Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 12.djvu/477

 ii s. xn. DEC. 11, 1915 j NOTES AND QUERIES.

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to have given what is probably the right explanation of the effect which is con- sciously or unconsciously aimed at in " splitting the infinitive." It is, in fact, an attempt at making compound verbs, as OXFORD GRADUATE has seen. I should connect it as a development in language with the growing tendency to express a composite idea by two substantives rather than by a substantive with an accom- panying adjective. We are getting by this means an ever -greater crop of compound substantives.

May I, however, express an entire dis- agreement with the tone of jubilation in which some of your correspondents speak of this as of a development not to be arrested, and for that reason desirable in itself ? It cannot be contested that there is a great inequality in different languages in respect to the clearness and fullness with which they can be made to express thought. Roughly speaking, those languages remain the most nearly perfect instruments for the expression of thought in which the average man's instinct for language was best developed and best trained ; and those are least happy in which the instinct for language has been, to start with, feeble, and has been poorly exercised. Probably most of us would think of French as an example of the former, German of the latter. It is instructive to observe that German runs to compound words, and French, on the whole, eschews them. Su.ch formations certainly blur and roughen a language unless kept merely as an occasional device. As for what concerns ourselves, so far from gibing at any writer who resists the prevailing tendency, it seems to me we should congratulate ourselves on having still among us some few whose instinct for language, as such, has preserved a good working degree of nicety. F. H.

SWIFT'S ' THE CONDUCT OF THE ALLIES ' (US. xii. 421). (1) Apparently Swift was referring to the expedition fitted out by merchants of Bristol in 1708, to attack the Spaniards in the South Sea. It consisted of two private men-of-war, the Duke and the Duchess, and was under the command of Woodes Rogers. See his life in the ' D.N.B.' by Sir J. K. Laughton. Several Quakers are said to have been among the owners, which reminds one of the profit that the Quaker surgeon. William Walters, made out of piracy in Defoe's ' Captain Singleton.' Rogers' s expedition plundered the town of Guayaquil in Peru, and also took the smaller of the two Acapulco treasure ships, but was

beaten off in an attempt on her consort. Rogers arrived in the Downs on 1 Oct., 1711 , just about the time w r hen Swift w r as com- posing this ' Conduct of the Allies.'

The main achievement of the expedition in the eyes of the modern reader is that it happened to rescue Alexander Selkirk from the island of Juan Fernandez.

EDWARD BENSLY.

MEDALLIC LEGENDS (11 S. x. 28, 48, 68, 89, 109, 315, 356 ; xi. 12, 73, 270). No. 33, " Ea est fiducia gentis," is, apparently, im adaptation of Lucan, ' De bello civili,' viii. 362:

Non hsec fiducia genti est.

EDWARD BENSLY.

NELSON MEMORIAL RINGS (US. xii. 233 361, 402). The following memorial rings re- lating to Nelson were shown at the Royal Naval Exhibition at Chelsea in 1891 :

No. 2987. Mourning ring for Lord Nelson, containing some of his hair. Lent by Miss A. J. Grindall.

No. 2988. Memorial ring presented to Admiral Sir Thomas M. Hardy, Bart., G.C.B., bv Lord Nelson's family. Lent by W. Manfield, Esq.

No. 2989. Ring, with Nelson's hair, formerly belonging to Mr. Benjamin H. Carew. Lent by Admiral Sir Arthur Farquhar, K.C.B.

No. 3274. Mourning ring of Lord Nelson. Lent by Montagu Guest, Esq.

No. 3278. Memorial ring, one of a number given after the death of Lord Nelson to his relatives, and to his captains and other officers. Lent by Maurice Nelson Girdle- stone, Esq.

No. 3330. Diamond memorial ring, with Nelson's hair and inscription at back. Lent by Messrs. Lambert & Co.

No. 3370. Memorial ring of Lord Nelson. Lent by Mrs. H. Nelson Nelson- Ward.

There were, of course, very many other deeply interesting l^elson relics on view at this exhibition. JOHN T. PAGE.

Long Itchington, Warwickshire.

I have in my possession a gold ring which

I suppose is a Nelson memorial ring. It has

on an oval the letters N. B., above which is

a viscount's coronet with the cap, showing

seven pearls, and below a ducal coronet

without the cap, all in blue enamel. At the

back of the oval is a locket for hair. It has

no inscription, maker's mark, or Hall-mark.

j Is anything known of rings of this descrip-

1 tion ? GEO. W. G. BARNARD.

Norwich.