Page:Notes and Queries - Series 12 - Volume 1.djvu/181

 128. 1. FEE. 26, 1916.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

Innocents' Day the priests gave way to the schoolboys and choirboys, whence its name of Childermas. At first the boys' service was a solemn celebration of the slaughter of the Innocents by Herod ; but towards the ^nd of the eleventh or beginning of the twelfth century the cult of St. Nicholas of Myra was introduced from the East, and -antedated the Boys' Feast by transferring the beginning of it from Innocents' Day to his day, Dec. 6. But although elected on St. Nicholas's Eve, the Boy -Bishop did not officiate until after Christmas, on the evening of St. John's Day at vespers, from the words of the Magnificat " Deposuit potentes " onwards. An Eton statute of 1443 said of St. Nicholas's Day, which was the birthday of the founder, Henry VI. :

" On which day, and by no means on the feast of the Holy Innocents, we allow divine service, except the sacred portions of the Mass, to be per- formed and said by a boy-bishop of the scholars -chosen yearly."

A. R. BAYLEY.

GEORGE INN, BOROUGH (12 S. i. 90, 137). 'The references at p. 137, ante, to Lillie "Smith, Lillie Smith Aynscombe, and an Act of Parliament in 1785, are not quite correct. Valentinia Aynscombe (who died on April 1, 1771) was daughter of Philip, who died in 1737. Philip's father, Thomas, died in 1740, and bequeathed 200Z. to Christ's Hospital and 200Z. to St. Bartholomew's, of both of which he was a governor. Thomas's will was proved on Oct. 23, 1740, and in it he made his granddaughter Valentinia his heiress. By this will money was provided to enable Valentinia's husband, when she should marry, to procure an Act of Parliament authorizing him to assume the surname of Aynscombe. Valentinia married Lillie Smith, and he assumed the name in accordance with the terms of the will. ALFRED ANSCOMBE.

ALLAN RAMSAY (12 S. i. 109). Ramsay's


 * Ever- Green ' was first published in 1724.

L Poems,' vol. ii. (1761), and consists of eleven verses.
 * David Malloch ' will be found in Ramsay's

The ' Tea-Table Miscellany ' is rather rare : four vols. in one, Edinburgh, 1768.

Most of Ramsay's productions first saw daylight in sheets at a penny each.

ALFRED CHAS. JONAS, F.S.A.

( 'THE TOMMIAD' (12 S. i. 128). ' The Tommiad ' was written by George James, Earl of Winchilsea and Nottingham ; its subject the soi-disant adventures of Thomas, second Earl of Wilton, in his salad days.

These noblemen were contemporaries, though Lord Wilton, well known in certain circles as " the Wicked Earl," was the older of the two ; his appearance in Rotten Row is described in the ' Modern Timon ' something in the following fashion I write from recollection :

See next on switch-tailed bay Attenuated Wilton leads the way.

Though Lord Wilton was born as far back as 1799, his widow's death was recorded by the press only a few days since.

My copy of ' The Tommiad ' has a photo- graph of the author inserted as frontispiece, which is perhaps the " portrait " referred to by MR. CAMPBELL. H.

THE BLACK HOLE OF CALCUTTA (12 S. i. 108). With reference to the statement that " the usually received story of the Black Hole of Calcutta has been seriously chal- lenged," the following paragraph is of interest :

" Calcutta, Feb. 2.

" A theory propounded at great length in the Calcutta papers by an English investigator that the Black Hole tragedy was an invention of Holwell, the leading survivor, has recently attracted general attention in India. A school of Bengali neo-historians had previously pro- pounded the theory, but the present is the first occasion on which English support has been prominently accorded. Mr. Rushbrook Williams, Fellow of 'All Souls,, Professor of History at Allahaoad, now writes controverting the theory* which he characterizes as ' distinctly regrettable because entirely lacking in justification and tending only to discredit the study of Indian history as pursued among us. That Holwell was a clever rascal was known even in his clay ; that he greatly exaggerated the duration of the siege of Calcutta is well re.-ogiiized ; bxit that he invented the Black Hole episode is believable only by those who have little acquaintance with the* principal sources of the history of that time. ....The main fact that over one hundred Europeans were imprisoned and that only a score came forth is as well authenticated as any in history.' "Morning Post, Feb. 7, 1910.

PENRY LEWIS.

Quisisana, Walton-by-Clevedon, Somerset.

AUTHOR OF FRENCH SONG WANTED (12 S. i. 11, 56, 131). My mother used to sing us a different version of this song to the tune printed at the last reference, which she had probably brought beck from the boarding- school in France at which she had been about the year 1820. It ran :

Ah ! vous dirai-je, maman, Ce qui cause mon tourment ? Papa veut que je raisonne Comme vine grand e personne ; Mais je dis que les bonbons Valent mieux que les raisons.