Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 8.djvu/215

 ii s. vn. MAR. is, 1913.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

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Keeper of the King's Lions " was given to gentlemen, with the fee of 12 pence a day and perquisites." In Richard III.'s reign the post was held by Sir Robert Bracken- bury, and in that of Henry VII. by John, Earl of Oxford.

In James I.'s reign some cruel baiting of the lions by dogs appears to have afforded amusement.

At one time the lions were named after the reigning kings, and there was a vulgar belief that " when a king dies the lion of that name also dies." Addison alludes thus to this belief in The Freeholder :

" Our first visit was to the lions. My friend [the Tory fox-hunter] enquired much after their health, and whether none of them had fallen sick upon the flight of the Pretender."

Lord Stanhope also, in his * History of England,' quotes Lord Chesterfield as saying d, propos of George II. having recovered from an illness :

" It was generally thought his Majesty would have died, and for a very good reason for the oldest lion in the Tower, much about the King's age, died a fortnight ago."

The proverbial expression of " the lions " is drawn probably from the fact that formerly going to see the lions at the Tower was an indispensable duty of all country visitors. CONSTANCE RUSSELL.

Swallowfield.

An interesting article on the lions at the Tower of London, by Mr. Wilfred Whitten, appeared in The Pall Matt Gazette on or about 22 Aug., 1912. A mention of these lions, and a somewhat coarse joke connected with them, evidently current at that time, is in ' Humphry Clinker ' in the letter dated 3 June. PERCEVAL LUCAS.

[C. C. B., who refers to 'The Book of Days,' i. 730-31, BLADUD, who refers to * Humphry Clinker,' and MR. JOHN ARDAGH also thanked for replies.]

THE ALCHEMIST'S APE (US. vii. 110, 157). The unicorn's horn was the great alexi- pharmic, the preservative against plague and poison, and to this, to its rarity, and to the great price it commanded its pro- minence in the apothecary's shop was probably due. And of course it was cheaper to use a representation of the animal as a symbol than to stock the horn cheaper, and as efficacious. The crocodile again, and the tortoise, both of which were to be seen in the shop of Romeo's apothecary in Mantua, were both used in medicine, and both were, I suppose, somewhat rare.

Rarity is a great catch : " far sought and dear bought " is an attraction to others besides ladies.

The ape was probably intended to pass as a familiar of the learned man. C. C. B.

THE STONES OF LONDON (11 S. vi. 429, 615; vii. 16, 77). Temple Bar. Portland stone.

Eleanor Cross, Charing Cross Station Yard. Portland and Mansfield stone.

New Zealand War Memorial, Greenwich Hospital Grounds. Obelisk of Cornish granite.

John Stuart Mill, Victoria Embankment Gardens. Pedestal of Portland stone.

Sir Hugh Myddelton, Islington Green. Statue of Sicilian marble, pedestal of grey Devonshire granite, base of Portland stone.

J. ARDAGH. 40, Richmond Road, Drumcondra, Dublin.

MEWCE : WASHINGTON: " PILLOWBEER " (11 S. vii. 103). Pillowbeer is still in occa- sional use in West Cornwall, sometimes for the more permanent case that holds the feathers, and sometimes for the washable slip in which the pillow itself is placed.

YGBEC.

WINTHROP MACKWORTH PBAED (11 S. vii. 109). The inscription on the monu- mental tablet at Kensal Green is set out at length in the Rev. Derwent Coleridge's ' Memoir,' which is prefixed to the edition of Praed's poems published in 1864.

HAYNES BAYLY (11 S. vii. 109). Accord- ing to the ' Memoir ' prefixed to the ' Songs, Ballads, and Other Poems ' of Thomas Haynes Bayly, edited by his widow in 1857, the poet was buried " in the new bury ing- ground at Cheltenham," and his epitaph, written by Theodore Hook, was inscribed on a tablet in St. James's Church in that town. G. F. R. B.

Thomas Haynes Bayly was buried in St. Mary's Cemetery, Cheltenham, where Mrs. Morgan, one of the poet's admirers, erected a headstone with the inscription :

" Here lie the mortal remains of Thomas Haynes Bayly, Esquire, who died in this Town on the 22nd of April, 1839."

There is also a tablet to his memory in St, James's Church, Cheltenham. See Gloucester Notes and Queries, i. 3 ; iii. 427 ; iv. 619. Norman's edition of Goding's ' History of Cheltenham,' 1863, pp. 484-6, has some biographical notes relating to Bayly, and mention is made that Mrs. Bayly " is still a periodical visitor " to Cheltenham.

ROLAND AUSTIN.