Page:Notes and Queries - Series 12 - Volume 8.djvu/123

 128. VIII. JAN. 29, 1921.] NOTES AND QUERIES. 99 the double alphabet in which M may be M or R, while W may be W or H, will be found to yield very interesting results. If your questioner desires to know more about the light and dark "A " he is recommended to study Baptiste Porta's * De Furtivis Liter- arum' (1602), and the * Cryptographiae ' of, Gustavus Selenus (1624). E. NESBIT. Well Hall, Eltham, S.E.9. " (12 S. viii. 50). Should not this word be "colter " ? A couter is a common slang word for a sovereign, being derived, according to the * Slang Dictionary ' (John Caraden Hotten, London, 1869) from the Danubian Gipsy word cuta, a gold coin. Illustrations of its use are -given in the 'N.E.D.,' which quotes the 'Slang Dic- tionary ' for its origin. T. F. D. PRINCE CHARLES EDWARD STUART'S SWORDS (12 S. viii. 27). The inscription on the second of the two swords mentioned at this reference would appear not to have been placed thereon by the order of Prince Charles even 11 the sword were presented by him. Not to speak of other serious difficulties, there was no such thing as "the Throne of Great Britain " from the Jacobite point of view. The Act of Union was regarded as a mere nullity, like all post-Revolution legisla- tion, for want of the assent of a lawful king. F. W. READ. FRENCH PRISONERS OF WAR (12 S. vii. 469,517; viii. 38). Your correspondent will find much to interest him in 'The Depot for Prisoners of War at Norman Cross, Huntingdonshire, 1796 to 1816,' by T. J. Walker, M.D. (of Peterborough), Constable & Co., 1913. W. H. WHITEAR, F.R.Hist.S. SCOTT OF ESSEX (7 S. vi. 194 ; 12 S. viii. 11). The late Mr. Golding's MSS. are, I believe, in the possession of the Essex Archaeological Society at their Museum, Colchester Castle. WILLIAM GILBERT. F.R.N.S. AUTHOR OF QUOTATION WANTED. (12 S. viii, 12.) 2. The Observer on January 31, 1915, published a letter signed "Alice Cobbett," and dated from Uckfield, Sussex, from which I append an extract : "Last November the New York Herald pub- lished some verses of mine, in which I emphasised the * Call of the Blood.' I have received in answer the enclosed verses from California. J have no knowledge whatever of the writer." FROM AMERICA. Oh, England, a,t the smoking trenches dying For all the world, We hold our breath, and watch your bright flag:, flying While ours is furled. We who are neutral (yet each lip with fervour The word abjures), Oh, England, never name us the time-server j Our hearts are yours ! We that so glory in your high decision, So trust your goal All Europe in our blood, but yours our vision, Our speech, our soul. J. R. H. 0tt Udimore : Past and Present. By Leonard J.- Hodson. (Robertsb ridge, Sussex, 5s. post free.); THIS pleasant little book deals with a small East Sussex parish consisting of 2,884 acres, with 5 acres of water, having a population at the last census of no more than 416 souls. It lies on a ridge between two valleys north and south on the western side of Rye ; and in the jearliest extant record of it an entry in Domesday Book appears, as the holding of one Reinbert, under the name of Dodimere. The families with which it was most notably associated in the Middle Ages are the Echinghams and the Elringtons. In the sixteenth century it passed to the Windsors, who were followed by the Bromfeilds, as these by the Comptons with whom it remained till" 1843, when it was sold to Thomas Cooper Lang- ford. The name, which cannot be explained with, absolute certainty, and the church are the subject of a legend, of a well-known type. The site first chosen for the church was not acceptable, it seems, to Heaven. Work done by day disappeared during the night, till the watching parishioners beheld a company of angels taking up the materials and conveying them across the water, chanting the while " Over the mere ! Over the mere ! " The church built in legendary days has been replaced by an early English structure small, bare, and plain, thought to be the work of a builder who made other churches in West Sussex. It has ; undergone divers vicissitudes in the way of decay,. of lamentable alteration and restoration and, again, of restoration both careful and affectionate.- It seems to have lost a south aisle, of which no trace remains and has a curious feature in two doors side by side both now walled up. The interior has some interesting detail in the way of carving, but is in general, except for modern colouring, plain. Traces of ancient colour decora- tion have been discovered. Mr. Hodson goes- thoroughly into every detail of it. The monu- mental inscriptions are both more numerous and more interesting than such often are in a church of this character. Our author gives a chapter to the history of the advowson and a list of the Incumbents who for most of the time are styled " Vicars,"