Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 9.djvu/201

 us. ix. MAR. 7, 1911] NOTES AND QUERIES.

195

CONSTABLE'S PAINTING ' THE CORNFIELD } {II S. ix. 108). This subject is generally attributed to Essex or Suffolk, but the following extract from an article ' Constable at Home ' in The Standard of 10 Dec., 1904, is specific :

" The painter was born at East Bergholt, a few miles from Ipswich, and in whichever direction we turn we are sure to come across objects that recall to us some of his most interesting pictures. Among those to which no local name is attached, ' The Cornfield ' is perhaps the best known. But there is a spot so very like it within a short distance of both Bergholt and Nayland that if it did not suggest exactly alike in the same neighbourhood, a con- junction not very often met with. In the valley of the Brett, a little river which flows through beau- tiful meadows till it joins the Stour near Higham, lies the pretty village of Shelley, with its little old church and its Hall. The Brett is here only a large brook, and, passing the church on our left hand, we cross the bridge, and on the rising ground beyond will be found the narrow lane depicted, as we think, in 'The Cornfield.' Turning round, and looking back down the hill we have ascended, we see below us the tower of Shelley Church ; on our left is arable land and a large hillocky field, sloping down to the meadow; just as we see it in the picture, save that in this it is full of red corn."
 * The Cornfield ' there must be two such scenes

W. B. H.

THE RED HAND OF ULSTER : THE CLASPED HANDS AS A RELIGIOUS SYMBOL (11 S. vii. 189, 275, 334, 373, 434 ; viii. 14, 95, 154, 217, 273). From The City Press of 31 Jan. last we learn that

" the Saddlers' Company have presented to St. Vedast's [Foster Lane] a perfect copy of the design at the top of the mace belonging to the church. The original disappeared some 20 years ago. The design is four hands clasped in the shape of a cross, surmounted by a heart, with the inscription 'May hand and heart for ever join.' "

This use of the hand and heart as a symbol of the Christian religion may be compared with the use of the clasped hands by the Jews and the hand and heart in Odd Fellow- ship, as noted in my former contribution (US. vii. 434). Gr. YARROW BALDOCK. South Hackney.

CROMWELL AND QUEEN HENRIETTA MARIA (11 S. ix. 127, 174). Henrietta Maria was never formally crowned. The fullest account of King Charles's Coronation at Westminster is probably that contained in a letter from Sir Simonds D'Ewes to Sir Martin Stuteville, in which he says, "The Queen was neither crowned, nor at the church, yet saw their going." Henrietta Maria, however, pre- sumably possessed a crown, because after Charles's execution the Commons ordered the whole regalia to be broken up and sold for the good of the Commonwealth, and among

other items that figured in the inventory and appraisement, "made and taken the 13th, 14th, and loth dales of August, 1649," is " The queene's crowne of massy gold weighing 3 Ibs. 10 oz., 338Z. 3s. 4d" I should have thought the mere fact of being the reigning king's wife created the status of Queen Consort, but I hazard this conjecture with due diffidence.

WlLLOUGHBY MAYCOCK.

HUMAN FAT AS A MEDICINE (11 S. ix. 70, 115, 157). See ' Des medicaments d'origine humaine et animate prescrits en Europe au Moyen Age et pendant la Renaissance,' by Reutter, in La France Medicate, from 25 May to ^10 August, 1913, pp. 185-8, 207-9, 229-31, 272-5, 287-90. I have a note of " 1'huile distillee de sang humain " as occurring at pp. 2723.

Is this remedy so horrible as suggested ? Similar medicaments have been used from the days of primitive medicine to the latest surgical experiments in transplanting. Is it not reasonable that as is a rock-fat to an animal-fat (or more specifically, as is vaseline to lanoline), so is the latter to human fat, for lubricating and soothing human joints ? Similar remedies are still official in the Chinese pharmacopoeia, and this fact was successfully pleaded, within the last two years, by a midwife in the French mixed- court at Shanghai. ROCKINGHAM. Boston, U.S.

At the last reference it is suggested that the many animal extracts still in use as medicines are survivals from the old practice of employing such substances as had pre- viously been referred to under this head. This is misleading. The healing art of the present day is, of course, a survival of that old times, and the use of some animal substances formerly in repute still continues. But whereas over ninety animals were represented in the first London Pharma- copoeia, there are but fifteen substances of animal origin official in this country now, and these include honey, wax, lard, suet, beeches, cod - liver oil, cochineal, sugar of milk, pepsin, spermaceti, musk, and wool fat, half of which are merely vehicles for more active medicines. C. C. B.

HENRY GOWER, BISHOP OF ST. DAVID'S

US. ix. 88). From words used in the 'oundation charter of the Hospital of St. David's, Swansea, founded by this bishop, it would seem that his family was settled in the peninsula of Gower (then a part of Carmarthen). He endowed it, he