Page:Notes and Queries - Series 12 - Volume 1.djvu/233

 s. i. MAR. is, 1916.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

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We know George Whitefield was a warm friend of William Romaine ; but again the name of the writer as printed on the title suggests that the Letter was written by one of Whitefield's many religious antagonists. Gushing gives it as by George Whitefield, but is this known for certain ?

Since sending my query (ante, p. 151) I liave been able to verify the reference in Tyerman. The ' Life ' he mentions is in the British Museum, though it was by chance that I found it, for the volume was published l>y Oliphant. It is entitled " Life of the

Bey. Gteorge Whitfield [sic], AM

Edinburgh : Published by William Oliphant. 1826." There is nothing to indicate by whom it was written, and probably this is the reason for Tyerman referring to it as " Oliphant's." ROLAND AUSTIN.

Gloucester.

DR. DONNE'S COUNTESS OP HUNTINGDON. Dr. John Donne, perhaps about the year 1620, described himself as this lady's chaplain, and inscribed to her a copy of verses commencing in this ungallant manner :

MADAM, Man to God's Image ; Eve, to man was made,

Nor finde we that God breath'd a soul in her ; Canons will not Church functions you invade,

Nor laws to civil office you prefer. Poems,' 1669, p. 166. [ u Man " should read man's.]

Is anything known of this countess ? It is an odd coincidence that a little more than a century and a half later Selina Shirley, by marriage her successor in the title, should so far have " invaded Church functions " as to found a sect, long bearing her name, though now practically extinct.

RICHABD H. THORNTON.

H. ENSOR, ARTIST. Amongst the pictures of Ford Madox Brown, sold after his death in 1893, was a well-executed oil painting, -about 24 in. by 9 in., the subject being a moorland landscape, and bearing the signa- ture " H. Ensor."

Information as to the artist and probable locality of the view would be acceptable.

W. B. H.

J. C. EASLING : THOMAS HODGETTS. Where may be found particulars of the life and works of these two engravers, who both had a share in the engraving of plates for Turner's * Liber Studiorum ' ? It was Eas- ling who, with Turner, engraved the " frontispiece " to the work ; he also did, the mezzotinting of the ' Mildmay Sea-piece,' engraved by W. Annis, who only engraved

throughout one plate of the series. The other plates by Easling, which are all excellent work, are ' Hedging and Ditching,' ' Winchelsea, Sussex,' and ' St. Catherine's Hill,' near Guildford.

Of Thomas Hodgetts it is said that he was " a quite inferior craftsman, and none of his plates were successful " ; he, however, did three of the seventy-one published plates, and they are ' From Spenser's " Faery Queen," ' Ville de Thun, Switzerland,' and ' Lauffenbourg on the Rhine.'

ARCHIBALD SPARKE.

GEO. KNIGHT, ARTIST. Can any one give the dates of this painter in oils of marine subjects, after the manner of Edwin Hayes ? The owner of two pictures of fishing-boats in a choppy sea off the English coast believes them to have been produced about the middle of the last century. Both pictures are signed with the name as above, having a long upright stroke for the final letter, shaped like an ancient Greek letter Tau.

W. E. WINKS.

Llanishen, Cardiff.

SONG WANTED. In Mid- Victorian days a popular song contained the words : For jealousy causes both bother and strife, As it did with Maria the dustman's wife.

Can anybody tell me the name of the song, or by whom it was published ?

T. J. WOODROW.

THOMAS MINERS was an English gentleman, living in Rome in 1577, who said he was nephew to Cardinal Pole. I should be much obliged if any one could suggest how such a relationship could be made out (cf. 11 S. iii. 45, 112, 154).

JOHN B. WAINEWRIGHT.

THE PROFESSOR AND THE BICYCLE. In 'Who's Who,' 1902, under " Skeat, Rev. Walter William," besides his many and manifold attainments there is this interesting and to me amusing statement : " Recreation : the first Cambridge professor who rode a bicycle." This information is not recorded in ' Who's Who,' 1907. As an old Oxonian I should like to know who was the first Oxford professor who rode a bicycle.

M.A.OXON.

FOLK-LORE : GEESE AND RAIN. I have once seen it stated that if thirsty geese in a crate be placed in a rain-storm they will die. Is this a common belief, and if so, where ? Is it a fact, and if not, how did the idea arise ? ALFRED S. E. ACKERMANN.