Page:Notes and Queries - Series 12 - Volume 9.djvu/243

 12 s. ix. SEPT. 3, i92L] NOTES AND QUERIES. 197 his elegant Epistle to Abraham Ortelius, they live most on white meats. Fuller, 'Worthies,' vol. ii. (1811), p. 554,! in enumerating the manufactures of Wales, says of cheeses : Such as are made in this Country are very tender and palatable ; and once one merrily (without offence, I hope) thus derived the pedigree thereof : Ap Curds, ap Milk,ap Cow,ap Grasse,ap Earth." Foxes are said to be the best Tasters of the fine- ness of Flesh, Flies of the sweetest Grapes, and Mice of the tenderest Cheese ; and the last (when they could compass Choise in that kind) have given their Verdict for the goodness of the Welch. j What should be the reason that so many people should have such an Antipathic against Cheese (more then any one manner of meat) I leave to the skilfull in the Mysteries of Nature to decide. EDWARD BENSLY. of 'Dreamthorp' (1906): "Dreamthorp, with its old castle and its lake, is, of course, Linlithgow." All the same I cannot find that Alexander Smith ever resided there, though he must often have seen it. H. M. CHARTERS MACPHERSON. When I was a boy of thirteen, I used to sit in the same church in Glasgow as the author of ' Dreamthorp.' It was the opinion of those who knew him then, that Linlithgow, with its palace and lake, was the prototype of Dreamthorp. HENRY FAULDS. Editor of Dactylography. ENGLISH RAILINGS IN AMERICA (12 S. ix. 50, 130). I examined these railings care- fully in 1901, having been told in New York that originally the top end of each was in the form of a crown, but that during the War of Independence these crowns had- been knocked off. There must be some hundreds of "rails," and the work of removing the crowns was thorough, for not one was left, but the process Would not be arduous as the fractures clearly show the material of the railings is cast iron. Thus a blow or two of a hammer or a large stone probably sufficed. ALFRED S. E. ACKERMANN. DANCE OF SALOME (12 S. ix. 150). According to Jusserand's ' English Way- faring Life,' pp. 214-215 (where also are two illustrations), at Clermont-Ferrand in stained glass in the cathedral (thirteenth century) Salome dances on knives which she holds with each hand, she also having her head downwards. At Verona she is represented on the most ancient of thfc bronze gates of St. Zeno (ninth century) bending backwards and touching her feet with her hands. She may be seen in the same posture in several MSS. in the British Museum (e.g., MS. Addit. 29704, fol. 11 (fourteenth- century), and MS. 10 Ed. IV., where are minstrels playing on instruments and a professional dancing girl who performs head downwards balancing on the points of two swords). Salome is also shown dancing upside down before Herod in glass in the Chapter House at York, at St. Denys, and in the St. John Baptist window at Bourges. Mrs. Jameson's ' His- tory of Our Lord,' i. 299, states that the same subject is carved over one of the doors of Rouen Cathedral. JOHN A. KNOWLES. well remember making a careful examination, in 1872, of the thirteenth-century glass in the windows of the south transept of Lin- coln Cathedral. In one light was a group of two figures, described by the verger as Salome dancing before Herod. The lady was depicted as turning head-over-heels, but whether backward or forward I cannot remember. It may be said that the inter- pretation of such groups depends upon the taste and fancy of the verger, for in the same window is a group of three upright figures. Asked for an explanation of this group the verger candidly admitted that he could not give one, but added : " To visitors we describe it as Moses and Aaron before Pharaoh." K. S. PETTY FRANCE (12 S. viii. 407,452, 477; 12 S. ix. 95). MR. W. R. DAVIES asks, " What are the facts ? " re the translation of " Petty France " to " York Street." In stating it was so called after Frederick, Duke of York, son of George the Second, I was quoting Besant's smaller ' Westminster.' th Fascination of London " series. Besant, in his turn, quoted, I believe. Mackenzie Walcott's ' Memorials of West- minster,' but at the moment I am unable to see this book. Wheatley and Cunningham ascribe the name to the fact tha* John Sharp, Arch- bishop of York, lived there in 1708. It seems to me quite possible that all these authorities are wrong. John Rocque's map, ' London in 1741-5,' gives the street
 * ' Adams iiawn. Cusson was her by her birth ;