Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 6.djvu/87

 118. VI. JULY 27, 1912.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

67

leading to Serjeants' Inn. This change took place in 1864, and in 1908 there was published, under the title of ' Peeps into the Past,' an excellent souvenir of the bi -centenary of the Amicable Society and centenary of the Norwich Union Life Office. This provides a well-illustrated and very full history of the building.

Before 1840 No. 50, Fleet Street, presum- ably an eighteenth-century building, was occupied for a few years by John Major, the publisher.

The few newspaper notices of this recent demolition are marred by sundry inaccuracies. A common fault is identifying the building as the original home of the Amicable Society since its foundation, or at least since its removal from Hatton Garden in 1737. The Observer in its issue of 26 May, under the heading of ' Exit Serjeants' Inn,' gave a resume of the history of the site. Messrs. Howell & Brooks, the surveyors and archi- tects to the Insurance Society, corrected some of the misstatements in the next week's issue. The house in Serjeants' Inn built for the Amicable Society is that now occupied by the Church of England Sunday School Institute, who purchased or leased it in 1840. The architect is said (by Messrs. Howell & Brooks, Observer, 2 June) to have been Mr. Delight, the Society's surveyor, but its style and the frieze in the ground-floor room strongly suggest Robert Adam. They are mistaken in saying that the Society occupied this fine house in 1730, removing thither from Mr. Hartley's book- seller's shop, where it was founded. The first court of the Society was held here 27 July, 1737, soon after the expiration of the twenty-one years' lease of the office "12 doors below, the Globe Tavern in Hatton Garden," whither the Society had removed from Fetter Lane in 1716.

Research into the earlier history of the site of No. 50, Fleet Street, would be of the greatest interest. Every site in this, the most interesting street in London, well repays intelligent and painstaking inquiry, and every demolition and excavation is worth careful record and observation, as affording clues to the remoter periods in its history. ALECK ABRAHAMS.

PORTRAITS OF MARY STUART. 1 find

that in my small collection of historical portraits there are three very early portraits of Mary Stuart that are apparently un- described.

1. This is a small medallion portrait of her as Queen of France. It is on p. 282

of an old Lyons book, ' Promptuarii Iconum editio secunda,' published in 1581. The date is interesting as being within the Queen's lifetime.

2. This is in a Dutch edition of ' Flori- mond Remond,' published at Antwerp in 1690. It is full-page and of a pleasing type. The print was taken from a picture by H. Verbruggen. As his dates are 1588- 1629, this, again, is old enough to be of historical value.

3. This is an old German print of the execution of the conspirators of Amboise. I fancy that I can trace the features of the Queen in one of the spectators. If correct, this would rank amongst the very oldest of the historical prints of her.

E. DtTPERNEX.

MADAME VIGEE LE BRITN'S PORTRAIT or LA PRINCESSE DE TALLEYRAND. At the Jacques Doucet Sale in Paris there was sold, on 7 June, Madame Vigee le Brun's portrait of the Princesse de Talleyrand before her marriage. Dated 1783, it is an oval, 91 by 72 centimetres, and was purchased by Mr. Knoedler, after some spirited bidding, for 400,000fr. The Princesse is represented seated, with her face three-quarters to the left ; she is decolletee ; gown grey, blue ribbons in hair and corsage ; green velvet chair and cushion. She holds a sheet j_of music, and is glancing upward.

The Princesse (nee Catherine Noel Verlee) in early years was married at Chandernagore to Francis Grand, and settled in Calcutta. She was the lady who captivated Philip Francis (supposed by some to be " Junius "), and the trial (1779) that arose out of the resulting scandal is a matter of history. Born at Tranquebar in 1761, she was married to the Prince in 1 802 and died in Paris in 1835, her grave in Mont Parnasse being still recognizable. A better-known painting of her by Gerard, is (or was) at Versailles.

WlLMOT CORFIELD. .

" HEN AND CHICKENS " SIGN. (See 11 S. i. 55.) The query at the reference given remains unanswered ; but a letter, dated 1 June, 1912. from Mr. R. J. Beevor, M.A., of St. Albans, contains this new item :

" I find in Boyne's ' Trade Tokens of the Seventeenth Century ' (new edition, 1889, vol. i. p. 793 ) mention of a token : Obv., CHRISTOPHER . WORTH and hen and chickens

Rev., IX. WHITE. CHAPELL. C. A. W.

. .The date of this would be 1652-72. Possibly probably, indeed C. W. was tenant, not owner, of this property. But it might be worth while to look for his will, in case ' The Hen and