Page:Notes and Queries - Series 12 - Volume 2.djvu/496

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NOTES AND QUERIES. [12 s.n. DEC. w, 1910.

4 THE BEGGAR'S OPERA.' Can any reader of ' X. & Q.' inform me whence Gay took the following airs in ' The Beggar's Opera' ?

Act I., Air 15. Pray, fair one, be kind.

Act I., Air 17. Oin thou wert mine own thing.

Act II., Air 1. Fill ev'ry glass.

Act II., Air 6. When once I lay.

Act III., Air 2. South Sea Ballad.

Act III., Air 8. Now, Roger, I'll tell thee.

Act III., Air 10. Would Fate to me Belinda give.

Act III., Air 17. Happy Groves.

A. E. H. SWAEN. Amsterdam.

THE SPEAKER'S PERQUISITES. Has the

Speaker of the House of Commons any

perquisites by virtue of his office, and if so,

what are they, and what was their origin ?

ALFRED S. E. ACKERMANN.

ODOURS. Can any reader give examples of odours which, though not disagreeable, are nevertheless injurious to health ?

ALFRED S. E. ACKERMANN.

POLAND m LONDON. 1. How did Poland Street, Oxford Street, acquire that name ? 2. When Stanislaus, the last king of Poland, came to London" where did he reside ?

C. TYNDALL WULCKO.

OCHILTREE FAMILY. Can any reader give me information as to the origin of the name " Ochiltree " as a surname ? A family of the name formerly in the north of Ireland claim to be descended from the Royal Stuarts of Scotland, through the Lords of Ochiltree. But, if so, why did they retain the name Ochiltree, when the lands ceased to be theirs ? Is there any other origin for the name ? FODHLA.

G. SNELL, ARTIST. I shall be very grate- ful for any information concerning this artist. In my collection of early water-colours is an exquisite drawing by him 'The Town Hall of Louvain,' signed " G. Snell " (9J by 6 J in. ). All that I have been able to discover about him is that he exhibited a drawing of St. Pierre, Caen, at the Royal Academy in 1844, and that he lived at 1 Belgrav'e Road, Pimlico. My example of his work is so admirable that, in the matter of finish and refinement, he may be regarded as on a level with such masters of his time as Mackenzie and Frederick Nash, and would hold his own even with earlier giants of the standing of Hearne, Malton, and Rooker. It seems strange that so delicate and learned a draughtsman could be forgotten. He must have produced other works, and in all probability they were engraved ; but I have never come across an engraving after him. F. P. BARNARD.

LADIES' SPURS. (12 S. ii. 190, 255, 335.)

WHETHER Greek and Roman ladies used spurs is a question impossible to decide, though it finds a ready answer in modern dictionaries, all copying or abridging Saglio's article ' Calcar ' in ' Diet, des Antiq.' The ever-recurring documents are but three in number ; I propose to show that they are all worthless.

(1) A red- figured amphora of late style (Bull. Acad. Bruxelles, xi. p. 76=Roulez, Melanges, v., with a plate). An Amazon is fighting on foot against two Greek war- riors ; she wears the Scythian costurie and trousers. A little over her left ankle, the drawing shows a kind of horizontal leaf (that part of the painting reproduced in Saglio, fig. 1006), which can be anything, even a spot or a mere accident, but is cer- tainly not a spur. Roulez, in the desbrip- iton of that vase, which seems to have dis- appeared, does not even allude to that derail, which he would have certainly commented upon if he had thought it was of sore interest.

(2) The left foot of the Mattel Amazoi in the Vatican (Clarac, 811,2031) is adorned with a broad strap which has been con- sidered, since Visconti, as a spur-holder (German Sporn-haUer). Visconti (' Mus. Pio Clem.,' ii. p. 262, pi. 38, of the 8th ed.) describes it thus :

" Qne bandelette avec sa boucle, destined a soutenir un seul 4peron, Ktvrpov, selon la coutume qu'avaient, peut-etre, anciennement les cavaliers."

Here he refers to Virgil, ' ^En.' xi. 714, where, however, j 'errata calce in the singular. does not prove that the rider had only one spur, as is occasionally the case with Arabs in Northern Africa and elsewhere (see Ols- hausen, ' Verh. Berl. Ges. f iir Ethnologie,' I860, p. 201). Amelung, with whom I had communicated on that subject, declared in his catalogue of the Vatican sculptures (1908, vol. ii. p. 457) that there is not the slightest trace of a spur on the strap, neither in the Mattel statue nor in the Amazon of the Capitol. The latter's foot has been described as follows : " Round the ankle is fastened by a buckle a spur, though the actual point is omitted" (H. Stuart Jones and others, ' Capitoline Museum,' 1912, p. 342). In fact, the buckle is there, but the spur is not. Amelung added, referring