Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 11.djvu/400

 392

NOTES AND QUERIES. PI* s. XL MAY w,

ouvrage, et je ne me suis pas tant trompe. Dans tous les cas, ce que j'ai trouve interessera votre correspondant, a n'en pas douter, comme un a-peu-pres. Voici ce que dit 1'abbe (dans son 'Introduction Generale,' a la p. 63) :

" Le Pere de Ravignan avait done le droit de s'ecrier : ' Pascal, votre ge"nie a commis un grand crime, celui d'etablir une alliance peut-etre in- destructible entre le mensonge et la langue du peuple franc. Vous avez fixe" le dictionnaire de la calomnie, il fait regie encore.'"

D'apres ce qui precede c'est le Pere de Ravignan qui a qualifie Fouvrage de Pascal du mot "mensonge." Je n'ai pas eu le temps de verifier la citation que fait Tabbe May- nard, mais voici 1'iridication qui se trouve en bas de la page ou je 1'ai copiee : " De 1'Existence et de 1'Institut des Jesuites, p. 36, 5 e edit." Votre correspondant, s'il desire pousser plus loin ses recherches, n'a qu'a s'y rapporter. EDWARD LATHAM.

61, Friends' Road, E. Croydon.

ISABELLA COLOUR (9 th S. xi. 49, 174). Is it absolutely certain, I beg to be permitted to inquire, that there really was, as mentioned by ST. S WITHIN, a queen in France in 1684 ? [ may add to the question the remark that there is not extant the slightest authentic proof that Louis the Great ever married Paul Scarron's widow. It is quite true, however, that St. Simon himself (who detested Madame Scarron) asserted that the marriage did take place, and in the winter following the death of Marie Therese, who passed away on 30 July, 1683, " piously and gently as she had lived." Voltaire did not agree with the date of 1684, but admits fully all particulars of the ceremony, and, more- over, no other writer said a word which can bring the matter into doubt ; but the union was certainly never acknowledged.

In conclusion, I beg to call attention to a statement on the subject in M. Guizot's ' His- tory of France ' at p. 595, vol. iv. (Sampson Low & Co., 1875) :

" The date has never been ascertained exactly of the king's private marriage with Madame de Main- tenon. It took place probably eighteen months or two years after the queen's death : the king was forty-seven and Madame de Maintenon fifty." Une union aussi etroite n'est pas commune. HENRY GERALD HOPE.

119, Elms Road, Clapham, S.W.

DUNCALFE (9 th S. xi. 289). A family of this name is noticed at 8 th S. viii. 212, including two persons named Humphrey, and one The reference there given to Poul- son's 'Holderness' should be completed by adding ii. 456 : John Duncalfe was buried at latrmgton, 22 October, 1637, and his wife

Margaret and his son Uriah were also buried there ; he had two surviving sons, John and Humphrey. These people belonged to Hull, and were related to Andrew Marvell. Probably the copy of Horace had been theirs.

W. 0. B.

John Stanbridge (1463-1510), grammarian, was successively scholar of Winchester, fellow of New College, master of Magdalen College School (succeeding John Anwykyll, the first head master), master of the Hospital of St. John at Banbury, and prebendary of Lincoln Cathedral. His grammars had a wide reputation in their day.

A. R. BAYLEY.

A biographical sketch of this family has already appeared in 'N. & Q.' Humphrey was Mayor of Hull in 1683, of which town Samuel was the town clerk (see 8 th S. viii. 147, 212; ix. 76). EVERARD HOME COLEMAN.

71, Brecknock Road.

" TRAVAILLER POUR LE Roi DE PRUSSE " (9 th S. xi. 289). It is scarcely surprising that neither of the volumes named mentions the above, as they do not profess to give the origin of proverbs or proverbial phrases as such, but rather of quotations. The origin of the phrase is given, however, in various dictionaries of French proverbs, and even in ordinary French dictionaries. Here is one brief account :

" ' Travailler pour le roi de Prusse.' Travailler sans recevoir aucun salaire. II parait que ce pro- verbe vient de ce que Fr6deric-Guillaume l' r, roi de Prusse, pendant tout son regne, ne songea qu'a amasser de 1'argent, et que jamais sujets ne furent plus pauvres que les siens."*

From the absence of any editorial note to the question, I judge that the origin of this phrase has not already been discussed in * N. & Q.' EDWARD LATHAM. 61, Friends' Road, E. Croydon.

HADRIAN I. (9 th S. xi. 288). Platina men- tions no vacancy of the see on the death of Hadrian I., so that it is probable that the said death occurred either on 26 December, 795 (the day on which his successor was elected), or on Christmas Day itself. Pope St. Peter transferred his chair from Antioch to Rome in 42, according to St. Jerome ; but, so far as I know, the first bishop to be elected to the Papacy was Formosus, Bishop of Porto, who became Pope in 891.

JOHN B. WAINEWRIGHT.

The exact day of St. Hadrian's death was 25 December, 795. Vide 'Bullarum Caroli

by Voltaire.
 * Practically the character of the king as described