Page:Notes and Queries - Series 12 - Volume 8.djvu/387

 i2s.v,ir.APHiLi6.i92i.] NOTES AND QUERIES. 317 health and long-life (besides the Judgment of learned Physitians) Experience does fully prove it, in those places where it is much used : The story of a rich Landlord, who would never let Leases for lives to any that were Cider drinkers, is some- what to the purpose : he concluded (from Experi- ence) such were like to live to long, so was not willing to meddle with them upon such termes." I do not know if this ' Treatise ' is rare. I found it bound in with newspapers of 1657 in the Burney Collection in the British Museum. NOBAH RICHARDSON. Red Hous?, Wilton, Salisbury. There can be little doubt but that cider is beneficial in the treatment of rheumatism and its kindred complaints. But, of course, the cider must be pure. Mr. C. W. Radcliffe Cooke, the great authority on cider, in his book on ' Cider and Perry,' Fays cider and perry owe their wholesomeness in a great measure to the malic acid contained in pears and apples. He adds : The acid of wine is tartaric, which, when combined with lime, an ingredient to be found in most articles of food, forms precipitates or insoluble particles which are, I am given to understand, the principal cause of gout, rheu- matism and kindred disorders. Malic acid, in itself a health-giving product, has no power to form such precipitates, and it is possibly for this reason that cider and perry acre now so often recommended to gouty people. Mr. Radcliffe Cooke quotes John Evelyn and William Hutton, the historian of Bir- ming am, in support of his contention. It is said that cases of gravel are practically unknown among cider drinkers, and in Normandy, where cider constitutes the staple drink of the people, gout is said to be unknown. Gravel and stone are likewise very rare, and medical men are satisfied that the immunity from both these forms of disease should be placed to the credit of the liquors mentioned. A Somerset writer sings its praises in this direction : Wold Zam could never goe vur long Wi'out his jar ov virkin ; A used the aider zame's twur ile To keep his jints vrim quirken. W. G. WILLIS WATSON. Single's Lodge, Pinhoe, Exeter. THE GOLDEN BALL (12 S. viii. 268). I cannot trace a tavern of this name in Southampton Street, St. Giles's, but in that respect others possibly may be able to supply fuller information. The mere title does not necessarily signify a tavern, especially in 1700, when balls as a sign were in common use, frequently in combination with other objects. The early! silk-mercers adopted a golden globe, or ball, as their sign, because in the Middle i Ages all silk was brought from the East, 1 and more, particularly from Byzantium and the imperial manufactories there. (Constantino the Great had adopted a golden globe PS the emblem of his imperial dignity.) Balls of various colours were invariably the signs of quacks and fortune- tellers in the eighteenth century. See Larwood's ' History of Signboards.' H. A. SMITH. 13, Sixth Avenue, Manor Park, E.I 2. THE ROMAN NUMERAL ALPHABET (12 S. viii. 250). Du Cange in his ' Glossarium ad Scriptores Mediae et Infimae Latinitatis ' gives the following numbers, quoting Baro- nius and other writers in support. A stroke over the letter multiplies by 1,000. A = 500 K = 150 R = 80 B = 300 or 151 S = 70 C = 100 L = 50 or 7 D = 500 M =1,000 T = 160 E = 250 N = 90 V = 5 F =: 40 or 900 W = 19 G = 400 O = 11 X = 10 H = 200 P = 400 Y = 150 I = 100 or 7 or 159 or 1 Q = 500 Z = 2,000 or 400 J. DE C. L. QUEEN ELIZABETH'S STATUE, ST. DUN- STAN' S-IN-THE- WEST (10 S. ix. 103; 12 S. viii. 294). Sir W. P. Treloar, in ' Ludgate Hill : Past and Present,' states that the statue of Elizabeth was placed in a niche of the outer wall of St. Dunstan's Church, Fleet Street, where it remains. The figures of the family of Lud were presented to Sir Francis Gosling, who meant to re-erect them at the east end (sic) of the same church, but somehow they were stowed away in the parish bone-house, where they remained till the Marquis of Hertford bought them, and along with the old St. Dunstan's clock and its two giants that struck the hour on a bell took them to his villa at Regent's Park. Allen, in his 'History of London' (1839), describing Ludgate, says: On the east side of the gate were three niches in which were the effigies of King Lud and his two sons, and on the west side that of Queen Elizabeth. When the gates of this city were taken down, Sir Francis Gosling obtained these statues from the city, with the intention to set them up at the west end of St. Dunstan's Church, Fleet Street, but there was only room for one, Queen Elizabeth. The remainder were consigned to the bone-house, where they remain at present (1839). F. A. RUSSELL. 116, Arran Road, S.E.