Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 11.djvu/21

 9*8. XL JAN. 3, 1903.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

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THE GOLDEN HORN (9 th S. x. 405). In ' Plin. Sec. Opera,' Regent's edition, lib. ix 20, this name is more manifest thar in Master Doctor Holland's translation "Hujus aspectu ^repente territi, semper adversum Byzantii promontoriurn ex ea causa appellatum Aurei cornus, prsecipit petunt agmine. " H. J. MOULE.

Dorchester.

"KIT-CAT" PORTRAITS (9 th S. x. 188, 231 316,435, 471). The Kit-Cat portraits referrec to by MR. PAGE are still in the possession oi the Baker family, and now ornament their drawing-room at Bayfordbury, not Herting- fordbury. MATILDA POLLARD.

Belle Vue, Bengeo.

I believe that the Rev. D. Kitcat, of Weston- Birt Rectory, Tetbury, Gloucestershire, claims to be a descendant of the original Kitcat, and I well remember his telling with glee a story of the mystification of a Bristol stationer, from whom he was ordering some cardboard or canvas *' Kit-cat size," when directed to send it to " Mr. Kitcat," and how he kept repeating, " Yes ; but that is the size of the canvas, now I want your name," believing all the while that he was the subject of a hoax. There are at least four Kitcats in the ' Clerical Directory.' Is there any family of this name in England other than that of the Kitcat Club founder ? W. S s.

LATIN CONVERSATION (9 th S. x. 407, 452). At the latter reference a correspondent mentions several Latin papers. Being interested in the subject, I wrote my book- seller, who informed me that the Phoenix is not known at Red Lion House; and Post Prandium is discontinued. The failure of these two papers published in England would imply that they received little support from English scholars. Perhaps there are others more favoured in circulation. If so, I should be grateful if some correspondent would kindly bring them to my notice. I should also like to know whether I can obtain copies of the American journals through any Lon- don publisher. I have seen Vox Urbis.

THEO. ETHELBERT BEASLEY. Bulbourne, Tring.

MISQUOTATIONS (9 th S. x. 428). To what extent are misquotations allowable? 'Tis a fearsome question, i' faith. The misquotation (innuendo, without exculpatory parenthesis), is it not aye high treason, a misdemeanour punishable by the aristarchs 1 But, with a bracketed caveat, may not the quoter treat his hapless authority as his own sweet will dictates? May he not orthographize,

bowdlerize, hyperbatize, and mangle to his heart's content? On his own head be it; swum cuique ; " tu 1'as voulu, George Dan- din." (Dandin flourishes amazingly in un- parenthesized tutoiement.) And even if a mutely recumbent attitude on the part of tergiversative " Brer Rabbit" appears metony- mically preferable to any vulpine posture, may not the misquoter be al lo wed catachrestically to " pursue the even " tenor of his way, regard- less alike of the lugubrious Gray and of the dark sayings of Uncle Remus ? 'Tis a free country ; and philippics about the verification of quotations fall on deaf ears.

J. DORMER.

I think that C. C. B. is hardly fair to Byron. He is as much spoilt by misquotation as any poet. I might point to many passages in his works which could not be altered without injury being done to him. I will point to one the thirty -four lines in ' The Giaour ' beginning, " As rising on its purple wing." No doubt he sometimes writes very carelessly. But so does Shelley. So does Shakspeare.

E. YARDLEY.

ELIZABETHAN POEM : AUTHOR WANTED (9 th S. x. 489). The quotation is copied, with scrupulous exactness, from the back of leaf 53 of "The Popish Kingdome or reigne of Antichrist written in Latin Verse by Thomas Naogeorgus and Englyshed By Barnabe Googe," printed in 1570.

WALTER W. SKEAT.

THE KING'S WEIGH HOUSE (9 th S. x. 427). The Steelyard in Upper Thames Street, so named probably from the balance or beam of steel employed there in weighing the mer- chandise imported by the German fraternity of Easterling merchants, appears to have been the most -important " weigh house " in the City; but upon the expulsion of these monopolists by Queen Elizabeth, owing to representations of the Company of Merchant Adventurers, their hall was used as a depot
 * or the navy, and the supervision and weigh-

ng of important merchandise were trans- 'erred to the Mayor and Corporation. Conse- quently the " King's Beam," as it was called, was removed first to Cornhill, where there was already a " beam " supervised by the Grocers' Jompany, and afterwards to Weighhouse Yard in Love Lane, Little Eastcheap, where, )efore the Great Fire, stood the church of St. Andrew Hubbert. Here, in a large room iver the Weighhouse, a congregation of ndependents had their "commodious meeting louse " in the early part of the eighteenth entury. From this conventicle the later meeting house called the "King's Weigh-