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NOTES AND QUERIES. ui s. i. APR. w, MO.

career to be chosen for it. . . .The demarch told me that his son had touched a pen ; consequently he had been sent to the university at Athens, and had there made considerable progress, but the meaning of the egg is not quite so clear, and the egg is the horror of all parents, for if the child touches it he will be a good-for-nothing a mere duck's egg, so to speak, in Society."

That the Japanese and the Chinese for- merly celebrated the same custom Tera- shima's ' Wakan Sansai Dzue,' 1713, reprint 1906, p. 47, shows. In China the first birthday, and in Japan the third, was adopted for it. The illustrious viceroy Tsao Pin (d. 999 A.D.), when just one year old, is said to have indicated on the occasion his future success both in military and civil offices, by taking a spear and buckler with his right hand, and a tablet and chalice with his left. KTJMAGUSU MINAKATA.

Tanabe, Kii, Japan.

OLDEST PARISH CLERK. The following paragraph appeared in The Daily Mail of 8 October last :

" Centenarian Parish Clerk. The death took place at St. Columb Minor, near Newquay, Corn- wall, yesterday, of Mr. James Carne in his 104th year. Mr. Carne was well known throughout the country as England's oldest parish clerk, and during the visit of the Prince and Princess of Wales to Cornwall in June he was presented to their Royal Highnesses. Living a simple life, Mr. Carne had reached his great age with all his faculties active. He went out daily, and was still strong enough to stand up in the choir at the chxirch where he had been parish clerk for nearly seventy years."

WILLIAM MCMURRAY.

[See also 10 S. viii. 5, 115.]

FOUNTAIN PEN. The ' N.E.D.' gives a reference dated 1823. But the thing in question must have been invented half a century earlier, for I find in The Massa- chusetts Gazette, 1 Jan., 1770, a notice of a sale of cutlery by "Public Vendue,"- in- cluding ' ' Shears and Scissars, Borax Fountain Pens, Pins, Needles, Razors, &c." These fountain pens must have been made in Europe, and probably in England. It is odd that they should be so rarely mentioned. RICHARD H. THORNTON.

36, Upper Bedford Place, W.C.

" LE CLERICALISME, VOILA L'ENNEMI ! "- I had always associated this phrase with Gambetta, but the writer of a notice of Alphonse Peyrat in ' Les Hommes d'Au- jourd'hui,' No. 110 (circa 1880), states that this journalist and historian used it in 1859. At an election for the Senate, Peyrat is reported to have said : "L'amnistie

est reclamee par to us les homines d'etat vraiment dignes de ce nom. Quant a la separation de 1'^glise et de 1'^tat, elle s'impose. Le Clericalisme, voila 1'ennemi !" The honour of this expression, states the biographer, " revient tout entier a Peyrat " ; and Andre Gill's caricature portrait, in colours, of Peyrat has this historical phrase on a sort of cartouche by the side of the chair in which Peyrat is seated. There can be no doubt, I think, that Gambetta rendered the phrase historic, but clearly he was not the author. W. ROBERTS.

[Mr. E. Latham's ' Famous Sayings and their Authors,' 2nd ed., 1906, p. 135, quotes the phrase from the Journal Officiel of 5 May, 1877, and adds : "Concluding words of L. Gambetta's (1838-81) speech in the French Chamber, May 4, 1877, quoting the phrase as being that of his friend Peyrat Alphonse Peyrat, a journalist, who died 1891."]

SUFFOLK POLL-BOOKS. The lists of Poll- Books that appeared in the Tenth Series (vii. 349, 415 ; viii. 76, 177, 453, 477 ; x. 124) may be supplemented by the following :

SUFFOLK POLL-BOOKS. A Copy of the Poll for Knights of the Shire for

Suffolk, Oct. 18, 1710, 12mo, London, 1711. A Copy of the Poll taken at Ipswich, Aug. 30,

1727. 8vo, Ipswich, 1727.

The Poll taken at Ipswich, April 7, 1784. 8vo.

The Poll taken at Ipswich, June 29 and 30,

1790. 8vo. The Poll taken at Ipswich, August 10, 1830.

8vo.

EASTERN DIVISION OF SUFFOLK. The Poll Book taken Dec. 17 and 18, 1832.

8vo. The Poll Book taken Jan. 13 and 14, 1835.

8vo, Hales worth.

The Poll taken July 12 and 13, 1841. 12mo.

The Poll Book taken April 21 and 22. 1843.

The Poll Book taken May 7, 1859.

WESTERN DIVISION OF SUFFOLK.

The Poll Book taken December 21 and 22,

1832. 8vo, Bury.

The Poll Book taken Jan. 19 and 20, 1835.

The Poll Book taken Aug. 5 and 6, 1837.

BOROUGHS OF SUFFOLK.

Ipswich : 1741 ; 1780 (Sept. 9) ; 1784 (April 3) ; 1807 (May 5-6); 1818 (June 16-22); 1820 (March 7-13); 1832 (Dec. 11-12); 1835 (Jan 6-7); 1839 (July 13); 1841 (July 2); 181 (August 16) ; 1847 (July 30) ; 1852 (July 8) ; 1859 (April 30).

Bury St. Edmunds : 1832 (Dec. 13-14 ; single sheet, folio); 1835 (Jan. 6-9; lOmo) ; 1 (July 24-25); 1841 (June 29); 184'* (July 31); 1852 (July 9) ; 1857 (March 28).

R. FREEMAN BULLEN. Bow Library, E.