Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 2.djvu/153

 9* s. ii. AUG. 20,

NOTES AND QUERIES.

145

MAYFAIR UNION (BLUE LAMP BRANCH). Philanthropists are occasionally deficient in a sense of humour, and their mistakes at times give occasion to the enemy to blas- pheme. Can the Bishop of Marlborough, the president, Lady Wimborne, and other dis- tinguished supporters of the benevolent insti- tution known as the May fair Union (Blue Lamp Branch) be aware that " Blue Lamp Hotel" is a slang synonym for a police station? JOHN HEBB.

2, Canonbury Mansions.

SIR KENELM DIGBY. The 'Diet, of Nat. Biog.,' vol. xv. p. 62, says :

" Digby promised to make a further donation to the Bodleian, but never did so, although he gave Laud many Arabic manuscripts to send to the university or St. John's College Library, of which nothing more was heard."

Some one has put opposite the last words in a library copy, " They are the 36 Digby Or MSS." RALPH THOMAS.

Two SISTERS OF THE SAME NAME. Giles de Badlesmere, the second baron, who died in 1338 without issue, left as heirs four sisters. The eldest and the youngest are both stated to have borne the name of Margaret (Archceo- lorfia Cantiana, xiii. 410). In Courthope's edition of Nicolas's ' Historic Peerage ' the names of these four sisters are given as Mar- gery, Maud, Elizabeth, and Margaret.

N. M. & A.

"ANGELS ON HORSEBACK." I find this expression used in a letter rather more than a century old with regard to the acting of Mrs. Yates on a special occasion : " She certainly played like an angel on horseback." I do not find it in the ' H.E.D.,' 'The Dialect Dictionary,' or, ' The Dictionary of Slang,' and I have searched without result the indexes to ' N. & Q.' No one to whom I have applied knows it in any other sense than that of oysters rolled in bacon and served on toast. The phrase seems generally expressive of superlative excellence. KILLIGREW.

[We have occasionally, but rarely, heard the phrase used as in this case, as a species of mock-heroical commendation. ]

THACKERAY'S BALLAD OF 'LITTLE BILLEE.' This ballad was first published in a little gossiping book called 'Sand and Canvass,' published in 1849, by Samuel Bevan, who was foreign agent for Lieut. Waghorn, the originator of the Overland Route. Bevan who by all accounts was, as Mr. Gilbert says,

a very genial wag

Who loved a quaint conceit-

met Thackeray in Paris, and apparently took down the ballad from his own lips. The version of the ballad in Mr. Bevan's book differs from the version in the collected edition of Thackeray's poems and ballads, and it is probable that the ballad underwent considerable modifications in the course of time. JOHN HEBB.

Canonbury Mansions, N.

A FELICITOUS MISPRINT. 'Corinna,' ix. (Bergk):-

T H StaveKws euSeis ; ovfj.avTra.pos rjcrOa Koptvva. So the words are always printed, with a full stop at the end of the line :

Sleepest thou imceasingly ? Yet before, Corinna, thou wert not so.

J.e., not given to sleep, not iVi'aAea, as one commentator would add. The words are possibly those of a divine visitant. Mr. Farnell, however, in his ' Greek Lyric Poets,' p. ( 253, places a mark of interrogation after Ko'pti/va. He has no note upon the point, and the semicolon is, in all probability, a mere misprint, attracted by the semicolon in the middle of the line. But, taking his punctua- tion, we get a beautiful and moving line addressed to Corinna, either by herself or another, as an epitaph :

Sleepest thou unceasingly ? Yet wert thou not once Corinna ?

F. BROOKS.

ANTHONY CLERKE, STATIONER, 1540-1561. In the transcripts of the Stationers' Regis- ters is an entry under the year 1561 :

" Recevyd of Anthonye Clerke for his fyne and for his quarterages which he was behynde for xvj yeres the vj of maye xx 8 ."

Upon this entry Prof. Arber very properly argues that previous to the incorporation of the Company of Stationers in 1556 there existed a voluntary association or brother- hood of printers, bookbinders, publishers, and the like, of which association or brother- hood the Company of Stationers was only the more formal and legally recognized authority continued under royal charter ; and this Prof. Arber dates back to 1545.

Having lately discovered the said Anthony Clerke in a somewhat curious position a few years earlier, it has occurred to me that the columns of ' N. & Q.' may well undertake to make a note of the circumstance.

Used as waste in the binding of an old book, I find a perfect document, viz., a writ issued to the Sheriffs of London, 20 July, 32 Henry VIII. (1540), for the arrest of "John Clerke taillour, Anthony Clerke stacioner, Laurence Strynger, and Edward Blunt tail-