Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 6.djvu/16

 NOTES AND QUERIES. [iis. vi. JULY 6, 1912.

at first, and then added by the engraver before the prints were made from the plate). Under the arms of Richelieu appears : "Me' 2 le" Card aux Alphonse et Arrnand de Richelieu."

I had not come across Cardinal Alphonse before, and was unaware of any other member of the Duplessis (or du Plessis) family than Armand having been a cardinal, though I have a number of books on him and his family. JOHN A. RANDOLPH.

THE HOUSE OF BRUNSWICK. A few weeks since a motor accident by the wayside in Northern Germany caused the instantaneous death of the young prince George "William of Cumberland. The sad event, however distressing to his own relations and personal friends, attracted little attention in this country, perhaps not unnaturally, as he was himself unknown in England, which his branch of our reigning house had quitted for Hanover so far back as the year 1837. But a brief note of sympathy, deploring the untimely fate of this youthful scion of Brunswick, may not be out of place in the pages of ' N. & Q.,' for in Prince George William has passed away one of the very few surviving male descendants of King George III., and the heir of the most ancient and famous house of Guelf. That house, one of the oldest in Europe, now stands in risk of total extinction at no very distant day, unless the late prince's only brother should marry and have sons, for the line of Brunswick-Wolfenbuttel died out with the last reigning duke William some years ago, whilst that of Hanover is to-day represented only by the Duke of Cumberland, now an elderly man, and one unmarried son. It is needless here to dwell on the notorious fact that the Duke's persistent refusal to accept the logic of events in his father's ci-devant kingdom of Hanover presents the only obstacle to the full recognition by Prussia of his sovereign rights in the duchy of Brunswick ; but his royal highness has always displayed in his political attitude no small amount of the quality called " noble firmness " by some, less kindly termed by others which cha- racterized his great-grandfather, our third George, in his dealings with the rebellious Americans. The attitude in question almost suggests a Stuart trait, inherited from their ancestors of that race. " De gust ib us," however, " non disputandum."

In connexion with the death of Prince George William, one cannot avoid reflect- ing how heavily Fate has dealt with the

heirs -apparent of crowns and regal families during the last half-century. Since the Tsarevitch Nicholas died in early manhood, two successive Princes of Orange pre- deceased their father, William III. of Hol- land. Napoleon III.'s only son perished by the hand of savages in Zululand. A lonely hunting-box at Meyerling was the scene of the Crown Prince Rudolf's tragical end, though impenetrable mystery still shrouds the actual details of the drama. Two grandsons of Queen Victoria, both heirs to crowns, were cut off in the flower of their youth, viz., Albert Victor, Duke of Clarence, and his cousin Alfred, Hereditary l5uke of Coburg ; whilst their unfortunate young kinsman, the Crown Prince of Portugal, was ruthlessly murdered only a short time ago, and now the heir of Brunswick has been swept away. H.

WE must request correspondents desiring in- formation on family matters of only private interest to affix their names and addresses to their queries, in order that answers may be sent to them direct.

KING SIFFERTH. I should be glad of some information about King Sifferth, who, according to the ' Anglo-Saxon Chronicle,' in the year 962 "killed himself, and his body lies at Wimborne."

According to Florence of Worcester, William of Malmesbury, Roger of Wendover, Simon of Durham, and others, Sifferth, a King of Wales, was one of the eight tri- butary princes who did homage to King Edgar, and rowed his barge at Chester on the river Dee, about the year 972. But this was ten years after the death and burial at Wimborne of the king of the same name. Besides which the chronicler alludes to the homage done at Chester by these vassal kings shortly after Edgar had been consecrated King at Bath in 972, though he speaks only of six kings, and does not give their names. Edear, be it remembered, "had obtained the kingdom" more than twelve years before his consecration. (CL also Freeman's ' Norman Conquest,'- vol. i. p. 68, n. 1.)

There is an old charter of King Edgar's, dated 3 June, 966, in which the King made a grant to the Church of Dorobernensis (Canterbury) and the monks serving God there. This was witnessed by " Siferd, sub- regulus," by the Archbishops of Canterbury