Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 2.djvu/20

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NOTES AND QUERIES.

[9 th S. II. JULY 2, '98.

carefully into the history of the Sherborns, and have a great mass of material. I should be glad to hear from any one interested in the family. C. DAVIES SHERBORN.

540, King's Road, S.W.

WIDTH OF ORGAN AND PIANOFORTE KEYS (9 th S. i. 408). There is much on this subject in the dictionary of Sir George Grove :

" The permanence of the width of the octave has been determined by the average span of the hand, and a Ruckers harpsichord of 1614 measures but a small fraction of an inch less in the eight keys than a Broadwood or Erard concert-grand piano of 1879."

The "average span" of a hand like that of Woelfl who must have straddled the key- board like a Colossus would not make the octave of much account. Recent invention has, however, rendered great things possible to the smallest of average hands. K. B. Schumann (d. 1865) invented a radiated key- board having c on a black key. Here the octave was the width of six of the present white keys (nearly 5in.). Herr von Jank6 (1887-8) also brought the octave within the limits of six keys. There appear to be some disadvantages, but it is obvious that much modern music the well - known No. 4 of Schumann's ' Nachtstiicke,' Op. 23, is an example would thus tend to become more tolerable at the hands of the modern " pupil " than it is at present. GEORGE MARSHALL. Sefton Park, Liverpool.

MACAULAY AND MONTGOMERY (8 th S. xii. 06, 132, 214, 332). In glancing over the penul- timate volume of ' N. & Q.' my eye caught, at the second reference, a very dogmatic assertion of the late C. F. S. WARREN, which escaped my attention when first issued, and which I venture equally dogmatically to contravert. " Macaulay was wrong ; soul and spirit are not identical, and so far MR. YARDLEY is right," is MR. WARREN'S ex cathe- dra utterance. In logical parlance, I deny the major, minor, and conclusion of this quasi -syllogism, and formulate my thesis thus : Soul and spirit are identical, therefore both MR. WARREN and MR. YARDLEY are wrong, and Macaulay was right. Mont- gomery was also wrong ; " his mistake/' to judge MR. WARREN ex ore mo, " was in the awkward association of the two words send and spirit" Very " awkward " it certainly was, and richly merited Macaulay's drastic

auestion. Since "qui bene distinguet bene ocet," it would be interesting to have had MR. WARREN'S distinction between soul and spirit, as 1 have never so far met with any con- vincing proof of difference between them, either philosophical or theological. What is

predicated of the one can be so of the other. But the onus proljandi would have lain with MR. WARREN. Finally, though MR. YARDLEY may not thank me for championing his cause, his contention that " a fairy is a soulless thing and a spirit " differentiates correctly soul from spirit. Fairies are the only instances (ima- ginary though they be, and precisely instances for that very reason) of spirit divorced from soul. This is the only way of answering "a question put as one of fact " or, rather, of hypothetical fact, which this undoubtedly is. " Quod gratis asseritur gratis negatur."

J. B. S. Manchester.

PORTRAIT OF HENRIETTA, LADY WENT- WORTH (9 th S. i. 347, 475). EBOR'S inquiry is one that much interests me, and I wish him the success which did not attend my own inquiries when reproducing in my Wentworth book Williams's engraving of Kneller's painting. It was not then known at the office of the National Portrait Gallery whether the picture yet existed : possibly, as a few years have elapsed, inquiry in the same quarter might now be more fruitful. The natural owners would be the Earl of Lovelace, or Earl Fitzwilliam, or Mr. Vernon- Wentworth (of Wentworth Castle, Stain- borough, co. York) ; but so far as my experi- ence has extended, the present representatives of the Wentworths do not appear to be inter- ested in family history, my work having had no encouragement from them.

The same interesting lady (whose story is too intimately connected with the unfortu- nate Duke of Monmouth) was also portrayed by Sir Peter Lely, if credence is to be given to a small engraving published by Richard- son in 1708. I doubt the identity, however, as it has no resemblance to Kneller's portrait. The engraving is found in the British Museum Print-Room and at the office of the National Portrait Gallery. It is a half figure, hair in pendent curls, pearl necklace, hand on breast.

A few words of description of MR. HUM- PHREY WOOD'S little picture would be wel- come. If representing Ann, wife of Sir Thomas Wentworth, third Earl of Strafford (first Earl, of the second creation), married 171 lj would it not have been described as the Countess of Strafford, not merely as "The Hon Uc M rs Wentworth'"? Her name before marriage was Johnson (only daughter of Sir Henry Johnson, Knt., by his wife Martha, Baroness Wentworth) ; she died in 1754 (cetat. seventy).

On looking through my pedigrees,! find that 1724 seems to fit Alice, wife of Thomas Watson-