Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 4.djvu/510

 534 NOTES AND QUERIES. [9*s.iv.DEc.3o)m Wells), G. A. C, Griffin, F. F. B, C W. G, G. L. C. (Old Brompton), K. (Covent Garden), Investigator, W. J. B. B., Naso, Cephas, R. O. (Eton), C. U. B. E. R., Trebor (King's College), G P., Oxoniensis, T. S. D. (Shooter's Hill), W. (Lincoln's Inn), L. C. R., Alicui, A. W. F., A. Grayan, J. G. (Birmingham), Periergus Bibliophilus, Pwcca, D. S. Y., Vox, Ceredwyn, Hermes, Melandra, H. J. M. (Ambleside), B. W. G., Norris, J. M. (Oxford), J. T.(Syden- ham), Archteus (Wiesbaden), P. H. F.(Stroud), Vulpas, A. H. E., Hibernicus, Rufa, W. P. P., L. S., Adolphus, Gastros (Cambridge), R. R. (Lincoln's Inn), J. W. C., Alythes, Rahere, W. H. C. (Temple), Venator, Antinephelegiseta (Oxford), J. S. (Doncaster), A Templar, Hypomagorus (Trm. Coll., Ox- ford), Julius (Runcorn), *iXoAdyos (Deanery of Gloucester), J. G. (Dunnichen, Forfarshire), T. R. F. (Spring Gardens), A. W. (Brighton), D. Sholbus, J. E. N., Emdee, A Subscriber Abinitio (Guildhall, Framlingham), G. W. (Hamilton Terrace), Cranmore, J. 0. W. H., E. R. J. H. (Chancery Lane), D. V. S.tHome), Arun, Priscian, Nemo, T. E. D. (Exeter), A. E. B. [Brael (Leeds), Jarlzberg, C. I. R., Nathan. B. G. J., A. R. (Kenilworth), H. G. (Milford), E. M. B., C. H. (St. Catherine's Hall Cambridge), J. P. S. (Horaerton), Wredjid Kooez, A. B. R. (Dukinfield), E. N. W. (South- wark), C. H., and others. Perhaps some of your older contributors—e.g., MR. EDWARD PEACOCK—can tell us who they were. T. CANN HUGHES, M.A. Lancaster. [Ma. EVERAKD HOME COLEMAN, we believe, aged over eighty, was one of our earliest contributors.] HOOD'S ' LAST MAN.'—In this ghastly serio- comic poem two men only survive the uni- versal pestilence, one of whom is a beggar. Jealousy springs up between them:— An' if it were not for that beggar-man I 'd be the king of the earth. The mocking advances of the mendicant are rejected, and he is hanged by his rival, who thus remains the " last man." It is remarkable that in La Bruyere's 'Carac- teres,' chap, v., ' De la Socie'te' et de la Con- versation, there is a passage which seems very nearly to anticipate the exact position imagined by the poet:— " Je suppose qu'll n'y ait que deux hommea sur la terre, qui la possedent seals et qui la partagent toute entre eux deux: je suis persuad£ qu'il leur naftra bientot quelque Rujet de rupture, quand ce ne serait que pour les limites." "Comparisons are odious" is a saying as old as Don Quixote: but one cannot help contrasting the weira and cynical humour of this strange, if not repulsive poem with the lofty tone and moral grandeur of Campbell's fine lyric with the same title. C. LAWRENCE FORD, B.A. Bath. LOVELY LADY COVENTRY.—In 'The Fatal Gift* Mr. Frankfort Moore makes his heroine Maria Gunning say : " They will find that I have still got Lord Coven- try to promenade with, and perhaps we may e'en extend our walk to Crome." This is probably a slip, Croome Court having been for generations the seat of the Coventry family in Worcestershire. It is recorded of this lady—"Lovely Lady Coventry"—that a lucky tradesman of Worcester, who waa making a pair of shoes for her, actually turnedtwo guineas and a half in peonies for showing them. There is a pastel of the famous Irish beauty, by La Tour, in this mansion. W. Malvern. SIR JOHNS.—In the sixteenth century "Sir John " seems to have been a popular nick- name for a priest. In Bale's account of the process against Oldcastle, Lord Cobham, for Lollard y, printed in 1544, it is stated that " babbling Sir Johns " spread abroad certain false statements about the Wickliffite martyr; and Aylmer, Bishop of London, in his ""Har- borowe for Faithfull and Trewe Subjects,' 1559, uses the expression twice. In the first case he refers to a " certain Sir John which said, ' By my priesthood if the Trinity were not in my portass I would not believe it.'" In the other passage, "Are there not in Eng- land women, think you, that for their learn- ing and wisdom, could tell their household and neighbours as good a tale as the best Sir John there?" The little treatise was directed against Knox's ' Monstrous Regiment of Women.' I have modernized the spelling, which throughout the book is atrocious. Brewer, in 'Phrase and Fable,'has Met* and Mass John, but not " Sir John." JAMES HOOPER. Norwich. ORDER OF COUNCIL. (See 8th S. ix. 436, 487.)—The distinction between an Order in Council and an Order of Council is this: the former is made by Her Majesty in Council, the latter by certain Lords of the Council without Her Majesty being present. An Order in Council is headed : " At the Court at [Windsor! the day of. Present the Queen's Most Excellent Majesty in Council." Sometimes, but not always, the names of Lords of the Council who are