Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 8.djvu/201

 ii s. vii. MAR. s, i9i3.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

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Grand Father's Dignity of Somerset, which his Great Grandfather [sic] before had possessed and was made second Earle of Somerset. The Seale or Chart of this Reginald hath been scene ooncerning the foundation of the Abbey o Nyweham in which he calleth himselfe Reginalc de Mohun, Earle of Somerset, and Lord of Dun- stere. . . .This was done in the year of Chrisl 1260 and in the forty five year of King Henry the Third."

Fuller in his ' Church History,' book iii. 26, relates a cock-and-bull story about a pension and an earldom being given by the Pope in a Bull " of base, obsolete, and ill- pointed French " (!) to this Reginald. Such evidence is not worth considering. Any stone was good enough to hurl at a Papist's head or at the Head of the Papists when Fuller nourished.

I have looked up the Papal Registers, the Patent Rolls, the Charter Rolls, and the Inquisitiones post Mortem for the period, and can find no Earl of Somerset. The charter founding Newnham Abbey is in Dugdale (1825 ed.), vol. v. p. 691, and I need hardly say the founder styles himself "Regi- naldus de Moun " tout court.

REGINALD M. GLENCBOSS.

THE BATTLE OF MALDON (11 S. vii. 110, 157). Another translation mentioned by Stopford Brooke is that by Lumsden (Mac- millari's Magazine, March, 1887). I have not seen ' Bryhtnoth's Prayer, and Other Poems ' (1899), by the late Bishop of Truro (Charles William Stubbs) ; but an article on ' Ely Minster : and the Story of the Earl Bryht- noth,' contributed by him to Goodwill in November, 1900, contains fragments of a verse translation. L. R. M. STRACHAN.

Heidelberg.

Col. W. H. Lumsden's spirited paraphrase, which appeared in Macmillan's Magazine for March, 1887, was reproduced by my good friend the late Mr. E. A. Fitch, F.L.S., &c. (a lifelong reader of 'N. & Q.' and an occa- sional contributor thereto), in his ' Maldon and the River Blackwater.' There are several editions of this book, of which I have many. The one before me is that for 1906, and the poem is printed on pp. 69.

CHAS. HALL CROUCH.

62, Nelson Road, Stroud Green, N.

[ST. S WITHIN also thanked for reply.]

" OF SORTS " (11 S. vii. 10, 56, 117, 136). This expression was in common use in India (Bombay Presidency) in the years 1886-7. When I went to India at the close of 1885 I had never heard it, and was much struck by the frequent use I heard made of it there. I assumed it to be of Anglo-Indian

origin, but know of no evidence in support of this view.

The phrase is a qualifying one, indicating that the substantive to which it is appended is not to be understood too literally. This may be due to a lack of precise information on the part of the speaker or writer, but at the time referred to I think "of sorts " was frequently tacked on as a conversational garnish, to which the speaker attached no very definite meaning.

It would be interesting to hear other Anglo-Indian views. H. E. ANDREWES.

The use of this expression certainly goes back much further than ten or twenty years. I recollect its appearing in store returns, &c., of the Public Works and other Depart- ments in Ceylon from the time that I first went out there (considerably over thirty years ago). Thus among the items would be some like the following :

Chisels of sorts. . . . . . 6

Gimlets of sorts. . . . . . 4

and so on. Probably it was originally evolved in inventories, store returns, &c., and has thence got into literary .use.

PENRY LEWIS. Quisisana, Walton by Clevedon.

This common colloquial expression may, perhaps, be better understood by referring also to Shakespeare. See Bartlett's ' Shake- speare Concordance,' p. 1428, under ' Sort.' The poet's favourite description of anything mean, poor, or indifferent was " in some sort." Something praiseworthy is pictured as a " great or good sort."

WM. JAGGARD.

SAINT SUNDAY (US. vii. 108). The fol- owing notes may be acceptable to your correspondent, though they do not answer lis query :

1473-4. 2d. paid for " up setting of Saint Su(n)day in his old place." 'Churchwardens' Ac- counts, St. Edmund s and St. Thomas's, Sarum,' Vilts Record Soc., 1896.

1522. Catherine Smith of York. " To be buried n St. Nicholas's Church. A wax candle to burn

afore St. Sunday." ' Test. Ebor.,' v. 147.

1530. John Wadeluff, Darf ' eld. " I gyff a hyeff >f be is to kep the lyght afore Seynt Sunday."

F. R. FAIRBANK. Caversham.

REGIMENTS : " DELHI REBELS," " THREES

ABOUT! "64TH(11 S. vii. 109). For "Threes

about ! " see ' Life of Field -Marshal Sir

Frederick Paul Haines,' by Robert S. Rait,

. 63 (London, Constable & Co., 1911).

T. F. D.