Page:Notes and Queries - Series 12 - Volume 9.djvu/195

 12 s. ix. AUG. 20, i92i.] NOTES AND QUERIES. 157 mattered were the tenants of the Crown. MB. GRIFFITH is clearly right in his main contention ; but so far as he attempts to explain the phrase he is less satisfying. What is the construction ? Why is the preposition ' ; in " used and in what sense ? It may be suggested that a frequent sense of '' in " is " by way of," " as." A main meaning of caput, chef, capo is " beginning" ; we see it in capo a" anno, da capo, " capital letters," with which we begin a sentence, and in the " capital " with which we " begin " business. A tenant-in-chief might thus be morely an " initial " or " primary " tenant, coming therefore next to the lord. Feudal tenure was pictured, aptly enough, as a chain, every link being, as we still say, '' dependent " on another. As mere renderings of the force of in capite the adjectives ;t direct " and " imme- diate " are never wrong ; but possibly " primary " adheres more closely to the original metaphor. It would not be without interest to trace the history of " commander-in-chief " and see whether it refers to supreme control of other soldiers (as every one now assumes) or to coming immediately under the Crown. Probably it is too modern for the feudal sense. OLD SARUM. Sicco PEDE (12 S. ix. 109). I suggest that when Linnaeus says " we pass over the dwarf birch, which is well known in the north of Europe, sicco pede" he means " cur- sorily, and without wading through what is already familiar." The Latin recalls Virgil's account of Camilla at the end of the seventh Aeneid, and Ovid's line, ' Met. ,' xiv. 50 : summaque decurrit pedibus super aequora siccis. B. B. Sicco pede transire or praeterire is a well- known piece of modern Latin for which, it seems, no classical authority can be pro- duced. The phrase is certainly not confined to Sweden. See J. P. Krebs, ' Antibarbarus der Lateinischen Sprache,' 7th ed., revised by J. H. Schmalz, Basel, 1907, vol. ii., p. 295, where it is suggested that the modern Latin levi pede aliquid transire and sicco pede aliquid transire may have been formed on the analogy of " obiurgare aliquem molli brachio," Cic., * Ep. ad Att.,' ii. 1, 6, " con- sules, qui illud levi brachio egissent," t6.,iv. 17, 3, and "levi manu quaerimus," Seneca, ' Quaest. nat.' vii. 32, 4. May not the figurative use of " sicco pede transire " this or a similar expression to describe the I miraculous crossing of the sea dryshod ? For instance, Ovid, ' Metamorphoses,' xiv. 50, writes of Circe, " summaque de- j currit pedibus super aequora siccis," and, in the Vulgate of Judith, chap. v. 12, we ! read of the passage of the Red Sea, " Ut. . . I pede sicco fundum maris perambulando transirent." EDWARD BENSLY. Much Hadham, Herts. ' Miss CHOKER ' BY SIR THOMAS LAW- RENCE (12 S. ix. 90). This portrait, which j is in Lawrence's best style, was first exhibited I in 1827. The subject of it, Rosamund Hester Elizabeth Croker, was then 17. She was the adopted daughter of the Rt. Hon. John William Croker and his wife, who was I her aunt. Her father was William Pennell, j Consul-General in Brazil. Her portrait made ! a great furore at the time of its exhibition. in 1906. I cannot recall the exact date of her death. The Lawrence portrait is, I believe, in the Pierpont Morgan collection. W. COURTHOPE FORMAN. MR. T. C. RUSSELL PARSONS could pro- bably obtain full information about Miss Croker from Madame Aidan, a nun at the Convent of the Assumption, St. Lawrence- on-Sea, Thanet, who is, I believe, a grand- daughter. H. A. PIEHLER. GLEANING BY THE POOR (12 S. ix. 70, 112, 136). What put an end to gleaning on large farms was not so much the decreased price of bread as the introduction of the horse-rake, which cleared the ground much more thoroughly than the old " bonny rake " (worked by hand) and left nothing worth gleaning. The loss of their old privilege was, as I well remember, much resented by the poor. In the Isle of Axholme, where small holdings abound and the hand-rake is largely used, gleaning still persists, or did so a very few years since. C. C. B. The admirable account of gleaning given on pp. 112 to 115 leaves few gaps to fill. The causes which have led to the decline in gleaning seem to be mechanical and economic rather than anything in the way of legal obstruction. The horse-rake re- duced the possible spoil of the most active gleaner to slender dimensions ; and the value of the grain salved makes a low appeal
 * have been promoted by the employment of
 * In 1832 Miss Croker married Sir George
 * Barrow, Bart. She was living at Molesey