Page:Notes and Queries - Series 12 - Volume 7.djvu/239

 12 a viz. SEPT. 4, i92o.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

195

not occur before 1905 in any of the records at either House of Parliament. In two formal documents only does it find place. Lord Beaconsfield with manifest inaccuracy described himself in the Treaty of Berlin -as " Prime Minister of England," and on Dec. 2, 1905, King Edward VII. by sign manual warrant gave to the Prime Minister place and precedence after the Archbishop of York. Since that time the term " Prime Minister " has appeared in the formal proceedings of Parliament. Lord North -as unknown to the Constitution (Lecky's ' History of England,' v. p. 19). Mr. Glad- stone seemed inclined to evade its use. Thus in a memorandum dated April 22, 1880, he writes in relation to the formation of a Ministry in that year :
 * always disclaimed the title of Prime Minister

" Harlington in reply to His Majesty, made becoming acknowledgments, and proceeded to say. . . .he had not had any direct communication with me, but he had reason to believe I would not take any office or post in the Government except that of first Minister." (Morley's ' Life of Gladstone,' ii. p. 622).

J. G. SWIFT MACNEILL. 17 Pembroke Road, Dublin.

F. H. G. will find both Prime Minister -and Premier very exhaustively discussed at 8 S. x. 357, 438; xi. 69, 151, 510; xii. 55, 431 ; 9 S. ii. 99 ; iii. 15, 52, 109, 273, 476; iv. 34; v. 94, 213, 416; 10 S. ix. 425 ; x. 287 ; and xii. 18. In these references is traced the use of both terms from the earliest point to 1909, when Prime Minister was first officially accepted as a title by the House of Commons, the position Laving been formally recognized and ac- corded special precedence by King Ed- ward VII. four years before.

ALFEED BOBBINS.

P~ When I was in Australia, in the first decade of this century, the word " Premier " always implied the chief Minister of one of the six Australian states, the term " Prime Minister " being reserved for the head of the "Commonwealth ministry. G. H. WHITE*. 23, Weighton Road, Anerley.

THE " 'UMBLE " COMMONS : "REVENUE ' ' '(12 S. vii. 170). May I venture to remind Q. V. that "an humble" has been enshrined in modern verse? It was in 1897 little inore than twenty years ago that Kipling, in his famous ' Recessional,' wrote :

Still stands thine ancient sacrifice, An humble and a contrite heart.

It may possibly have been the usual habit of politicians of a past generation to pronounce "revenue" with the stress on the second syllable. At all events Mr. Gladstone did so, for I well remember hearing him speak in the House of Commons, and being struck by his pronunciation of the word. J. R. H.

When I was at school a little over seventy years ago, I was taught not to aspirate the words "humble," "herb," "heir," and, I think, "hospital." O. S. T.

CARDINAL ALEANDER'S EPITAPH (12 S. vii. 131). The epitaph was written by Cardinal Girolamo Aleandro (1480-1542), Archbishop of Brindisi. Burton quotes the Latin version in the ' Anatomy of Melancholy,' 2, 3, 5. " Excessi e vitae aerumnis facilisque lubensque,

Ne pejora ipsa morte dehinc videam, I left this irksome life with all mine heart, Lest worse then death should happen to my part.

Cardinal Brundusinus caused this Epitaph in Rome to be inscribed on his tomb, to shew his willingness to dye, and taxe those that were so loth to depart."

A marginal reference is given to " Chytreua deliciis Europse." The epitaph is to be found on pp. 8, 9 of the 3rd edition (1606) of Chytraeus's book, among the inscriptions from Rome. The date of birth is there given as 1479 (? = 1479-80). Paolo Giovio ' Elogia doctorum virorum,' xcviii, says that he was buried "in aede Transtyberina divo Chrysogo.no dedicata " having given in- structions in his will that the Greek couplet of which Giovio only gives the Latin rendering, should form part of his epitaph. S. Crisogono was the church from which he took his cardinal's title.

Roscoe, 'Leo the Tenth,' vol. ii. (1853), note 237, gives an English version of the Greek lines,

Without reluctance I resign my breath,

To shun the sight of what is worse than death,

adding that :

" It may be doubted, whether he meant to refer to the rapid progress of the Reformation, or to the licentiousness and scandalous abuses of the Roman court under Paul III."

EDWARD BENSLY. Much Hadham, Herts.

BAR (12 S. vii. 110, 136, 154). The des- cription of the arms of the Comtes de Bar given in your last issue suggests that Henry Comte de Bar who married the daughter of Edward I. in 1293 had a kinsman in England in the person of Sir John de Bar. The same arms, with a bordure for difference, were*