Page:Notes and Queries - Series 12 - Volume 2.djvu/101

 12 S.IL JULY 29, 1916.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

95

1796, and died before 1856, having been Paymaster of the Household to William IV. and Queen Victoria from before 1837, and a Groom of the Privy Chamber.

Sir Win. Cunningham, fourth Baronet of Caprington, co. Avr, was born Dec. 19, 1752, and died before 1834. W. R. W.

King William IV. and Mrs. Jordan had nine children, the eldest of whom was created Earl of Munster, June 4, 1831. All took the name' of Fitzclarence. The eldest daughter, who received by royal warrant, May 24, 1831, the rank and precedence of child of a marquis (as did the other children, except where marriage had already given them higher rank), was Lady Sophia Fitzclarence. She married, Aug. 13, 1825, Philip Charles, Lord De Lisle and Dudley. She died April 10, 1837, leaving issue.

A. FRANCIS STEUART.

79 Great King Street, Edinburgh.

THE "FLY": THE "HACKNEY": THE "MIDGE" (12 S. i. 150, 254, 398, 494; ii. 32). When, as a boy of 14, I was visiting Bude, in North Cornwall, in the summer of 1870, I went to the neighbouring town of Stratton in a " midge." Not having pre- viously heard the name, I asked the youthful driver why the vehicle was so called, and he replied : " Because it's a little fly " an answer which, from his assured manner, I felt certain he had often given as triumph- antly before. " Fly " was well known to me, for we had several such in my native town of Launceston, as well as specimens of another favourite vehicle, the " sociable," a small wagonette in much request among picnic parties. DUNHEVED.

R. B.'s reference to the Torquay " midge " recalls to my mind a miniature four-wheeler which for years used to ply for hire in Birmingham, also known locally as " the midge." It was popular with old ladies and children, and was driven by an old man and drawn by a small horse, both of a great age. Somewhere about 1870 I remember being taken to a children's party in it from Edgbaston to Moseley. The unhappy "midge" broke down on the way, and shortly afterwards its licence to ply for hire was refused renewal ; and, shorn of its wheels, the last I saw of it was in the yard of a local coach-builder as a dismantled derelict.

Its loss left a gap in the ranks of the -common objects of the street-side to be met with in Birmingham in those far-off days.

WlLMOT CORFIELD.

27 Longton Grove, Sydenham, S.E.

COLOURS OF BADGE OF THE EARI.S OF WARWICK: BEAUCHAMP (12 S. ii. 49). In ' The Official Baronage of England.' by James E. Doyle, 1886, vol. iii. p. 581, sub nom. Richard de Beauchamp born 1381, succeeded as 5th Earl of Warwick 1401, died 1439 are the arms " From his seal " : Quarterly, I. t IV., Chequy or & azure, a chevron

ermine, (N BUBO run) ; II. & III., Gules, a fess

between 6 cross crosslets or, (BEAUCHAMP). CREST Out of a coronet gules, a swan's head fc

neck argent. SUPPORTERS Two bears argent, muzzled gules,

each leaning on a ragged staff of the first. After 1422 Quarterly, I. & IV., BKAVCHAMP:

II. & III., NEUBOUKG : on an escutcheon of

pretence, CLARE & DKSPENSER quarterly. Also I. & IV, BEAUCHAMP, impaling XEUBOURG

II. & HI., CLARE, impaling DESPKNSER. SUPPORTERS Dexter, a bear argent, muzzled gules ;

Sinister, a griffin with wings elevated and

depressed argent. BADGE A ragged staff in bend dexter argent.

It will be seen that the badge of this Beauchamp, Earl of Warwick, was a ragged staff ; that the supporters, apparently before 1422, were bears, each leaning on a ragged staff ; and that both bears and ragged staves were argent.

The supporters of the 4th Earl are given as " Two bears " ; the supporter of the 6th, " A bear argent, collared gules, studded of the first, with chain attached & reflexed over the back or " (quoted from ' Rous Roll,' 54).

Collins, in his ' Peerage of England,' 4th edit., 1768, vol. v. p. 205, says that Henry de Newburgh was created Earl of Warwick by William the Conqueror, 107G, and that William Rufus " enriched this new created Earl with the whole

inheritance of Turchil de Warwick The Bear

and Rigged Staff (which had been the device or ensign of Turchil's family, from before the time of his ancestor, Guy Earl of Warwick, so famous for his feats of chivalry in the time of the Saxons ) was, on the grant of this inheritance, assumed by the new Earl, as the ensign likewise of his family : and hence it became the remarkable badge of the successive Earls of Warwick, through the lines of Newburgh, Beauchamp, Nevil, Plantagenet, and Dudley ; and when supporters came in use, was in that shape added to their arms." The reference for this account of the Bear and Ragged Staff appears to be Dugd., ' Antiq. of Warwickshire,' p. 298.

Mr. Philip iNorman, in his ' London Signs and Inscriptions,' 1893, p. 12, has a quotation from Stow (no indication of its place given) :

"In the 36th of Henry VI. the greater estates of the realm being called up to London, Richard Nevill Earl of Warwick came with six hundrv.l men all in jackets embroidered with ragged staves before and behind, and was lodged in \Varwicke Lane,"