Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 12.djvu/175

 9 *s. xii. AUG. 29, 1903.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

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somewhere talks generally of geryons as of jotuns. The wretched old " patriarch " slum landlord of Dickens's 'Little Dorrit,' who sedulously cultivates a benevolent appear- ance so as to mask extortions by his agent, is a petty, serio-comical Geryon of the Dantesque type. FRANCIS P. MARCHANT. Brixton Hill.

LINES TO BOOK-BORROWERS. At the be- ginning of a fifteenth-century book belonging to the Society of Antiquaries the following lines appear. From the style of handwriting they are not much later than the period of publication of the volume : Reddatur liber domino & (juocunque repertus Non opus est quseras, aspice, nomen habes.

PHILIP NORMAN.

[French class-books sometimes contain on the fly- leaf a rough drawing of a picture of Pierrot hanging by the neck with the following macaronic qua- train :

Aspice Pierrot pendu,

Quod librum n'a pas rendu ;

Si librum reddidisset

Pierrot pendu non esset.]

CALAMITY JANE'S CAREER. Under this heading the Daily^ Telegraph's New York correspondent furnished a short biography, which seems worth preserving in the pages of * N. & Q.' The paragraph appeared in the Daily Telegraph of 4 August. I must ask the Editor and readers of l N. & Q.' to forgive my obtrusiveness in alluding to matters which do not personally concern myself ; but I have been always some what of a "crank" on the subject of female warriors from Semiramis down to the Ranee of Jhansi, 1857. I might not be so persistent only that 'N. & Q.' circulates all over the world and is kept, whereas a newspaper is usually "chucked away" when read :

" That noted female character in the annals of Western life, known since 1870 as ' Calamity Jane,' and who inspired Bret Harte to write that most popular of all his stories, ' The Luck of Roaring Camp,' in which she figured as Cherokee Sal, died on Saturday at Terry, near Deadwood, South Dakota. Her name was Mrs. Martha Burke. According to her own story, the girl was thrown on her own resources at the age of fifteen by the death of her parents, and she determined to become a scout. Her only associates were soldiers and Indians, and she speedily adopted their ways. She donned male attire in 1870, when she volunteered to go as a scout with General Custer in one of his Indian raids, and wore it during the greater part of her remaining years. She was christened ' Calamity Jane' in 1872 by Capt. Egan, whose life she saved. Capt. Egan was shot from his horse by an Indian, but the woman scout killed the Indian, and, picking up the wounded officer, she placed him across her saddle and rode off to the fort under the fire of the other Indians. When Wild Bill Hickok was shot

dead in a gambling - house in Deadwood by Jack McCall, a notorious desperado, Calamity Jane led the party which captured and lynched McCall. During her career Calamity Jane took part in scores of battles with Indians and fatal affrays with white len."

HERBERT B. CLAYTON. 39, Renfrew Road, Lower Kennington Lane.

FRAUDULENT AMERICAN DIPLOMAS AND DEGREES. (See ante, p. 101.) The following extract from the St. James's Gazette of 10 August may supplement one phase of the information already given :

"Another interesting addition to the sidelights which have recently been thrown on a certain class of American university is to hand in the circular of a literary mill in Ohio. * Our prices are as follows,' say ' Colchester, Roberts & Co.' : ' High school ora- tions and essays, $3 to $8. College essays, orations, and debates, $3 to $15. Political speeches, $10 to $30. Lectures, $10 and upwards. Sermons, from 50 cents to $25. Our work, with the exception of the low-priced sermons, we guarantee original. This scale has stood the gales of twenty-two years of business experience on the part of the firm, and it represents bed-rock values. We are no strangers in the educational institutions of the country.'"

A. F. R.

rain*

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 may be addressed to them direct.

DON MANUEL ROSAS, the celebrated and cruel Dictator of the Argentine Republic, being driven away by a revolution, fled to England in 1852, at the age of fifty-nine. Rosas lived twenty-five years longer, and died in or near Southampton, 14 March, 1877. His public and political life is well known, and many books, essays, and papers have been published on the subject ; but, to the best of my knowledge, one finds nothing about the twenty-five years of his life spent in England. How did he live there ? What were Iris occupations 1 Had he friends or acquaintances in Southampton? Did he ever evince any regret in occasional conver- sations about the cruel and bloody deeds which he committed as Dictator of Argen- tina 1 ? When he arrived in England Rosas had with him his only child, his beloved daughter, Doiia Manuelito. Rosas. Did they live together until he died? What has be- come of her ? Is she still alive ? Has she been married; if so, to whom? In short, all particulars about the private life in Eng- land of these two persons would be welcome. It is very likely that something was pub-