Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 9.djvu/38

 NOTES AND QUERIES. [ii s. ix. JAN. 10, 1914.

THE WEARING OF SWOBDS (11 S. viii. 410). To wear a sword is the sign of a gentle- man. This explains the fact that footmen were forbidden to wear it. Upper servants, however, were reckoned as gentlemen, as in. the common phrase " Gentlemen's gentle- men." They did not wear livery, but plain clothes, and were allowed to wear swords. In Lord Broughton's Life we read of a dinner at Devonshire House in the last century where out-of-livery servants with swords attended. Sydney Smith, writing to Archdeacon Singleton in 1839, makes fun of the " domestics of the prelacy with swords and bag-wigs " at Lambeth Palace. To the present day the train-bearer to the Speaker always wears a sword.

CHE SARA SARA.

GROOM OF THE STOLE (US. viii. 466, 515)- In Halliwell's ' Dictionary of Archaic and Provincial Words,' 1847, one reads, s.v. ' Stole (4) ' :

"A kind of packing-chest for robes and clothes. We still have 'groom of the stole.' See 'Privy Purse Expences of Eliz. of York,' p. 45."

In ' Anglise Notitia ; or, The Present State of England : The First Part,' by Edw. Chamberlayne, loth ed., 1684, p. 160, is :

" A List of His Majesties Servants in Ordinary, above Stairs.

" Gentlemen of the Bed-Chamber, whereof the first is called Groom of the Stole, that is, according to the signification of the word in Greek, from whence, first the Latines, and thence the Italian and French derive it, Groom or Servant of the Robe or Vestment ; He having the Office and Honour to present, and put on his Majesties First Garment or Shirt, every Morning, and to order the things of the Bed-Chamber."

One of the duties of the Gentlemen of the Bed-Chamber was, " in the absence of the Groom of the Stole, to supply his place."

The word " stole " comes from the Greek oroA?7 (equipment, robe, stole). See Skeat's and other dictionaries. In modern Greek the word has much the same meanings, plus uniform and livery (of servants).

ROBERT PIERPOINT.

I note that the " stole " here mentioned has been variously interpreted as the liturgical stole worn by the King at his C'oronation, the long robe or vestment worn by him on solemn occasions, and his Majesty's first garment every morning. I cannot help thinking that all these are after- thoughts, and that it really has to do with the apartment long known as the Stole (or Stool) Chamber, the evidence for which is abundant, as will appear in Mr. St. John Hope's great book on Windsor Castle, to

be published immediately. This supposi- tion fits in well with the gold key which the Groom of the Stole wore as his emblem of office. J. T. F.

Winterton, Lines.

Your correspondent J. T. F. is surely in- error in confounding the royal robe known from very remote times as the " stole " with the " stool chamber," by which he apparently means the " lieu d'aisance."

The stole has been worn by every English sovereign at his or her Coronation, including the present King, and has been fully de- scribed and illustrated in official narratives of the ceremonial. H.

GLASGOW CROSS AND DEFOE'S ' TOUR y (11 S. viii. 349, 416, 492). I have a copy of the first edition of the 'Tour' "by a Gentleman " ; vol. i., 1724 ; vol. ii., 1725 ; vol. iii., 1727, " which completes the work and contains a J tour thro* Scotland | with a map of Scotland by Mr. Moll." This has no separate title, but is separately paged. The words " in the centre stands the cross ' 7 do not occur in this edition. After the words " are so large of themselves "the paragraph continues, " as you come down from the hill," &c. J. F.^R.

Godalming.

JOHN STROUT (STROUDE), DEVON (11 S. viii. 489). I doubt whether the two John? are identical. John Strode, who matricu- lated (aged 17) at Exeter College, and took his B.A. degree from Broadgates Hall (Pembroke College) on 11 May, 1621, was apparently younger brother of William Strode (1599 ?-1645), the celebrated poli- tician. In the Register of Exeter College, under * College Plate : White Plate : Bowles,' occurs the following entry : " Ex dono Johannis Strode, Gulielmi Strode equitis aurati filii et hujus Coll. commensalis, 13 f oz." According to Prince (' Danmonii Illustres '), he was apparently "a great favourite of the nobility and gentry, who- spent much of his time about London, and was counted the best bowler (player of bowls) in all England."

PEPYS QUERY (11 S. viii. 489). On Sunday morning, 2 Sept., 1666, Mr. Pepys walked to the Tower, " and there got up upon one of the high places " ; and '* there I did see the houses at that end of the bridge all on fire, and an infinite great tire on this- and the other side the end of the bridge ; which, among other people, did trouble me for," &c.

" Poor little Mich ell " was the younger son of Thos. Michell, bookseller, of Westminster Hall. He had married Betty Howlett,