Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 6.djvu/431

 9*s. vi. NOV. 3, i9oo.] NOTES AND QUERIES. 357 Week, he is induced to stay the Remainder of this Week, and positively no longer, At Mr. Billon's, Glover, High-Bridge, where he takes the most perfect Likenesses in Miniature Profile, on a much improved Plan, that in point of Likeness and Elegance, exceeds every other Profiles that have yet appeared. He humbly solicits those who please to favour him with their Commands, will take the earliest Opportunity, as they may depend upon a jierfect Likeness in an elegant Gilt Frame and Glass, at 6*. each; or reduced upon Ivory for Rings, Pins or Bracelets, at the same Price. N.B.—Ladies or Gentlemen having Shades by them of Living or Deceased Friends, may have them reduced to any Size, the Likeness preserved, and dressed in the present Taste. The first mention of a machine in this col- lection occurs in a circular dated 29 April, 1824 :— Newcastle-upon-Tyne, At Mr. Dixon's Long Room, White Hart Inn, Old Flesh Market. Striking Likenesses, Cut with Common Scissors in a Few Seconds! Without either Drawing or Machine, or any other Aid than a mere Glance of the Eye ! By Mr. Seville. Full-Length Figures, Animals, &c., cut in any attitude. Plain Profiles 1*. or two of the same Person 1*. M. Elegantly Bronzed I*, each extra. Full-length Figures Jk or two of the same 6*. 6d. Bronzed 2*. each extra. Dogs 3*. W. each. In the "N.B." of Mr. Miers the use of the word " shades " is worth noting. KICHD. WELFOKD. Newcastle-upon-Tyne. I have several old .silhouettes of the last century signed " Charles fecit, the first Pro- iiiist in England, the Original inventor on Glass. No. 130, opposite the Lyceum, Strand." They are not cut out of black paper, but very beautifully painted. I have always under- stood that Charles was the finest artist in this line, but I shall be glad to learn more about him. I may add that these are not portraits of children, but adults. CHARLES DRUEY. "PERFIDE ALBION" (0th S. vi. 2-29).—This unmerited reproach upon the honour of a vastly misunderstood neighbour was already a matter of tradition in the time of Misson, the French traveller during the first years of the eighteenth century, and there is every reason to suppose that it arose out of the chivalrous rivalries of the two nations instigated by Edward III. of England and Philip de Valois. The motto " Honi soit qui mal y pense" had its birth during these rivalries, Edward intending by it and by the order of the Garter "to retort shame and defiance upon Philip that he should dare to think ill of so just an enterprise" as the revival of King Arthur's Rouna Table (Elias Ashmole, 'The Order of the Garter,' 1672, chap. v. p. 183). "The age did exceedingly abound with Im- presses, Motto's, and Devises, of which the Rolls of the Great Wardrobe will afford variety the Apparel, Plate. Bods, Household furniture, Shields, even the very Harness of his Horses, and the like being not without them."—Ibid., pp. 184-5. Misson says:— " I can't imagine what could occasion the notion that I have frequently observed in France, that the English are treacherous 'Tis certainly great injustice to reckon treachery among the vices familiar to the English."—' Memoirs and Observa- tions in Travels over England,' trans, by J. Ozell, Lond., 1719, p. 73. See also • N. & Q.,' 7th S. ix. 411. J. HOLDEN MACMlCHAEL. Wimbledon Park Road. ACCOUNT OF THE INQUISITION IN SPAIN AND PORTUGAL (9th S. vi. 210).—Part i., in' Portuguese, of this book was written by a secretary of the Portuguese Inquisition. He was so much affected by the cruelties and injustice of this tribunal that he retired to Rome, where he wrote this account in 1672. It was circulated in MS. The author, fear- ing to fall into the hands of the Inquisitors, would not return to Portugal, and died in Rome. In the preface to the' Reflexiones,' in Castilian, the MS. is supposed to have fallen into the hands of a calxillero Espafiol who was living in Rome. He was scandalized by tho aspersions thrown on the Inquisition, but after two or three discussions with the author was converted to his views, and wrote these ' Reflexiones,' which eventually fell into the hands of the anonymous compiler, in 1700, who published them at Villa Franca— i.e., London—in 1722. There are two copies in the British Museum and one in the Bodleian. This anonimo is supposed to be David Nieto, a learned Italian rabbi, who was born in Venice in 1654 and died in London in 1728. He began life as a physician in Leghorn, and his reputation in religious science became so great that his co-religionists invited him to London to preside over the synagogue and the Jewish schools there. Among his other works is " Es Dat 6 Fuego legal compuesto en Ydioina Hebraico y traduzido en Romance. Por el Excelentissimo Sr H. H. 11. David Nieto, en Londres, Aiio 5475," i.e., A.D. 1715. In the Bodleian copy, which includes the Hebrew text, there are a preface and twenty-six pages of ' Reflexiones' in MS. in a beautiful Spanish hand, which bear a remark- able analogy, both in style and arrangement, to the' Reflexiones' attributed to the caballero