Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 1.djvu/353

 n s. i. APR. so, 1910.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

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record of when he left. He never took a degree.

He took holy orders shortly before his death. One afternoon in April he was out riding, and walked his horse into a pond for thf purpose of giving him drink, but both suddenly disappeared. The horse got out, but the man was drowned. This was in 1783 (i. 251).

Frederick Reynolds was born 1 Nov., 1764, and he says (i. 52) he entered West- minster School at the age of eleven ; but Barker and S terming give the date as 22 Jan., 1776, when he was twelve. He got to the head form (where he had several dukes as schoolfellows) in 1781 (i. 135), but I do not find when he left the school. The next fact he chronicles is that his father placed him in his own office, which Frederick did not consider exactly the best placQ to learn law (i. 4, 146), and entered him as a student of the Middle Temple 12 Jan., 1782. He married Miss Mansel the day after his brother Richard was married, namely, 16 March, 1799 (Gent. Mag., p. 251). He never cared for the law, and soon gave it up, becoming a successful dramatist, in which capacity he has obtained a notice in the ' D.N.B.' from the careful pen of Mr. W. Prideaux Courtney, who also signs a notice of the son Frederic Mansel Reynolds.

Frederick's ' Life ' is to a biographer a most annoying publication. It has taken me many hours to guess at dates from the desultory particulars he gives, and many weeks to get them as exact as possible from other sources. His book is interesting and amusing, but some of his anecdotes are so free that no publisher in the present day would offer them to his readers. A curious incident is that, when the family break-up came, he and his brother lived in chambers in the Temple for several years (at ii. 16 he says four years, and at p. 293 fifteen years, but ten years was the time) without paying any rent, nor could they find out who the land- lord was !

The piece that most interested me is where he describes his sufferings and torture as a boy at a school at Walthamstow, for these tally with my own terrible experi- ences in every particular, though mine were some seventy years subsequent. Many a boy's whole life has been darkened from this cause, and I regret to say the frightful system of bullying referred to still continues in certain schools.

There are some things Frederick ought t<> have explained, and others which I do not understand. Why, for example, did he

spell his name Frederic all through the two volumes of his ' Life,' and only discover at the end, when he came to the title and dedication, that it ought to have been- Frederick ?

It seems to me strange that the wherries (the water cabs of those days) at the Adelphi were such a novel sight to him (i. 65) when the Westminster School boys bathed in the Thames at Millbank (see * Swimming,' by Ralph Thomas, p. 108) ; and he used to go to Battersea Fields to shoot with his school- fellow the Duke of Bedford (i. 82). He must have seen plenty of boats on these occasions. RALPH THOMAS.

THE GREEN PABK AVENUE. It is of interest to note that the new avenue running north to Piccadilly from the Victoria Memorial approximately covers the site of the great pavilion erected for the display of fireworks celebrating the Peace of Aix-la- Chapelle. It was 410ft. long and 114ft, high, and was ' ' invented and designed by the Chevalier Servandoni, and all the framing was performed by Mr. James Morris, Master Carpenter to the Office of Ordnance. >? These particulars are provided in ' A Description of the Machine for the Fireworks, with all its ornaments and a detail of the manner in which they are to be exhibited in St. James's [sic] Park, Thursday, April 27, 1749, on ac- count of the General Peace signed at Aix La Chapelle, October 7, 1748.* This rather scarce pamphlet was printed by W. Bowyer and published by Dodsley.

Many prints of these public fireworks were published by Overton, Bowles, and Dicey,, but probably the scarcest is that depicting the scene when, after a grand overture by Handel had been performed, and the King and a dense crowd were watching the fire- works, the pavilion caught light and was nearly destroyed by the flames. The title runs :

" The Grand Whim for Posterity to Laugh at t being the Nigh View of the Royal Fireworks, as Exhibited in the Green Park, St. James's, with the Right Wing on fire and the cutting away the two- middle arches to prevent the whole fabrick from being destroyed. London : Printed for T. Fox,, near Ludgate. Price Sixpence."

Several of the prints show Buckingham House and the surrounding scenery, and it is by one of these " prospects ?2 taken from the Library at St. James's Palace, that I identify the site as being on the line of the new avenue.

ALECK ABRAHAMS.