Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 3.djvu/33

 9* s. m. JAN. 14, '99.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

27

The description was

'Post Office Directory,' the old church of Withycombe Raleigh (formerly spelt Withe- combe Raleigh), near Exmoutn, which must be the one meant, was built in the fifteenth century and called St. John the Baptist's. The greatest part of it was taken down about 1748, but a portion (commonly called St. John's-in-the-Wilderness) still remains and is used as a mortuary chapel, being about a mile and a half distant from the village and the modern church, which was built in 1864 And called St. John the Evangelist's.

W. T. LYNN. Blackheath.

THE LADY NELSON COLLECTION OF LETTERS I shall be very much obliged if you o any of your readers can tell me who is the present owner of the collection of Nelson letters which originally belonged to Lady Nelson and passed to her cousin Mrs. Franck lyn. I wish to communicate with the present owner. R. B. MARSTON.

St. Dunstan's House, Fetter Lane, E.G.

'THE CHRIST WITH BLUE EYES.' I was much struck with the woodcut of a bust named as above which appeared recently in a provincial newspaper. " as follows :

"This bust a new discovery was purchased recently by the Russian Ambassador at Madrid, and has been pronounced by experts to be the work either of Michael Angelo or Donatello. The eyes are of blue rock-crystal. A photograph of the work has been sent to the Queen, who is desirous to have the bust copied in marble. The discovery has created a sensation in the world of art."

Will any savant in art kindly favour me with his remarks ? By whomsoever executed, the work seems a very fine one ; but I think the " experts " must be mistaken in assigning it either to Michael Angelo or Donatello, as I am not aware that either of these sculptors ever inserted eyes, though the ancients some- times did, as notably Phidias in his great statue of Pallas. R. M. SPENCE, D.D.

Manse of Arbuthnott, N.B.

" TAXIDERMIST." Who is responsible for the invention of this vile phrase 1 ? It is not in Johnson's ' Dictionary.' I suppose we get it from the French. It would have been easy to suggest a more regular formation, such as " taxidermatist," or more correctly " dermatotaxist," or even " dermataxist." But scientific people are above such matters, and seem to contemn them.

JULIAN MARSHALL.

MR. WARBURTON'S SERVANT. In ' Bio- graphia Dramatica ; or, a Companion to the

London, 1782, I find numerous entries of the names of plays, followed by the remark, " This was among those destroyed by Mr. War- burton's servant." I find no explanation of this in the book itself, and I am puzzled to know where to look for the details. Where can I find them ? I presume the Mr. War- burton referred to is the famous Bishop of Gloucester, to whom D'Israeli devotes a long chapter in his ' Quarrels of Authors '; but this article does not help me to understand why and when his servant destroyed a number of very scarce and early plays. I believe I have read the account somewhere ; but I neglected Capt. Cuttle's advice. Hence this query.

WALTER HAMILTON.

[The servant used the quartos in order to baste fowls. The story is familiar.]

" XMAS." From about what year does this (to my thinking) ugly and needless con- traction date? I mean, as a printed and written form. It was comparatively rare half a century ago. This year it has served not only to catch the eye of the shopping folk, and to help to adorn Christmas cards, but has been printed upon bills announcing church services. I have actually heard "Xmas " ! But, offensive as are some of the contractions that have been adopted into our spoken lan- guage, it may fairly be hoped that a word with such associations as "Christmas" will not be debased by English tongues.

HENRY ATTWELL.

THE 'ECLECTIC REVIEW.' Can any one supply the names of the writers in the Eclectic Review between the years 1811 and 1828 ? The articles written by Ann Taylor, of Ongar, between 1811 and 1813, and those by her brother, Isaac Taylor, of Stanford Rivers, who wrote from about 1818 to 1828, are specially wanted. The editor was Josiah Conder. HENRY TAYLOR.

" FILIGALENT^J." What is the meaning of the word filigalentce, which is surely not a pure Latin vocable 1 ? It occurs in the fol- owing phrase from an entry in a college register of the seventeenth century :

"(Z) admissus est pensionarius filigalentae odem (X) [a principal of the college mentioned in, preceding clause] ejus curatore."

T. K.

FURLY OF COLCHESTER, ESSEX. At Sothe - jy's sale, 9 March, 1865, of John Kendall's ibrary (mostly books interesting to the Society of Friends), there was sold to a Mr. Marsh an old Dutch Bible (Leyden, 1663), having in it a pedigree of the Furly family

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Playhouse,' by David Erskine Baker, 2 vols., from 1659 to 1773. If any of your readers