Page:Notes and Queries - Series 12 - Volume 9.djvu/523

 12 s. ix. NOV. 26, i92i.] NOTES AND QUERIES. 429 Jennings, 63, Cheapside, with the following informative title : To the Parishoners of the Parish of St. Thomas the Apostle in the City of London. This view of their Doomed Churchyard, as it appears this 2nd Day of Axigust in the year of our Lord God 1848, is inscribed by their affectionate Friend and Pastor, who sincerely sympathizes with them in their Grief and Indignation at the contemplated ap- propriation of consecrated ground to unhallowed purposes. H. B. WILSON, D.D., Rector. The Rev. Harry Bristow Wilson was very active in the attempted preservation of the rights of the parishioners and was also the author of : 1. A Letter to the Parishioners of .St. Thomas the Apostle in the City of London, 1826, 4to, 16pp. 2. Second Letter, ditto, to which is prefixed The Report of His Majesty's Commissioners for inquiring concerning Charities so far as relates to Charitable Devises, &c., in the Parish of St. Tho- mas the Apostle, 1829, 4to, 23 pp. 3. The Case of the Rector of St. Thomas the Apostle, in the City of London, with his Parishioners, 8vo, 1849. Unfortunately his best efforts were useless. His writings on other churches are numer- ous and useful, notably his ' History of St. Lawrence Pountney.' ALECK ABRAHAMS. WE must request correspondents desiring in- formation on family matters of only private interest to affix their names and addresses to their queries in order that answers may be sent to them direct. ROBERT DINWIDDIE OF VIRGINIA : POR- TRAIT WANTED. I am anxious to know the whereabouts of the portrait of Robert Dinwiddie, Lieutenant-Governor of Virginia 1751-1758, who died at Bristol in 1770, painted by Allan Ramsay, which was last heard of in 1883 in the possession of Mrs. M. A. Dinwiddie, widow of General Gilbert Hamilton Dinwiddie. PAXTON. THOMAS TYNDALL, " THE HONEST LAW- YER." I should be glad of information respecting the ancestry of Thomas Tyndall, who was known as " the Honest Lawyer." Born on Jan. 13, 1781, at Hollo way Head, near Birmingham, he practised in that city for many years ; married, in 1812, Hannah, daughter of P. H. Witton, and died on Jan. 15, 1868. LAURANCE M. WTJLCKO. 142, Kinfauns Road, Goodmayes, Essex. I NIGGER SONG OR ENGLISH FOLK SONG ? A few days ago I was at a party to which a professional singer came a baritone. His last song was a kind of ballad with the following refrain : Pullee off your old coat, Rollee up your sleeve, Life is a hard road to travel. Pullee off your old coat, Rollee up your sleeve, Life is a hard road to travel, I believe. At the close of it, I asked the vocalist where he had got it, and he answered " From such and such a collection " I forget which but from one of the collec- tions made in these modern times by such delightful persons as Baring Gould, Cecil Sharpe, &c. " When I knew that song," said I, "it was a nigger song ; it came over from the States in the same ship as * Poor Uncle Ned,' and that's more than 60 years ago. Lads at their work or in the streets of our little town used to sing it plentifully, but the chorus ran a little differently, though the tune was the same. It went thus : Pullee off yo' ole coat, Rollee up yo' sleeve, Jordan am a hard road to trabil. Pullee off yo' ole coat, Rollee up yo'. sleeve, Jordan am a hard road to trabil, I believe. The last two words were sung fortissimo, with a burst sometimes of many voices. I do not know if the ballad itself was approxi- mately the same the words of the chorus are all I remember. Will some of your readers say ? Note " Jordan " it speaks volumes ; a hard road is the road through the wilder- ness to Jordan and the Promised Land. CHARLES SWYNNERTON. VERLAINE AT STICKNEY. I am sur- prised and interested to learn from Mr. Ralph NevilPs ' May fair and Montmartre ' (pp. 187, 188) that some time in the sixties or seventies of last century this extra- ordinary being was one of the masters at Stickney Grammer School, Boston, Lincoln- shire. He taught French, Latin and drawing for a year and a half, apparently quite to the satis- faction of the headmaster. At that period of his life he appears to have lived quietly absorbed by his tutorial duties. Can any correspondent of ' N. & Q.' give further information as to the poet's bearing in Lincolnshire, and does any one of them owe some of his French, Latin or drawing to Verlaine ? fcgjk ST. SWITHIN.