Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 9.djvu/487

 us. ix. JOKE 20, i9R] NOTES AND QUERIES.

481

LONDON, SATURDAY, JUNE 20, WU.

CONTENTS.-No. 234.

NOTES : " The Broad Arrow " : The King's Mark, 481 Bishop Jewel's Library, 483 St. Stephen's Chapel, West- minster Henry Dethick, 485 Fox of Stradbroke A Source of Defoe's ' Robinson Crusoe 'Two Mysterious Frenchmen and a Dog, 486" Robert Burton " " Lady " =Woman Blandandered, 487.

QUERIES : References from Swift Wanted Dr. Heigh- ington and his Wife Lydia "Titmarsh," 487 Pauline Tarn Biographical Information Wanted Bullivant Robinson: Withers A "Trawn chaer "Gladstone and Chancellor of the Exchequer" Flash " of Welsh Fusi- liers" Rag-Time," 488 Old Etonians West Indian Families Voyage of the Providence : Capt. Bligh Oordon Highlanders Print Portraits of "Beau Nash" Chapel-house Registers of Protestant Dissenters Bell of the Bounty Runaway Marriages at Lamberton Danish Lyrics, 489 Moore of Winster " lona " Dryden : St. Margaret's, Westminster Strahan : Mack Fraine Family Cottam Family Penmon Priory, 490.

REPLIES : Privy Councillors, 490 " Trod " Heraldic Staffordshire Poets Bishop Cartwright, 492-Oxford Coptic Dictionary Lancashire Proverb Charles I. : John Lambert and Lieut. -Col. Cobbett Alexander Smith's ' Dreamthorp ' Dubber Family Old Etonians Anec- dotes of Distinguished Persons -Paris in 1780 and 1860 Anglesea House, 493 Lombard Street Bankers Liverpool Reminiscences " Stile " = " Hill " Clack Surname Lieut. -Col. J. MacPherson, 494 Loch Chesney New Allusion to Shakespeare Dr. King" Vossioner," 495 Moira Jewel Wickham Wreck of the Jane, 496 Cromwell's Illegitimate Daughter Sir J. Sackfylde Hugh Peters, 497 Sir F. Gal ton Mothering Sunday Burnap Robin Hood Romances Rev. R. Scott Ros- tand's ' Cyrano ' Governor Eyre J. Curwood, 498 General Columbine Colour-Printing, c. 1820, 499.

NOTES ON BOOKS :' The Bruce of Bannockburn ' ' Analecta Bollandiana ' Catalogue of Documents of Brighton, Preston, and Hove ' The Finance of the

Hundred Years' War.'

"THE BROAD ARROW": THE KING'S MARK.

41 I WANT to find the origin of the Broad Arrow the King's Mark. I once heard it was as old as Edward the First."

So wrote an officer of the Royal Navy, in a postscript to a most interesting letter, some eighty years ago to the Admiralty.

On mentioning the above statement to a gentleman who is an authority upon naval records, he said :

" I do not believe that the anchor was the origin of the broad arrow ; it dates much further back, probably to Edward the First's time at least, as that officer states."

Thirty years ago this subject was for months under discussion in ' N. & Q.,' 6 S. ix. 206 (1884), when several theories were pro- pounded, without anything being satis- factorily or definitely arrived at.

It is therefore proposed to deal solely with facts, collecting together here all

references found, first to the anchor (whether it were the origin or not of the well-known sign), and secondly to the broad arrow.

As it is a lifetime since 1884-5, perhaps it will be permissible to repeat all the authentic statements relating to the said symbol which then appeared in * N. & Q.,' along with such references more recently discovered.

Although many earlier instances than the one to be mentioned presently have been met with, where an order had been issued for all trees intended for the navy to bear the sovereign's mark, the said mark was, unfortunately, never described until 6 James I. (1609), which is the earliest refer- ence to it found up to the present time, and now recorded for the first time.

"Instructions for marking of Timber for His Majesty's Navy, And haveinge nevertheless appointed that so muche thereof shalbee reserved for the use of His Highnes Navy as shall by skilful Shippwrights be found fittinge for the same, Hath therefore commanded that Choise should be made of a meete person to be sent to viewe such Choise trees as shalbee fittinge for that [purpose] and growinge w th in xv teen myles of the sea-side or any portable river and before any sale made the sayde Commissioners to marke the same w th an axe bearinge His Maj ts letters and an anker to distinguishe them from the rest as appropriated to His Majestys Navye leste in the general sale they should bee soulde away." Excheq. Special Commission, No. 3785, co. Essex, 6 Jas. I., Sche- dule of Timber Marked for the Navy.

It might be adduced in favour of the anchor having been the origin of the broad arrow, that even if the impression of the King's mark on the axe were perfect it is probable that it was not always clearly defined on the trees, and that whereas a sea- faring man might quickly have discerned that it was meant for an anchor, those who lived inland, and especially in or near forests, being better acquainted with an arrow's head, would be likely to read it as such.

From Rymer, 18 ' Feod.' 978, we get a copy of an order of Charles I. in 1627 for establish- ing a Crown mark, by which it is appointed that

"All muskets and other arms to be. hereafter issued out of His Majesty's Stores, for land service, shall be marked with the mark C. R., and for Sea Service, with the mark C. R. and an anchor."

According to Haydn's 'Dictionary of Dates,'

" All attempts to ascertain the origin of the broad arrow has been fruitless. It is stated that trees fit for shipping in the Forest of Dean in 1639 were marked with the Crown and broad arrow."