Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 9.djvu/163

 ii s. ix. FEB. 2i f i9u.i NOTES AND QUERIES.

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adding to Swinburne's verses in French and Latin in which he also wrote an unpub- lished epigram on Thomas Carlyle the two pieces of Greek elegiacs prefixed to ' Ata- lanta in Calydon,' the one addressed to Landor and the other written on his death, we obtain the result that the poet composed In three languages other than his own.

EDWARD BENSLY.

In this connexion see the Greek elegiacs prefixed by Swinburne to ' Atalanta in Calydon.' G. W. E. R.

GROOM OF THE STOLE (11 S. viii. 466, 515 ; ix. 32, 95). I am indebted to Prof. Herdener of Durham for the following extract, which Is, I think, strongly in favour of the opinion that I have expressed, which, it seems, was that of another correspondent in his nonage.

" II y en a [sc. des gentilshommes ordinaires]

pour enleyer et rapporter sa chaise percee " [sc. celle du roi]. H. Taine, ' Les Origines de la France Contemporaine, L'Ancien Regime,' tome i., 23 me Edition (Hachette, 1900), p. 140.

And in a foot-note Taine adds :

"Comte d'Hezecques, 'Souvenirs d'un page de Louis XVI.,' p. 212. Sous Louis XVI. il y avait deux porte-chaises du roi, qui tous les matins, en habit de velours, 1'epee au cote, venaient verifier et vider, s'il y avait lieu, 1'objet de leurs functions ; cette charge valait a chacun d'eux 20,000 livres par an"[=80UZ.].

J. T. F.

Durham.

T. & G. SEDDON (11 S. ix. 86). The following may be of some interest :

' Johnstone's London Street Directory,' 1817, p. 10 : " No. 150 Aldersgate Street. T. Seddon, Cabinet Maker and Upholder."

' Robson's London Commercial Directory,' 1839: Manufacturers, 149 and 150 Aldersgate Street." ALECK ABRAHAMS.
 * ' Seddon, Thos. Geo., Upholsters and Cabinet

FEE-FARM RENTS (11 S. ix. 84). More than fifty years ago I remember that a near relation of mine used to go annually to cer- tain towns in Yorkshire to receive the fee- farm rents due to a nobleman for whom he was agent. . ST. SWITHIN.

In Bedell's ' Account of Hornsea,' 1848, .the following occurs :

"Much of the land in Hornsea is subject to a mall fee-farm rent, paid half-yearly to ' the heirs of John Tempest, Esq., and others,' of which nothing whatever seems to be known but that it must be paid. It may be the rent referred to in a document dated about 1703, of which there is a copy in Drake's 'Eboracum,' p. 624, intitled ' The names of all the towns and villages in Her Majesty s Liberty and Court of Records of the late dissolved

Vlonastery of St. Mary's, York.' Among other places are the following: 'In Holderness (inter alia), Hornsey-Burton, F. Hornsey and Hornsey- Deckhold, R. F.' In a note it is explained that "R means that the records remained in the Abbey, and F that the town paid a, fee-farm rent. These rents may have come to the Crown at the dissolu- tion of monasteries, and have been subsequently ilienated."

During my incumbency of Hornsea of nearly a quarter of a century I paid this rent yearly, but my successor resisted the impost, and, I believe, successfully. I am under the impression that he found it was a tax imposed for a temporary purpose about the time of Charles I., but that the right to levy it had long expired. I will make further inquiries. E. L. H. TEW.

Upham Rectory, Hants.

THE ROADS ROCJND LONDON SEVENTY YEARS AGO: RHUBARB (11 S. ix. 82). Many years ago, talking with Mrs. Loddiges (widow of Mr. Conrad Loddiges, author of 'The Botanical Cabinet') about the asso- ciation of their family with orchids, Mrs. Loddiges replied: "Yes, but I am much more proud of the fact that we first intro- duced rhubarb into England." Messrs. Myatt were certainly amongst the earliest cultivators, but I think the next paragraph in MR. McDowALL's article about the first use of rhubarb at a ladies' boarding, school at Hackney appears rather to cor- roborate Messrs. Loddiges' s claim to priority, as their well-known nursery was in Hackney.

E. G.

Hackney.

WILL-O'-THE-WISP (11 S. ix. 108). During the last twenty years I have fre- quently, when traversing the great expanse of marshland which stretches away north- ward from Harlech Castle, seen what I believe to be the true " marsh -lights." At any rate, what I saw was a phenomenon for which I could account in no other way. S. A. GRUNDY-NEWMAN.

Walsall.

HUMAN FAT AS A MEDICINE (11 S. ix. 70, 115). In the sixteenth century Ambroise Pare, writing his mother-language, discredited the use of " mummy " in medicine. He said it made his patients vomit, and pointed out, moreover, that bodies of the rich, em- balmed with aloes and spices, were not obtainable, but that inferior persons, em- balmed with pissasphaltum, were palmed off on the doctors. Jews, Arabs, Chaldeans, and Egyptians never intended, in embalming their bodies, that they should be eaten by