Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 1.djvu/399

 9 th S. I. MAY 14, '98.]

NOTES AND QUERIES.

391

monument is so blocked up with others that it is impossible carefully to examine its de- tails. There is an engraved portrait of her in Lodge's 'Portraits,' said to be from the original picture in the "collection of the Right Honourable the Earl of Derby al Knowsley," but no artist's name is affixed The preceding portrait is that of her third husband, Thomas Stanley, Earl of Derby, by Holbein, and from the same collection. He, as is well known, turned the tide of battle in favour of Henry, Earl of Richmond, at Bos- worth Field in 1485. Standing at the side of the tomb of this benevolent lady, I could not help thinking of the different condition of the tomb (in the presbytery of St. David's Cathe- dral) of her first husband, Edmund Tudor, Earl of Richmond, who died in 1456, to whom she was married for little more than a year, and whom she survived for the long period of forty- three years, though not in a state of widowhood. It is thus described in Murray's
 * Handbook to the Welsh Cathedrals ':

"The altar-tomb is of Purbeck marble, having side panels ornamented with small shallow quatre- foils in a kind of reticulation. Each panel had a shield of arms in the centre; but all disappeared during the great rebellion, together with the brass on the top of the tomb, shields at the corners, an inscription at the feet of the figure, and others on the verge and at the end. The tomb has, however, been entirely restored. The armorial bearings of the earl, of his countess (the Lady Margaret Beau- fort), and of other members of their families have been emblazoned in enamel on copper shields on the panels, and on the four corners of the covering slab, in which copies of the original inscriptions and a full-length figure intended to represent Edmund Tudor have been inserted. The cost of this very complete restoration was borne by Mr. Lucy [t. e., the Rev. John Lucy, Rector of Hampton-Lucy], the munificent donor of the mosaics in the eastern triplet." Pp. 168-9.

The earl is styled " Father and Brother to Kings." The enamelling on the shields is very beautiful, and the heraldry a perfect study. JOHN PICKFORD, M.A.

Newbourne Rectory, Woodbridge.

While most cordially sympathizing with MR. THOMAS in part of his article I cannot agree with him in all of it. I have long wished that somebody would take up the subject of the awful vulgarizing and debasing of Westminster Abbey by the wholesale cram- ming it with monuments utterly unsuitable in every possible way. I cordially wish that something akin to the covered cemetery at Lucerne or the Campo Santo of the Italians could be devised to relieve our beautiful abbey from the crowd of monuments which are rapidly reducing it to something like a statuary's yard. To take one instance

out of hundreds. I yield to no one in my admiration for the late Lord Beaconsfield; but why on earth should there be a statue of him outside the Abbey and a sort of miniature replica of it within? On the other hand, I cannot sympathize with MR. THOMAS in his objection to stained-glass windows. Even Milton loves the

storied windows richly dight, Casting a dim religious light.

Possibly, too, MR. THOMAS may never have been at St. Saviour's in old days, when the glaring light of midday has at times forced me to move my seat. Can churches be too glorious for the honour of God and the refreshment and elevation of those who dwell in some of the dismal alleys of South- wark, and to whom the glories of such a church must be a kind of revelation?

CHARLOTTE G. BOGER. Chart Button.

"SELION" (9 th S. i. 204). In my former communication on this subject I accidentally omitted Minsheu's account of the word. It is as follows :

"Selion (Selio) diet, a Gal. Seillon, i. Porca. terra elata inter duos sulc9s, a Ridge of a land, with its it is taken for land, and is of no certaine quantitie, but sometime more, sometime lesse. West. part. 2. Symb. tit. Recouerie, sect. 3. Crompt. in his lurisdict. fol. 221, saith that a Selion of land cannot be in demand, because it is a thing vncertaine."

C. C. B.

Mr. Seebohm's description of selion is hopelessly involved. He seems to have con- fused selion with balk. A selion is a roughly cut acre of the proper shape for ploughing, the selions being separatee! from each other by balks, or strips of unploughed land. See Blashill's * Sutton-in-Holderness.'

JOHN HEBB. Canonbury, N.

MEAD : BRIGHT ALE : WELSH ALE : SWEET WELSH ALE (9 th S. i. 265). That the brewing 3f mead was at one time a very important business is proved by what Froissart relates of " Jaques Dartuell, governor of Flaunders," and of his son Philip. He says :

' In the towne of Gaunt there was a man a maker of hony, called Jaques Dartuell. He was entered into such fortune and grace of the people that he might commaunde what he would through all Flaunders." Froissart, Pynson, 1523, f. 17 verso.

As is well known, the English Queen Philippa was godmother to the son of this Jaques, and he was called Philip, after her. When he commanded the citizens of Antwerp to sub- mit to his rule they taunted him with his ather's business and said " howe they set but