Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 4.djvu/194

 274 NOTES AND QUERIES. [9*s.iv.SEPT.3o,'9 who. with lance broken and horse disabled in hard fight, took his place in the ranks of the infantry, and was thereon granted such sub- ordinate appointment as our lance-corporals now hold. Smith in his ' Military Dictionary,' 1779, bays that lance negate " in some of the foreign troops is a soldier that does duty as a cor- poral"; but he does not give the English expression lance-corporal. Nor does James in his ' Military Dictionary,' 1810, although he gives lance spezzate, and speaks of the twelve lance spezzates, or reduced officers, maintained by the Pope. If T.'s definition of the practical meaning of the word in the British arrny needed con- firmation, it would be found in the recent personal experience of one of them — Mr. Horace Wyndham, author of ' The Queen's Service': "The term 'lance' means acting." This being so, it is equally applicable to the similar appointment in the grade of sergeant. The word "lancer" is mentioned as some- times used for lance-corporal. KILLIGREW. HENBANE (9th S. iv. 226).—If C. C. B. will rub his eyes, and look again in the 'Dic- tionary,' he will I think, find hen-dwale in its Jalphabetic place on p. 222, col. 3. Some space in ' N. & Q.' woula be saved if people would look twice before writing to say that words are not in the ' Dictionary,' or if the Editor would himself test such assertions before printing them. It was recently wisely said by an American scholar and critic, " He is a rash man who ventures to say what is not in the | Dictionary'; when you cannot find something there, it is safer to say you have failed to find it." J. A. H. MURRAY. Oxford. It is certainly surprising that henbane in 1 H.E.D.' is not chronicled earlier than 1706, for it occurs in Turner's 'Libellus de Re Herbaria Novus'1538. s.v. ' Apollinaris,'and in the Herbals. But what is ' Alphita.' quoted by C. C. B.-some early MS. 1 S. L. P. Ulverston. [Use circa 1265 is quoted in the ' Dictionary.'] MUMMY WHEAT (6th S. ii. 306, 415, 452 ; iii. 135, 158, 212, 278 ; iv. 173 ; 8lh S. i. 224, 363, 479 ; ii. 55, 187, 296; iii. 246).—May I, without expressing any opinion on the point in dispute between your correspondents re- garding the vitality of "mummy peas," mention a little reminiscence as to mummy wheat? In 1881 I stood with the late Mr. John Macgregor ("Rob Roy") in his drawing- room, which was really a most interesting little private museum, when he particularly drew my attention to two long glass tubes placed one on each side of the fireplace. These tubes contained the haulm and ears of a large species of cereal. Mr. Macgregor went on to tell me that he had obtained the seed of the plants before us from a mummy which had been unrolled (at the British Museum, I think) in the presence of the Prince of Wales and himself, that some of the seed had been given to the Prince also, that he (Mr. Macgregor) had grown his share himself in the Temple in London (of all places in the world), and that the long dried stems and ears in the tubes were the result. On my asking him whether there was any possibility of a mistake in the matter, he most earnestly protested that there could be none ; that the mummy had never been unrolled before, as was evident from the condition of the adhesions ; that he had seen the corn extracted from its interior with his own eyes ; and that no hand but his own had touched the seeds after they were given to him straight from the mummy. I expressed then, as I express now, no definite opinion on the matter : but I must say that Mr. Macgregor, though an enthusiastic man in all that he undertook, was a roan of calm judgment and great reasoning power, and one who was not easily deceived. He has now been dead for some years, and I know not what has become of his curiosities, but it is most probable that the glass tubes and their contents and the labels on which particulars detailing the growth of the plants were inscribed are still in existence. The incident was, at any rate, interesting, and I give it now for what it is worth. R. CLARK. Walthamstow. ALIEN PRIORIES (9th S. iii. 449).—As no response has appeared to this inquiry, and as it is not statea that the inquirer has read the Act of 2 Henry V. dissolving the priories, it may be stated that the Act is to be found in vol. iv. of the ' Parliamentary Rolls,' p. 22. There is nothing in the Act to indicate that property transferred before this dissolution was also seized to the Crown. ARTHUR MAYALL. FORD FAMILY OF BAGTOR AND OP EMBER COURT (9th S. iv. 128). — John Foorde. of Ashburton, co. Devon (died 7 May, 1538), had two sons, George and John. From George (buried 31 August, 1670) descended the Fords of Nutwell, ending with Sir Charles, 17..., and the younger branch of Bagtor, Ilsington, and Dartington, ending in George in 1720. John (buried 21 January, 1586/7)