Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 2.djvu/474

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NOTES AND QUERIES. [9 th s. IL DEC. 10, m

The St. Glairs were dressed in green, and they crossed the Ord on a Monday, on their way to the battle of Flodden, where they fought and fell, almost without leaving a representative of the name behind them. The day and the dress came to be regarded as inauspicious. If the Ord must be got beyond on Monday, the journey was per- formed by sea. Dr. Morison, who chronicled the superstition a hundred years ago, at the same time made this appreciative remark : " A superstition thus derived from the heroism of their ancestors, and so well calculated to excite a similar spirit in their offspring, philosophy itself will allow to be preserved from oblivion."

Quite so; but in the case of the Grahams there is no rhyme or reason for a superstition connected with the refreshing colour, and so I think that whoever contributed the idea confused the two families.

WALTER M. GRAHAM EASTON.

THE JEWS AND BILLS OF EXCHANGE. The exact date of the introduction of bills of exchange in the mercantile world seems, as far as I have ever been able to ascertain, to be involved in much obscurity. When a schoolboy I had read that the Lombardy merchants invented these negotiable instru- ments in the thirteenth century. This is apparently controverted by Hallam in his ' Europeduring the Middle Ages,' when tracing the decline of Jewish influence in Italy. " This decline of the Jews," he says,

"was owing to the transference of their trade in money to other hands. In the early part of the thirteenth century the merchants of Lombardy took up the business [the italics are mine] of re- mitting money by bills of exchange."

And in a foot-note he adds, " Orders to pay money to a particular person were introduced by the Jews about 1183." Whence it follows that the Jews in Hallam's judgment were the originators of this dangerous process of raising the wind. That has always been my humble opinion ; but I go further, and sug- gest that prior to the closing of the canon documents of monetary value were known among the Jews for what were their ni~it3K'] Moreover, I venture to suggest that Jewish bill-brokers were in full blast in Rome before the Christian era, as the following lines in Dry den's translation of Ovid's 'Art of Love' seem to attest :

If you complain you have no ready coin No matter tis but writing of a line : A little bill not to be paid at sight.

I have no Latin copy at hand to compare ; so it will be interesting to hear what many of your classical contributors have to say on the matter, M. L, BRESLAR,

CURE FOR CONSUMPTION. In Balzac's 'La Peau de Chagrin' there is a somewhat wonderful cure for consumption referred to, which, however, as a cure for the incurable seems (to me at least) to have something plausible about it. I quote from the latest English translation (' The Magic Skin,' Rout- ledge), the French original not being acces- sible :

"There [at the house of his notary] he [Raphael] chanced to meet a physician who related how a native of Switzerland had cured himself of a con- sumption. The man never spoke for ten years, compelled himself to breathe only six times a minute in the close air of a cow-house, following a rigid diet."

This suggests a question or two. Would not the want of sufficient exercise and (presum- ably) of sunlight in most cases be of itself sufficient to kill off the patient ? Then, again, could the patient force himself to breathe only six times a minute ; and is (forced) deep breathing really beneficial in such cases 1 Is speech, again, injurious in such a case ? Many hold it to be directly beneficial.

On the other hand, Walking Stewart seems to have been of the opinion (which is still that of many country people) that cows sweeten the air, and render it more bene- ficent for men.

The question, however, is, Did Balzac "invent" this case and its cure, or (which seems to me more likely) did he adapt it from some old work on medicine ? Some of the contributors of ' N. & O.' may be able to throw some light upon Balzac's interesting case. THOMAS AULD.

GENERAL WASHINGTON. Additional MSS. 28,660-77, British Museum, 'Collection for Berkshire,' by J. Richards, article 'Hag- bourn':

" Crosscot, formerly the residence of the cele- brated General Washington. He was, when in the English army, in early life, quartered in Reading, where he formed an intimacy with his landlord's daughter, who afterwards married a Mr. Sims of this place. Washington subsequently obtained his discharge and took up his residence at Crosscot, where he remained till the American war broke out, when he left for that country. His armchair, which was a portable one, was afterwards in the posses- sion or Mr. Humphrey of Blewberry, by whom it was sold to General Fox. Mr. Job Lousby, In- formant." Add. MS. 28,664, vol. v. p. 14.

R. J. FYNMORE.

[Washington could not have been quartered at Reading in England.]

MODERN WITCHCRAFT IN DEVONSHIRE. Two women of the lower class were quarrel- ling violently the other evening in Heavi- tree, a suburb of Exeter. One yelled to the other, " You wretch, you always keep a black