Page:Notes and Queries - Series 10 - Volume 4.djvu/354

 292 NOTES AND QUERIES. no* s. iv. OCT. 7, won. at her own residence of Clarence House, 22 Sept., 1840. Next of the sisters in order of birth was the Princess Elizabeth, born 22 May, 1770. H.R.H. possessed a pretty taste for art, and the American Minister Rush records that she it was who chiefly assisted the Queen to " do the honours " in the days of the Regency. Princess Elizabeth had long been considered a confirmed spinster, when irreverentcourtiers received with considerable mirth the news of her engagement, at the mature age of forty- seven, to the Prince of Hesse-Homburg, of whose person and manners the caustic Creevey paints a very unattractive picture in his biting memoirs. But there seems no doubt that Queen Charlotte had been unfortunate in her attempts to make their home a happy one for her daughters ; though the Princess Elizabeth did not escape the comments of a censorious world for quitting the aged and dying queen. It must be admitted that as Landgravine of Hesse-Homburg the princess'.-, many ex- cellent qualities were displayed in later life to great advantage. A volume of correspond- ence dealing with her last years was pub- lished not long ago. H.R.H. died 10 Jan., 1840. The Princess Marv followed Elizabeth in seniority. Born in 1776, she formed an early attachment to her cousin Prince William, afterwards Duke of Gloucester. It is said that reasons of State prevented for many years the royal sanction to their union, the ruling powers having decided that the prince must be kept in reserve as a possible husband for the Heiress-Presumptive, the Priticess Charlotte. No sooner had the marriage of the latter with Leopold of Coburg taken place than Princess Mary's dreary period of waiting came to an end. Her union with the Duke of Gloucester was celebrated 22 July, 1816, and she died his widow 30 April, 1857. The fifth daughter was the Princess Sophia, born 3 Nov., 1777. To disinter dead-and- gone scandals is an ungrateful task, but it is undeniable that gossip made free with the good name of this princess ; Creevey's pages again supply the details. Her royal highness lived in great retirement for a series of years, and died in her apartments at Kensington Palace, 27 May, 1848. The youngest of the sisters, and the darling of her father's heart, was the Princess Amelia, born 7 Aug., 1783 : out she in her turn was fated to know misfortune. She expired after a rather mysterious_ illness on 2 Nov., 1810, and it appears certain that she had some time previously contracted a secret marriage with General FitzRoy, to w horn her will bequeathed all her jewels and personal property. So many years have elapsed since all these princesses were in the heyday of youth and beauty that the real facts relating to the romances of their lives are now little likely to be ever fully disclosed ; but should the whole truth become known, it will be pro- bably learnt that beneath the demure roof of the austere Charlotte it was not her wild sons only who sought and encountered many strange adventures. H. TRIPOS VERSES (10th S. iv. 124, 172).—For this subject see 'A Short Manual of Com- parative Philology," by P. Giles (Macmillan, 1895), p. 58, and Wordsworth's 'Scholae Aca- demicse,' pp. 17-21. The former says, " The honour-lists were printed on the back of the sheet containing these verses." In the copy I possess (1886) this is undoubtedly so. I very much regret that the practice has lapsed. H. K. ST. J. S. FRENCH REVOLUTION POTTERY (10th S. iv. 228, 252).—If J. F. R. will refer to the May number of The Connoisseur, he will find on p. 15 an excellent article on ' Speaking Pottery of France,' by L. Solon. It also contains interesting illustrations of the ware referred to. CHARLES GREEK. Full information as to the patriotic Revo- lution pottery may be found in Champfleury, • Histoire des Faiences Patriotiques de la Revolution,' Paris, 1867. LUDWIG ROSENTHAL. Hildegardstrasse 16, Muuich. DOWRIES FOR UGLY WOMEN (10th S. iv. 247). —See Herodotus, bk. i. ch. cxcvi., and No. 511 of The Spectator. The account in Herodotus is the subject of a well-known picture by the late Edwin Long, R.A., 'The Babylonian Marriage Market,' now in the Royal Holloway College, Egham. EDWARD BENSLY. Aldeburgh. The quotation sought for is from Herodotus. The idea has probably done service often in fiction. In 'The Marriage Act,' a farce by Charles Dibdin, the plot turns on an edict by the governor of an imaginary island that all the celibate inhabitants are to be married forthwith :— "The maidens shall assemble this day in the garden of the castle, there to be ranged and bid for by the young men, according to their difierent degrees of beauty Whoever would make a choice. must give more or less for his wife in proportion as she is handsome or ugly The money given to purchase the handsome goes to portion the ugly, that so they may easier get husbands."