Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 5.djvu/165

 ii s. v. FEB. 17, i9i2.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

133

" ?>. Winchester and Worcester are the only existing Marquessates older than the reign of George III.

" 4. Of all the English Earldoms created by the Normans, Plantagenets, and Tudors, eleven only remain.

" 5. The present House of Lords cannot claim amongst its members a single male descendant of any one of the Barons who were chosen to enforce Magna Chart a. or of any one of the Peers who are known to have fought at Agincourt ; and the noble house of Wrottesley is the solitary existing family among the Lords which can boast of a male descent from a founder of the Order of the Garter."

And this volume was published in 1883 !

TERTITJS.

HENRY DOWNES MILES (11 S. v. 69). The following is taken from ' Modern English Biography.' by Frederic Boase (1897), vol. ii. col. 871, a biographical dictionary which in many respects seems to meet the requirements of MR. C. K. SHORTER :

" Henry Downes Miles, b. 1806 ; sub-editor of The Constitution, 1833, which was started in opposition to The Times ; subsequently on The Croicn ; ring reporter to the London daily press and Bell s Life in London many years ; retired 1871 ; edited The Sporting Magazine ; translated M. J. E. Sue's ' The Mysteries of Paris,' 1846, and ' The Wandering Jew,' 18-16 ; edited ' The Licensed Victuallers' Year-Book,' 1873, and ' The Sportsman's Companion,' 1863-4, twelve parts only ; author of ' The Life of J. Grimaldi,' 1838 ; ' Dick Turpin,' 4th ed., 1845 ; ' Claude du Val,' 1850 ; ' The Anglo-Indian Word Book,' 1858 ; ' The Book of Field Sports and Library of Veterinary Knowledge,' 1860-63 ; ' Miles' Modern Practical Farrier,' 1863-64 ; ' English Country Life,' 1868-69 ; ' Pugilistica, being One Hundred and Forty-Four Years of the History of British Boxing,' 3 vols., 1880-81. D. Wood Green, Middle- sex, Feb., 1889."

It was stated many years ago that ' Pugi- listica ' was written in order to discharge a debt owing by the author to the publishers of the work Weldon & Co., 9, Southampton Street, Strand, W.C. I have not been able to obtain any confirmation of this story. ARTHUR MYNOTT.

I think MR. SHORTER will find what he wants in Boase's ' Modern English Bio- graphy.' Four volumes are published ; the first was in 1892 ; and there are two articles of mine on it at 8 S. i. 487 and xiv. 62. More- over, ' M.E.B.' is referred to in every volume of ' X. & Q.' If MR. SHORTER will first consult Mr. G. F. Barwick's eighteen- penny pocket-book, ' The Pocket Remem- brancer of History and Biography,' which is professedly compiled from ' M.E.B.' (and other sources), he will generally be able, as in the case before us, to get an idea whether the person he wants is in ' M.E.B.'

The chief facts about H. D. Miles are duly chronicled in ' M.E.B.,' vol. ii. 871. Un- fortunately, Mr. Boase, who has spent upwards of 1,000. in endeavouring to supply us with such information as MR. SHORTER suggests is required, was unable to ascertain the exact date of Miles's death. He only says Miles died " February, 1889." What was the exact day ?

In his preface Mr. Boase enumerates the classes of people deceased since 1850 that are to be found in his book, and, beginning with Privy Councillors, comes down tc " sporting celebrities, eccentric characters, and notorious criminals." Of these last, several who had committed unspeakable atrocities are in vol. iv., the last volume published. RALPH THOMAS.

THE SUN AS THE MANGER (US. iv. 469), " Driving out a nail with a nail " might be the Shakespearian phrase for explaining the astrological quotation seemingly mis- taken by another from a book repeatedly mentioning " Juno suckling the infant Jove.' r Whether this book is trustworthy technically I know not ; it says (' Star Lore of All Ages/ by W. T. Olcott, London, 1911, p. 89) :

" Cancer is celebrated chiefly because it con- tains the great naked-eye star cluster ' Praesepe,' the so-called s Manger,' from which two asses, represented by stars near by, are supposed to- feed."

The sun, arriving at this sign, begins his- apparent retrograde motion.

" The astrological significance of Cancer has generally been malign" (p. 91); but the contrary appears to have been the belief in India, according to ' The Light of Asia ~ (book i. paragraph 2) : The grey dream-readers said : " The dream is

good ;

The Crab is in conjunction with the Sun ; The Queen shall bear a boy, a holy child."

ROCKINGHAM.

Boston, Mass.

OXFORD DEGREES AND ORDINATION (11 S, iv. 528 ; v. 53). I must apologize for my stupid blunder in ascribing ' Dorothy For- ster ' to Sir A. Conan Doyle, knowing well that Sir W. Besant was the author. Robert Patten in it is described not only as M.A.. but also as belonging to Lincoln College, Oxford, which certainly was not the case.

Allow me to correct M.A.OxoN. in some of his statements respecting S.C.L. I took my degree in 1868 two years before he entered the University and the statute had been for some time amended, insomuch that no one could be admitted to the status of