Page:Notes and Queries - Series 12 - Volume 5.djvu/183

 12 S. V. JULY, 1919.]

NOTES AND QUERIES.

177

"SKIFFLE -SHUFFLE." This word is classed is rare in the ' N.E.D.,' and no earlier use of it is quoted than 1871. It appears in the speech made in the House of Commons by Mr. George Grenville on the disturbances in America, Jan. 26, 1769 : "Do not let us stand shime-shuffle between two measures " <' Debates, 1768-1770,' Sir H. Cavendish, p. 203). Here it evidently implies hesitation, .so may be only a playful or a cant enlarge- ment of " shuffling " ; but possibly it is an -expression that was used in some game such -as shovel -board. ALFRED WELBY.

Carlton Club.

PROVERB : " LET THE WEAKEST GO TO THE WALL." The following may be worth noting from ' Rambles round Edge Hill,'
 * by the Rev. George Miller, 1896 :

" Shotteswell Church, Warwickshire. On the north and west sides of the north aisle the old stone seats against the wall of the church remain . In those days there were no seats in the midst of 'the church, and the congregation stood or knelt . When the clergyman commenced his sermon he 'Used to say ' Let the weakest go to the wall ' ; hence the proverb now so strangely perverted .from its original meaning."

W. B. H.

DEFOE AND ALEXANDER SELKIRK. The that, " despite some apocryphal stories, there is nothing to show that Defoe knew anything of Selkirk beyond what had been published by Rogers, Cooke, and Steele." "The following documents in an extra- illustrated copy of Robinson's ' History of Stoke Newington ' (1820), belonging to Mr. Aleck Abraham, seem to throw some doubt on the above statement :
 * D.N.B.' in the article on Selkirk states

Portland House.

Thursday Evg. My Dear Mr. Lunell,

My dear Wife has copied the mem. about De &oe for you, & I now send it.

I trust Mrs. Lunell & yourself were not knocked tip with our long " palaver " Tuesday ! Ever Sincerely,

RICHARD BALL.

(Memo, after a conversation with Mr. W. P. Lunell, May, 1834, E. A.)

Joseph Beck (the Father of Joseph, the hus- band of the well-known Mary Beck) built the

'house at Frenchay. The wife of the elder Joseph Beck survived him ; she had three hus- bands, Jos. Beck, Caysgarne, and lastly

Daniells, and survived them all. This Mrs. Danielle lived at a corner house in James's


 * Square, Bristol (the corner diagonally opposite

the entrance from the Barton) ; there she was visited by Alexander Selkirk, then recently

returned from his solitary abode in the Island of Juan Fernandez ; there also she was accustomed

t to entertain Daniel De Foe. It was in her house i

that Selkirk gave De Foe an account of his adventures, &c., from which De Foe drew up a narrative of Selkirk which was published. Many years later, De Foe wrote and published his romance of ' Robinson Crusoe,' the notion of which was suggested by Selkirk's narrative. The romance speedily supplanted the genuine work, and while the existence of the latter is now hardly known, the former is still among the most popular of books.

A gentleman (name forgotten) who was accus- tomed to meet Selkirk at Mrs. Daniells's sent a paper to The Gentleman's Magazine containing a very specific account of what he heard from him.

In addition to Cowper's well-known poem, there is another entitled * Jwan Fernandez,' by Patrick Branwell Bronte, the MS. of which was offered for sale by a London firm in 1914. J. ARDAGH.

35 Church Avenue, Drumcondra, Dublin.

MONUMENTS IN SYDNEY. Monuments to the following are found in Sydney, New South Wales.

1. Life-size statue on square base in Wynyard Park :

John Dunmore Lang, D.D. Patriot and Statesman.

Born 1799 at

Greenock, Scotland.

Died 1878 at

Sydney.

2. Life-size statue on base facing Queen Square :

The Right Honourable

William Bede Dalley, P.C.,

Scholar, Statesman,

Patriot.

3. Life-size statue on base :

Captain Cook

Born at Marton, Yorkshire, 1728.

Discovered this Territory, 1770.

Killed at Owhyhee, 1779.

J. W. FAWCETT. Consett, co. Durham.

HEREDITY : LONG HAIR. Dean Stanley considered that Richard II.' s eyes had been transmitted to members of Queen Victoria's family ; the tresses of the heroine of Coven- try would seem to have had a yet longer passage through the centuries. A lady who claims to be a descendant of Leofric of Mercia and the famous Godiva, writes thus in The Guardian of May 15, 1919 :

" Unusually long and abundant hair still prevail? in our family. In youth, my mother's hair reached her ankles, and she had scarcely a grey hair when she died at the age of eighty-three. The hair of one of my aunts measured 6 ft., and trailed several inches on the ground behind her. Four of my sisters and myself, when young women, had hair which fell well below our knees, shrouding us like thick mantles ; and now that I am in my seventieth year my hair is as long and almost as abundant as ever, and absolutely refuses to turn grey. Two or