Page:Notes and Queries - Series 12 - Volume 7.djvu/288

 236

NOTES AND QUERIES. [12 S.VII.SEPT.I 8,1920.

OWEN McSwiNY (12 S. vii. 190). Owen McSwiney or Swinoy (d. 1754), playwright and theatrical manager is mentioned in the 'D.N.B.'

Another portrait of him was painted in 1737 by J. B. Vanloo, and engraved in mezzotint by J. Faber, jun. in 1752. George Vertue makes the following reference to MacSwiney (B. M. Vertue MSS. Add. 23076, f. 48) :

" At first here to show his skill he (i.e. Vanloo) began with . . . .the picture of Mr Swiney another noted man about playhouses, operas, &c., in his white or grey hair, this Swiney also many years ago proposed a Subscription for several paintings of Vandykes of Noblemen, &c., to be engraved by Van Gunst in Holland, ten of them were done and more proposed, but however he failed in this project, he of late years got into another of having large desseins drawn by several eminent Painters abroad in France and Italy, and had them engraved by the best Engravers, several of these being done and the prints representing the mausoleum heroic or Monumental actions of the renowned great Noblemen and Others in England a work certainly of great expen.ce."

These ventures may have been responsible for MacSwiney's bankruptcy when, as the 'D.N.B.' tells us, he had to take refuge abroad, returning to London in 1735.

I find that Vertue includes the name of "Mr. Swiney, Player," in the list of sub- scribers to Sir Godfrey Kneller's Academy of Painting, in Great Queen Street, in 1711. This was doubtless Owen MacSwiney.

Mr. W. G. Strickland ('Dictionary of Irish Artists,' article on 'Robert Crone'), mentions a third portrait of Owen MacSwiney by Crone, in his picture " 'The Ship Cabin' painted in Italy for Lord Boyne, repre- senting Owen McSwiney, Robert Wood and others in the cabin of the yacht in which Lord Boyne sailed to the Levant."

Can someone tell me which Lord Boyne thi? was I Crone does not seem to have been born before about 1730. I have a note of his arrival in Rome in 1755, but if he painted MacSwiney (d. 1754) in Italy, Crone must have arrived in that country before this date. Mr. Strickland says that he went to Italy in 1760.

(Mrs.) HILDA F. FINBERG.

47 Holland Road, W.I 4.

THE HEDGES or ENGLAND ( 12 S. vii. 190, 216). The reply to "Viator" clearly turns upon the fact that the common-field system, which was general until the close of the eighteenth century, did not need nearly so many fences. Lord Ernie ('English Farming: Past and Present ') says: "The

pages appropriated to hedges by agricultural writers of the eighteenth century indicate the era of the abolition of open fields, and the minuteness of the instruction proves that the art of making hedges was still in its infancy."

On the other hand Evelyn devotes Chapter XX of ' Sylva,' running to 15 folio pages, to " Fences, " Quick-sets, &c.," and Gervase Markham, his contemporary, has quite a lot to say about the excellence of " quickwood _^ fences. f*

In an age which cannot regard aesthetic considerations let us be thankful that the hedges of England are useful as wind-screens to cattle in winter, and, if actually existing, are cheaper to keep than to replace with wire or rails ; but the hedgerow elms, which do damage far exceeding their timber- value, are doomed ; many have already gone to assist the new yeomanry^in finding the purchase-money. J-

WILLOW PATTERN CHINA (12 S. vii. 169,. 197, 219). The story of the Willow Pattern China told to me in my childish days was that the daughter of a Chinese Mandarin eloped with her lover. The couple attempted to escape by boat, but were pursued by the- irate father who killed them both, and their souls became transformed into two birds. The oranges and the Pagoda also entered) into the story, but these details have escaped my memory.

The rhyme repeated about the china runs- as follows :

Two swallows flying high ;

A little vessel passing by ;

Iron bridge with palings o'er ;

Three men passing and not four,

Chinese temple there it stands

In a far and foreign land ;

Orange tree with oranges on ;

Iron palings all along.

For variants of the above lines, see the- Saturday Westminster Gazette of Sept. 4 r 1920. L. M. ANSTEY.

THE "'UMBLE COMMONS" (12 S. vii. 170-, 195). In French the letter H is ever silent. In English words of French origin it was equally so until the commencement of the nineteenth century, since when, however, it has been generally aspirated in the word& humble, herb, and hospital. On the other hand the letter H at the commencement of English words of Teutonic and Scandinavian origin, such as hand, house, hammer &c. t has always been aspirated. fa* 'K**w*

Until late last century the letter U in> English words of French origin, such as