Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 10.djvu/299

 11 S. X. OCT. 10, 1914.]

NOTES AND QUERIES.

293

other ; there shall be a childe borne in Pomfret with three thumbs, and those three Knights will give him three horses to hold while they winne England, and all Noble blood shall be gone but one. . . .and rue the time that ever they were borne to see so much blood shed."

In his ' History of Norfolk ' Mr. Bye refers to an article in the Transactions of the Norfolk and Norwich Archaeological Society, vol. i.

Is there a special West Country] or Somersetshire version of these

Ancestral voices prophesying war?

Another difficulty raised at the same reference is that in book xv. chap, vi., where Squire Western's sister cries :

" Indeed, indeed, brother, you are not a fit minister to be employed at a polite court. Greenland Greenland should always be the scene of the tramontane [so all the editions I have by me ; not " tramountain "J negotiation."

The natural interpretation of this seems to be that Greenland is the only region in which such a Goth and barbarian as Western should attempt to play the diplomatist. He is quite unfitted to deal tactfully with civilized people.

His sister's affectation of the technical language of high politics has always an infuriating effect on Western. Hence the terms of his rejoinder.

For " tramontane " see the passages col- lected in ' The Stanford Dictionary ' under ' Tramontane,' and compare ' Tom Jones,' bk. viii. chap, ix., where, provoked by a prosaic remark of Partridge's, the hero exclaims : " Did ever Tramontane make such an answer ? "

The selection of Greenland as the type of a desolate country remote from civilization scarcely calls for illustration ; but one may note that less than three years after the publication of ' Tom Jones ' we have the same " dreary country " chosen as the abode of Anningait and Ajut in The Rambler-. EDWARD BENSLY.

University College, Aberystwyth.

Referring to a visit paid by the Earl of Chatham to Radway Grange, Warwickshire, the late Rev. George Miller wrote in ' Ram- bles round the Edge Hills ' (1900) :

" It was when the Earl was staying at Radway with George, Lord Lyttleton, and Henry Fielding, that the great novelist read his manuscript of ' Tom Jones ' in the dining-room of Radway (ir.i utfe, to obtain the opinion of that distinguished audience, before he offered it to the publishers. Several traits in Squire Allworthy's character were taken from the novelist's host on that occasion, and a flavour of Radway, its scenery and charac- teristics, pervade the book."

Fielding's host was Sanderson Miller, " a Warwickshire squire with a genius alike for friendship and architecture," the recipient of the letters published in 1910 under th& title of ' An Eighteenth-Century Correspond- ence.' The editors of the ' Correspondence r refer (p. 149) to " the tradition in the Miller family " with regard to Fielding's visit to- Radway, and add :

" A Mr. Wills, writing in 1756, speaks of Radwajr as the original of Mr. Alwqrthy s seat, but the honour is more generally claimed for Prior Park^ near Bath." A. C. C.

FIELDING QUERIES : SACK AND " THE USUAL WORDS " (11 S. x. 209). I am unable to assist MR. F. S. DICKSON with definite in- formation respecting " the usual words ' r which were wont to accompany a libation, such as is described at the military mess :'n ' Tom Jones,' bk. ix. chap, iv., but I would call MR. DICKSON'S attention to p. Ixxv of the Memoir prefixed to ' Th3 Poems of Thomas Hood,' written by Alfred Ainger, Master of the Temple (Macmillan & Co.,. 2vols.), 1897:

" A favourite method with Hood was to em- body his puns in a drawing. These ' picture- puns ' abound in the ' Comic Annuals.' I may cite two specimens of these. One represents ar incident in a besieged town, where a live shell has* fallen into a house, and is smoking away in alarming fashion in the centre of the floor. The occupants of the room are escaping hurriedly by door, window, and chimney, the legend under- neath being ' One black-ball excludes.' The- other drawing referred to displays a recruiting serjeant waving above his head the dreaded cat-o'-nine tails. The legend beneath is the well- known toast ' The Army I and Three-times- three I ' '

The inference is, I take it, that in Hood's day (1799-1845) the usual toast in the Army was " Hip-hip-hurrah ! " Whether the toast were the same in 1745 I know not, but MR. DICKSON may care to follow up the hint the above excerpt affords.

I am unable to say whether the ingredient of sack suggested by MR. DICKSON be correct ; but he may be interested to learn- that " cyder-and," often mentioned in ' Joseph Andrews ' as the beverage which. Parson Adams so greatly relished, consisted of brandy, cider, nutmeg, ginger, and sugar. The sugar, spirit, and spices were first mixed in a large jug, and the cider, made smoking hot, was poured upon them, the liquor being served in glasses as required. This recipe I have from a distinguished antiquary- one long resident in the county watered by Fielding's " sweetly-winding Stour."

J. PAUL DE CASTRO.

1, Essex Court, Temple.