Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 3.djvu/342

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NOTES AND Q UEKIES. m s. m. APRIL 29, 1911.

from a famous campaign story of a farmer j who burnt down his barn to free it from rats, i.e., reckless radicals ; but an old New York country editor told me that, to his knowledge, the first Hunker users by their own statement meant it as an insinuation that the active Barnburners were low in- cendiaries, who committed arson whenever plunder or revenge prompted. " Hunker " seems to be a sportive formation from the Dutch, equivalent to " stay-at-home."

"Hard-shell" and "Soft-shell," almost at once abbreviated to " Hards " and " Softs," were the equivalents for Hunker and Barnburner adopted a little later ; the former was taken over from a common use regarding extreme and narrow religious bodies, implying usually country groups of little culture and much hard fanaticism. FORREST MORGAN. Hartford, Conn.

HUMPHREY HENCHMAN (11 S. iii. 288). According to Hutchins's ' History of Dorset,' 3rd ed., vol. ii. p. 831, Humphrey Henchman married Ann Wood. W. S. WRIGHT.

POOR SOULS' LIGHT: " TOTENLATERNE " (11 S. ii. 448; iii. 30). In the cemetery of Kloster Neuberg, near Vienna, there is an elegant cross or Tpdtenleuchte, lanterne des morts. Its height is about 30 ft. ; the date engraved upon it is 1381. There is a small door about 5 ft. from the ground, and near the summit a chamber with six glazed win- dows, in which the light was exhibited. In France some ten or twelve of these lanterns have been found and described ; in Germany about as many.

M. Lecointre, " Archeologue de Poitiers," remarks :

" The hollow columns or janaux were specially raised in the cemeteries in order to protect the living from the fear of those returning and from the spirits of darkness, and to safeguard them from this terror of the night this affair that walketh in the darkness, of which the Psalmist speaks ; finally, to invite the living to pray for the dead.''

Viollet-le-Duc observes :

" As to the idea attaching to these monuments, in the twelfth century, for example, M. Lecointre appears to us to be right, but nevertheless we are disposed to think that these columns belong, by tradition, to the usages or superstitions of a very remote antiquity. We can only regret that we have no lanterns of the dead, prior to the twelfth century, remaining. We cannot doubt of their existence since they are mentioned several times, amongst other instances, in the battle waged between Clovis and Alaric, but we do not know the form of these first Christian monuments."

TOM JONES.

SIR WALTER SCOTT'S POET ANCESTOR (11 S. iii. 287). It is probable that ASTARTE alludes to William Alexander, first Earl of Stirling, who was a well-known poet in the early part of the seventeenth century. He published manj^ tragedies, and some of his poems and letters occur in the folio edition of Drummond's works, 1711. King James VI. used to call him his philosophical poet. He died in 1640.

CONSTANCE RUSSELL.

Swallowfield Park, Reading.

The Scottish poet-peer from whom Sir Walter Scott's descent can be traced was the first Earl of Stirling. Prof. John Rutherford, Scott's maternal grandfather, married as his first wife,

" Jean, elder daughter of Sir John Swinton of Swin- ton by his wife Anne Sinclair, younger daughter of Sir Robert Sinclair, Bart., of Longformacus by his wife Margaret, younger daughter of William, Lord Alexander, eldest son of Sir William Alexander of Mensbry, Earl of Stirling, celebrated as a poet and statesman." See Rogers's 'Genealogical Memoirs of the Family of Sir Walter Scott,' printed for the Grampian Club, 1877, pp. lii-liii.

W. SCOTT.

[MR. A. R. BAYLEY and DELTA also thanked for replies.]

"SCAVENGER" AND " SCAVAGER " (11 S. iii. 146). I think DR. ROUND'S r.ttack upon Mr. Riley was unwarrantable and careless ; he attacks what is said in the Preface and appears to ignore the ' Liber Albus ' itself ! He could have dispensed with reading the book, as he could have got the reference from Riley 's Index to the translation pub- lished in 1851 ; the Index refers to p. 272, which translates p. 313 in the ' Liber Albus * itself. I give this reference in my article, and think it a pity that the ' N.E.D.' has not done the same. The account in the w Liber Albus,' at p. 313, is so explicit that no one can pretend to misunderstand it. The " Scawageours " had to take an oath to repair the pavements and remove the " ordures." WALTER W. SKEAT.

~ BLACK BANDSMEN IN THE ARMY (11 S. iii. 287). The following passage is to be found in Sibbald Scott's 'British Army,' 1868, vol. ii. p. 399 :

"It will not be uninteresting to give a descrip- tion of a regimental band of the last [eighteenth] century. It is contained in an extract of a letter by the late Mr. W. J. Mattham, innkeeper, of Lavenham, Suffolk : ' We have had four companies of the West Middlesex Militia quartered upon us for three days, [each] consisting of three officers and forty-nine men, who had the best band I ever heard, 'tis worth mentioning to those who ar^