850. Ferrers, Earl, continued : view of his execution at Tyburn, oblong, 4to, etching, rare and curious, 2s. 6d.

3851. with view of his 1, execution, 8vo, Is.

A. Walker.

I have an etching, on comparatively modern paper, entitled :

A Perspective View of the Execution of Lord Ferrers | at Tyburn | May 5 th, 1760, for the Murder of his Steward | Printed for Bob Wilkin eon, 58 Cornhill.

HORACE BLEACKLEY.

" ONE SHOE OFF AND ONE SHOE ON " (10 S. ix. 270). The one foot was presum- ably left bare to give a better hold on rocky or slippery ground. There are classical parallels in abundance. When part of the garrison of Platsea made their famous escape through the enemy's lines by night, they had only their left feet shod, aox/>yA.ei'as CI/CKO. T^S irpos TOV Trr/AoV (Thucydides, iii. 22, 2). See also Virgil, ' ^Eneid,' vii. 689, with the passages quoted by commentators, whose explanations are not invariably distin- guished by clearness or practical sense.

The protected foot, as a rule, would be that most likely to be advanced against the foe, and this would depend on the weapon employed and the method of fighting. The left feet of the Welsh archers are to the front and have shoes. The Samnites (Livy, ix. 40, 3) and gladiators equipped in their style wore a greave on the left leg. When the Roman soldier wore one, it was on the right (Smith's 'Diet. Ant.,' s.v. ' Ocrea '). The " Samnite " gladiator from a Pompeian wall-painting on plate xxx. (fig. 10) of Schreiber's ' Atlas of Classical Antiquities '