Page:Notes and Queries - Series 10 - Volume 3.djvu/599

 10* s. in. JO-E 24, loos.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

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sources between 1877 and 1883, for a history of the Hundred of Becontree and Havering Liberty, co. Essex. MR. FANSII AWE'S MS. is an "original" merely in a certain limited sense, being defective at the end, as it ceases at 1672. The original and only full and com- plete MS. known of Lady Fanshawe's memoirs, of about the year 1676, together with the splendid transcript of the same in the highest style of contemporary calligraphy, prepared for presentation to the king (Charles II.), is in my possession, and intended for pub- lication by me, with notes and illustrations, in an 'edition de luxe, for the printing of which arrangements have already been made. These two MSS. I have recently acquired, together with numerous original deeds, documents, papers, paintings, prints, Ac., of or relating to the Fanshawes, and I shall incorporate all the new informa- tion in my work, as well as that from my other Fanshawe acquisitions of many years ago. I think that these facts should be known as MR. FANSHAWE has announced the publication of a new edition of the memoirs. Moreover, I venture to state that, considering the well - known incorrectness of the former editions of 1829 and 1830, none (even from the complete original MS., not accessible to MR. FANSHAWE) would be acceptable to the British public unless edited by a competent antiquary.

W. I. K. V.

SHAKESPEARE'S GRAVE (10 th S. i. 288, 331, 352, 416, 478; ii. 195, 292). Would Mr. Brassington, the librarian of the Shake- speare Memorial, be kind enough to tell us, who are not so fortunate as he to live at the source, in what the discrepancies between Dugdale's drawings of the Clopton monu- ments in Stratford Church and the originals consist] Dugdale is regarded as a very reliable author ; but if it can be shown that in his illustrations, at any rate, there are aarista/kes, we need not accept his Shakespeare bust -ae genuine. Otherwise, the case against the present one is very serious.

G. KRUEGER. Berlin.

CHILDREN AT EXECUTIONS (10 th S. ii. 346, 454, 516; iii. 33, 93). As an instance of children being taken to view ghastly spec- tacles, for a lesson and a warning, may I give
 * an episode in my own experience 1

On the afternoon of Monday, 15 August, 1892, 1 was walking through the Morgue with a, Frenchman. There were displayed to view on that day eight corpses, two of them those of women. From their appearance, I believe

that the majority of these bodies had been taken from the Seine. Some of them were dreadfully bruised and disfigured about the face, and were horrible to look on. Passing on with us, in front of the glass which separates the bodies from the public, was a poor woman with her child, a little girl, from four to five years of age. The mother was holding the little one up in her arms, so that she might have a better view of the grim figures reposing beyond the glass. 1 ex- pressed astonishment to my friend that so young a child should have been brought to see such a gruesome sight. He assured me that such instances were not at all uncommon, and that parents often brought their chil- dren, refractory or otherwise, to point a moral lesson for their benefit, and to warn them of the consequences of disobedience and wickedness, accentuating their homily by showing them these silent witnesses.

CHR. WATSON.

In 1865 there appeared anonymously ' Robert Dalby and his World of Troubles, being the Early Days of a Connoisseur,' now known to be mainly the autobiography of Henry Merritt (1822-77, 'D.N.B.'). The fol- lowing passage from it refers to Oxford in the early thirties :

"In those days boys were not squeamish On

my way from the jail that morning, I came upon a large number of charity schoolboys who had been dismissed by their master for the day in order that they might be present to witness the execution with a view to their moral improvement, a favour which they one and all seemed to appreciate vastly, most of them being in high spirits and playing at leap-frog to keep themselves warm."

W. B. H.

"JOCKTELEG" (10 th S. iii. 65). The com- munications under this heading fairly agree that the origin of the name of this descrip- tion of knife was the maker's surname, be that John de Liege or Jacques de Liege ; while the legend connecting this knife with an attempt on the part of James VI. of Scotland to be facetious at the expense of nis courtiers is thrice told. It is not so clear ihat the maker's name waa given to the cnife, as the quotation from ISomerville mplies, while he was in Liege, nor is it any clearer that a " Jockteleg " was the ordinary one carried for the purposes indicated in the ixtract mentioned. A common pocket or lasp knife, one would think, hardly required case. Be that as it may, in Sir John Foulis's account- book there are several entries ( for ,hese knives : under date 21 June, 1672, "for i Jock the Leg knife 00 : 08 : 0." A foot-