Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 12.djvu/221

 9* s. xii. SEPT. 12, iocs.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

213

dated 28 June. He had then no moustache. It is just possible that between that date and mid-October he may have grown one. He at times dispensed with the ** barber's shear," when travelling about, to save time and trouble. But this very locomotion would preclude lengthy sittings needed for a limning. Ten years before I made a sketch of him in fez and caftan, smoking a long cherry- stick pipe. As he had then clipped off his moustaches, they were omitted ; but as he scanned the outline, he took the pencil in hand, and added these adornments to his upper lip. I may add that 1840 as a date is only put proximately on Maclise's drawing of him. It looks much younger than he appeared at that time ; and not then moustached. EYKE CROWE.

PETER. THE GREAT IN ENGLAND (9 th S. xii' 127). Many details of the visit of the Czar of Russia to this country in 1698 will be found in the pages of ' N. & Q.' At 2 nd S. i. 365 there is a copy of the long bill of expenses for damages done to the build- ings and adjoining property, furniture, and gardens, at Evelyn's house, at Sayes Court, Deptford, amounting to 350. 9*. 6d ; 5 th S. ii. 125 refers to his visit to Godalming, and 8 th S. xii. 26 to the frequent occasions when he appeared at the Royal Observatory, Green- wich, even when Flamsteed was engaged at his observations.

Evelyn, in his 'Diary,' under the date of 9 June, 1698, says :

" To Deptford, to see how miserably the Czar had left my house, after three months making it his Court. I got Sir Christopher Wren, the King's Surveyor, and Mr. London his gardener, to go and estimate the repairs, for which they allowed 15QL in their report to the Lords of the Treasury."

Evelyn's servant writes to him : " There is a house full of people and right nasty. The Czar lies next your library, and dines in the parlour next your study. He dines at ten o'clock and six at night, is very seldom at home a whole day, very often in the King's Yard, or by the water, dressed in several dresses. The King is expected here this day ; the best parlour is pretty clean for him to be entertained in. The King pays for all he has."

EVERARD HOME COLEMAN. 71, Brecknock Road.

AITKEN (9 th S. xii. 129). Aitken of Saltcoats and Darroch, Stirlingshire, had the following arms registered in the Lyon Office in 1871 : Argent, a chevron gules between three cocks sable.

In 1874 James Aitken, shipowner, Glasgow, registered Argent, a chevron azure between two cocks in chief sable and an oak tree

eradicated proper in base. Here the oak is a piece of canting heraldry, allusive to the supposed meaning of Aitken- aiken, oaken. The same allusion appears in the arms granted to Aiken of Dalmoak (1892): Or, three oakslips fructed proper, a chief vair.

John Chetwood Aiken, banker, Bristol, registered in 1885 a variation of the arms of Aitken, the names doubtless being of common origin, viz., Or, a chevron sable between two cocks respectant in chief gules and a hunting horn in base vert, garnished and stringed of the third.

In 1804 the followings bearings were regis- tered for Catherine, second daughter and co- heiress of Charles Aitken, of the island of Saint Croix : Per fess ermine and or, four fleurs-de-lys in cross azure, surmounted of a cross of the last edged of the field between four spur-revels gules, the cross charged in the centre with two greyhounds' heads addorsed or. This is manifestly a modern achievement, designed in the worst style of heraldry.

As for the origin of the name, it might conceivably represent a diminutive of Arthur. During the Peninsular War British soldiers spoke familiarly of the Duke of Wellington as "Atty," and kin is a common Anglo-Saxon diminutive suffix. But Arthur was an ex- ceedingly rare personal name in Scotland during the thirteenth and fourteenth cen- turies, when most fixed surnames were evolved. I cannot bring to mind a single instance of it. Adam, on the other hand, was a very common baptismal name, and I think Mr. Bardsley probably is near the truth in his 'English Surnames' when he assigns that as the origin of Atkin, Atkins, and Atkinson, sharpened forms of Adkin = little Adam, Adkins, and Adkinson = little Adam's son. He goes near to prove the origin by citing from the Hundred Rolls an instance of an individual entered in one place as "Adam le Fullere," and in another as "Adekin le Fuller." Aitken appears to be but a northern variant of Atkin.

HERBERT MAXWELL.

" CRYING DOWN CREDIT" (9 th S. xii. 29, 138). Col. Clifford W alton ' i n his 'History of the British Standing Army,' p. 715, says :

"In 1688 James the Second tyrannically ordered publicans to afford free quarters to soldiers, while private persons were compelled to billet men for the remuneration of eightpence a week. It was in eon- sequence of these oppressions that the Declaration of Rights asserted the privileges of the subject in

this matter In Ireland, as well as in England,

there were instances of officers being brought to trial for exacting free quarters. Openly professed extortion of free quarters became therefore less