Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 10.djvu/295

 x. OCT. 11, 1902.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

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copied, but in his note Lysons has made a mistake. The baronetcy of 1702 was created in favour of the illegitimate son of the poet and dramatist, who, like his father, was named Charles. He married Frances, daughter of Sir Richard Newdigate, Bart., of Arbury, and died in 1727. He was succeeded by a son of the same name, who married Elizabeth, daughter of William Frith, of Nuthall, co. Notts. Esq., and died in 1729/30, leaving a son Charles, who succeeded as third baronet and died unmarried at Nuthall in 1781, when the baronetcy became extinct.

There was, however, another branch of this family, who were descended from Sir Isaac Sedley, of Great Chart, co. Kent. This gentleman was knighted at Enfield, 6 Dec., 1606, and was created a baronet on 14 Sept., 1627. The fifth baronet was Sir John Sedley, a younger son of Sir John Sedley, second baronet, who succeeded his nephew Charles in 1702. It is, I think, this gentleman whose burial is recorded in the register of St. Pan eras. He married Mary Nicholls, of Keirising, co. Kent, and left a son George, who suc- ceeded to the baronetcy. The family seems to have fallen in social status, and it is, I think, to the last holder of the baronetcy that Park alludes in a note to the pedigree of Waad in his ' History of Hampstead,' p. 137, as an instance of vicissitudes of families : " The baronet family of Sedley in Kent ended in a Sir Sedley, an upholsterer in Lon- don." This was probably Sir Charles Sedley, who was younger son of Sir George Sedley, sixth baronet, and succeeded his brother George in the baronetcy. He also died un- married, and the dignity became extinct, but the family had sunk so low that neither Courthope nor any other authority whom I have consulted is able to give dates.

W. F. PRIDEAUX.

RETARDED GERMINATION OF SEEDS. On several occasions the attention of readers of ' N. & Q.' has been directed to the vitality of seeds after having been long^ buried in the earth. A curious example of this is mentioned in the late Mr. W. E. Shuckard's ' British Bees ' (1866). It may at the present time be the more interesting to some persons because the observation was made on the day when our late Queen was crowned. I quote the passage, premising that what the writer calls the common mustard was probably the char- lock or wild mustard, Sinapis arvensis :

"A quantity of soil had been removed from the City, where an artesian well was being bored, and consequently from varying depths, and carted thence and cast upon the edge of the river bank at Battersea. The following season, from this soil, a

thick and prodigious quantity of the common mus- tard plant shot up, and when in flower I happened to be collecting near the spot on the day of our gracious Queen's coronation, when I captured multi- tudes of a splendid large Allantus, entirely new to the British fauna, and a choice addition to collec- tions. This ground had been hunted at all seasons through all botanical and entomological time, and neither had the mustard plant been found there before nor had the insect. Whence did they come?"-?. 223.

ASTARTE.

Qturies*

WE must request correspondents desiring infor- mation on family matters of only private interest to affix their names and addresses to their queries, in order that the answers maybe addressed to them direct.

ST. PANCRAS : ARMS OF THE BOROUGH. From a card describing a handsome mace recently presented to the borough I take the following description :

" The coat of arms exhibits in the first quartering a fimbriated cross (the name of the borough being taken from its patron saint and martyr). The second and third quarterings are taken from the arms of Lewes, which town was the first in England to consecrate a church to the memory of St. Pancras. The fourth quartering consists of the arms of the county of Middlesex, of which the borough of St. Pancras is a constituent. The escutcheon of pretence bears the figure of St. Pancras as shown on the seal of the Corporation. The crest repre- sents the sun rising in splendour, having reference to the early rise of Christianity in the borough. The lambrequin or mantling is taken from the principal colours in the coat. The motto, ' Con- stans justitiam moniti' ('Persevering in justice with moderation ')"

The motto and its translation surprise me. I fail to see how it can translate at all as a portion of an intelligible Latin sentence, and moniti does not and cannot mean " with moderation." One is aware that Latin is not a municipal desideratum nowadays, but one does not see why the authorities should flaunt their ignorance of it in this per- petual way. Perhaps some explanation is forthcoming. Meanwhile, I should like to know (1) who made this motto ; (2) why the borough did not take competent advice, which would have cost them nothing.

V. R.

PURCELL FAMILY. I am engaged in an attempt to establish the ancestry of the great Henry Purcell, and have amassed consider- able material, but am somewhat handicapped by being unable to come to London. Can any London or other reader supply information beyond that in Cummings's 'Life of Purcell"? His baptism entry (circ, 1658) is nearly cer- tain to be in some London register, but has