Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 11.djvu/308

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NOTES AND QUERIES, in s. XL APRIL 17, 1915.

were nephews of Hall. Like most dis- coveries, electro - plating has had many claimants for the honour.

On the 4th of May, 1839, The Athe- nceum announced Prof. Jacobi's invention of electro typing, and stated that the Emperor of Bussia had placed funds at his disposal to perfect his discovery. This brought a letter from Mr. Thomas Spencer of Liverpool, from which it appeared that he had for some time been independ- ently engaged on the same subject. His objects were to engrave in relief upon a plate of copper ; to deposit a voltaic copper plate, having the lines in relief ; to obtain a facsimile of a medal, reverse or obverse, or of a bronze cast ; to obtain a voltaic impression from plaster or clay ; and to multiply the number of already engraved copper plates. I have in my possession a few of these early attempts. In 1840 the process was applied to gilding and silver-plating. In 1851 Spencer was enter- tained at a public dinner in Liverpool, and presented with a purse containing 200 guineas, to commemorate his discovery.

A. N. Q.

" PERIL GARPENT."

" These coins to be current throughout the realm of England, and all persons, whether natives or strangers, to receive them in all manner of pay- ments, on peril garpent." R. Ruding (' Annals of the Coinage of Great Britain,' ed. '{ [1840], i.218), citing the Close Roll of 18 Edw. III. pt. 1, m. 28 dorso.*

I must refer the curious to his book for the weird speculations as to the meaning and origin of the fearsome penalty expressed by this ghost-word. In the Record Edition of ' Feeders,' iii. (1825), 1, the phrase appears : " que mesme les monoies ne soient refusez de nully sur peril q'appent." The Chancery scribe wrote " qappent," but, not being willing to waste Chancery time, ink, or parchment, or his own labour, and improving on the well-known method of writing bb like Ib, e.g., in abbas he simrly repressnts the first p by a single " staff," which happens closely to resemble the r of a later period. Q. V.

BLACK MAN CHURCHWARDEN. In Wol- stanton Parish Register it is recorded, under date 1676-7, that John Mills, a black man, was one of the churchwardens, for his house at Newchapel. This is an early instance of one of the coloured race taking an active part in the religious life of this country.

B. D. MOSELEY.

And not " 18 dors.," as Ruding states.

THACKERAY'S LATIN. (See 10 S. xi. 206.) At the above reference PROF. BENSLY identified the line

O matutini rores, aurseque salubres (quoted inexactly in a letter of Thackeray, Biographical Edition, vol. iii., Introduction, p. xxviii, in the form " O matutini roses, aura que salubres ") as the beginning of Cowper's pointed out that Thackeray also used the phrase in his ' On the French School of Painting ' in ' The Paris Sketch Book ' :
 * Votum.' I think no correspondent has

" ' O matutini rores aurseque salubres ' [he writes] in what a wonderful way has the artist managed to create you out of a few bladders of paint and pots of varnish. You can see the matutinal dews twinkling in the grass, and feel the fresh, salubrious airs (' the breath of nature blowing free,' as the corn-law man sings) blowing free over the heath ; silvery vapours are rising up from the blue low- lands."

WILLIAM CHISLETT, Jun.

Stanford University, Cal.

" QUEENIE " THRALE. The following curious letter, written by Mrs. Thrale's eldest daughter in cipher, has been de- ciphered for me by the kindness of Mr. J. P. Gibson, of the Department of MSS., British Museum, and his assistant Mr. Millar. The letter is undated, and the name of the person to whom it was addressed does not appear, but I have reason to believe it was written to one of the daughters of Sir Abraham Pitches, a neighbour of Mr. Thrale at Streatham, and probably to the second of these, Peggy, who married Vis- count Deerhurst, afterwards Earl of Coventry, as " Queenie " in one sentence styles her correspondent " Your Ladyship."

Blanks in the letter are caused by part having been unluckily burnt ; it runs as follows :

MY DEAR, My Mother has scolded me so to-day and been in such a passion you can't think, but she will have a good many people here to-day, I hope. To-night \ve stay at home, and Lady Lade* will have company, I supose. I believe we shall stay a fortnight. I hope you can read this with great ease now, I mean without the least difficulty. I desire that by the time I come home I may see some passages out of any book copyed out by your ladyship in this hand, not little bits but good long ones, and then when you have perfected yourself in it, I shall make you burn your alphabet, but I will

not must copy a great deal, and then you will

find such pleasure in it to what you do now. If I find that you have made a great progress when 1 come home, I shall be very glad, for you wont be puzzling yourself to understand the meaning of my letters. Are you not very sorry for Mr. Durn ford's death?

widow of Sir John Lade.
 * " Queenie's " aunt, a sister of Henry Thrale, and