Page:Notes and Queries - Series 10 - Volume 7.djvu/525

 10 s. VIL JUNE i, 1907.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

433

hanger." But, generally, all these forms were undistinguishably called " pot-hooks." R. OLIVER HESLOP.

Newcastle-upon-Tyne.

In my schooldays hangers were distin- guished from pot-hooks by having a hook at each end of the stem, shaped like the italic letter i. Hangers are extensively used by butchers and ironmongers upon horizontal steel rods for displaying their goods. Hangers are devoid of eyelets, un- like pot-hooks.

Members of the 2nd Middlesex Batallion, formerly called the 77th Regiment, were once nicknamed " pot-hooks," because the two sevens resembled those humble instru- ments. WILLIAM JAGGABD.

An apparatus is still to be seen in old kitchens with a toothed rack, by which the pot can be hung higher or lower over the wood fire. At top this is attached, I think, to a ring running on a horizontal rod. This top I take to have the form which gives its name to the first half of a written n. The second half I take to be the hanger. Hooks of this shape are to be seen in butchers' shops and in larders. T. WILSON.

[H. T. W. also thanked for reply.]

SLINGSBY, MALE DANCER (10 S. vii. 310). The following is from The Gentleman's Magazine, vol. Ix. part ii. p. 961 :

" 15th Oct., 1790. Suddenly, at his brother's house at Twickenham, John Slingsby, Esq., of the Surrey militia, and brother to a once celebrated dancer of that name. Nothing could have been more unexpected than this event. He had passed the evening chearf ully, and on retiring, at half past eleven o'clock, particularly requested of the maid- servant who attended him to nis room, to awaken him the next morning at nine. Before she reached the bottom of the stairs, she heard the report of a pistol, and her scream alarming the family, they flew to Capt. S.'s room, and found him lifeless. He had placed the loaded pistol in his mouth, and the contents, passing through the upper part of the head, had shattered the skull in a most dreadful manner."

ALFRED SYDNEY LEWIS.

Library, Constitutional Club.

ABRAHAM LINCOLN AND EUROPEAN POLI- TICIANS (10 S. vii. 165, 275, 318). The queerly distorted version of an account of a meeting between Abraham Lincoln and Lord Hartington, as told by M. N. G., ante, p. 276, seems to refer to a story that for more than forty years has in this country been familiar in our mouths as household words. It is this.

Shortly after his arrival in Washington, and before his presentation to the President,

it being then the time when the Civil War was at its height, Lord Hartington had the bad taste to appear at some public assembly at the national capital wearing a Confede- rate badge. The President heard of this, and, when Lord Hartington was presented, he feigned not to have caught the name, and said, in an inquiring tone, " Ah ! Mr. Partington ? "

I do not vouch for the truth of the story very likely it is a fable ; but that is the story. It has the advantage over the other version in that it is witty ; that it implies, if the story is true, a well-deserved rebuke ; and that it is characteristic of Lincoln ; whereas the version of M. N. G. represents nothing but simple boorishness, is without point, and without sufficient verisimilitude ever to have become popular.

ISAAC HULL PLATT. Wallingford, Pa.

The Marquis of Hartington was at a masked ball in New York, where an unknown lady came up to him and pinned a secession badge on his coat. The Marquis did not know what it was, and allowed it to remain ;, but very soon a man told him roughly ta take it off. The Marquis of course paid no attention, and a disturbance seemed to be near, when a gentleman whispered to the Marquis what the badge was. The Marquis at once removed it. This account of thu badge incident differs from that quoted from Lowell at the last reference ; but every one must believe as he thinks proper.

M. N. G.

MUSICAL GENIUS : is IT HEREDITARY ? (10 S. vii. 170, .236.) ST. S WITHIN' s refer- ence to the Scarlattis induces mention of another master of church music, Antonio Lotti, who was the son of a Hanoverian chapel-master, flourished from 1667 to 1740, and became the founder of the Venetian school. The great Braham, "who sang like an angel," came of a musical family, and began as a chorister in the Cathedral Synagogue in Duke's Place, handing down his gifts to his daughters, one of whom was a fine actress, and of such surpassing beauty that she attracted the notice of the then Duke of St. Albans, who fell in love with and married her. If we may give living examples of hereditary genius, we need only cite the Hambourg family, Mark, Boris, and Jan, trained by their father, Prof. Hambourg.

What has always struck the present writer is the variability of genius, proving that behind all its manifestations there