Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 4.djvu/61

 ii s. iv. JULY io, ion.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

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ARCHBISHOP STONE OF ARMAGH (11 S- iii. 450). See the ' D.N.B.,' vol. liv. p. 405 for Andrew Stone (1703-73), and p. 410 for George Stone (1708 ?-64). They were sons of Andrew Stone, a prominent banker of Lombard Street, London, by his wife Anne Holbrooke. The Under-Secretary's only son, Thomas, died before he was twelve years of age, and was buried in Westminster Abbey on 15 February, 1761. The Arch- bishop died unmarried, and was buried in Westminster Abbey. His portrait by Ram- say is in the hall of Christ Church, Oxon.

A. R. BAYLEY. [T. S. R. W. also refers to the 'D.N.B.']

WELLINGTON STATUES IN LONDON : M. C. WYATT (US. iii. 285). The following extract from The Times of 21 June may be added to the note at the above reference. The quotation contained in it is taken from The Times of June, 1838 :

" The Times comments as follows of the appointment of Mr. Wyatt, the sculptor, to design the Wellington Memorial :

' ' It is a week or ten days since we raised our voice against one of the most mischievous, offensive, and revolting jobs that ever disgraced this country, so fertile in them. It behoves us, we see, to try our hand again ; and if the noblest of the fine arts can yet be rescued from insult, or the memory of the greatest living Englishman from desecration, it is our bounden duty in the discharge of which we earnestly claim, nay, supplicate, the cordial help and support of all our brethren of the press, without distinction of politics or party to denounce and reprobate, in the face of the whole world, the monstrous attempt upon human patience which is now in progress, and of which the authorship rests, as our correspondents, and indeed the printed reports, inform us, with Sir Frederick Trench.

' ' The job in question is no other than the consignment of the " Wellington Memorial," for the western end of the metropolis, to a certain Mr. Wyatt, to whom we are indebted for that burlesque effigy miscalled an " equestrian statue " of George III., which adorns a part of Westminster formerly known as Cockspur Street, but latterly, through the good offices of the said Mr. Wyatt, distinguished as " Pigtail-place."

' We had ourselves never heard of this person being remarkable for any piece of original statuary but a " monument," as it was misnamed, to the Princess Charlotte, wherein the body of the deceased appears dripping under a wet sheet, as if just dragged out of the Thames and her corpulent spirit (a separate portion of the same group), mounting with painful difficulty, pretty much after the fashion of a prize calf at Smithfield. Surely such a piece of lumbering feebleness and animal vulgarity never yet disgraced a sculptor's chisel, or deformed, as it now does, the interior of a Christian'^church.' "

ROBERT PIERPOINT.

" FRANKLIN DAYS " : " BORROWING DAYS" (11 S. iv. 9)." Franklin days" seem to be the English mediaeval rendering of li Cavalie, the Knights' days, considered in Provence and other parts of Southern France as critical days for weather. They probably became naturalized in England during the Plantagenet times of close inter- course with Southern France, which brought so many Provencal words and customs to England. The terms " Franklin " may have been adopted to avoid the ambiguity of " knights' " in conjunction with " days " ; and this group of days appears to have shifted to certain critical days two or three weeks later.

The first of the series of knights is the knight St. George's Day, the 23rd of April ; then come St. Mark on the 25th, and St. Eutropius on the 30th. To these is added Holy Cross Day, 3 May, as in the saying,

Jourget, Marquet, Troupet, Crouset, Soun li quatre cavali6,

with the variant " Soun li quatre capoulie de la fre," i.e., are the four chiefs of cold.

In this rime the names of the knights or chiefs are given in their familiar diminu- tives, Jourget for Jorgi, &c. ; and Holy Cross Day is personified. Sometimes St. John of the Lateran Gate, 6 May, is added to the knights ; and St. Philip on the 1st of May is also considered critical.

Another group of saints, Pancras, Gly- cerius, and Boniface, the three saints de glace of Northern as of Southern France, are held responsible for the cold weather frequently occurring from the 12th to the 14th of May. I have heard an English saying that " the 12th of May is the coldest day." This cold snap often occurs some- what later, perhaps as a consequence of the New Style in a country which has forgotten most of the saints. However, this year, as indeed I have observed in other years, a cold northerly wind blew in Paris, as at Exeter, on the 19th and following days. It is to this group of days that the term " Franklin days," originally earlier, appears to have shifted.

The critical day of English summer, St. Swithin, 15 July, is in France that of St. Medard, 8 June ; and in the south St. Gervase, 19 June, shares the obloquy of the latter saint in possibly bringing a long spell of rainy weather even more dreaded, as wheat is usually fit for reaping by St. John the Baptist's Day, 24 June. After this month rain is welcome and critical