Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 7.djvu/253

 9* S. VII. MARCH 30, 1901.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

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begin about 1676, and are well indexed, divided into two classes of grantors and grantees and mortgagors and mortgagees. It does not appear to be compulsory, but prac- tically every dealing with property which requires the aid of the law to protect or assist it is here given ; the lawyers laugh at the idea of any one omitting registration. If Lord Halsbury's foolish Registration Act had been copied from this model, it might now be of value ; but his scheme is, of course, based upon so many blunders, that it is much better that it should be left severely alone for the present.

There are societies which, upon being fur- nished with the details of the position of any property, will for a small fee of half a dollar supply the name of the grantee and date of the last conveyance in the locality index. The Title Guarantee and Trust Company, of 146, Broadway, New York, undertakes this work by letter or personal application.

The record index of the date and name will give that of the grantor, who may be found in the character of grantee with the date and name of his grantor, so that step by step the complete history of the title can be obtained. There are persons who make it a business to make searches, at apparently moderate fees ; a lawyer will require about five dollars for a general search. These deeds lead to other records which are equally ac- cessible, as bankruptcies, actions at law, &c. These latter are especially valuable in ques- tions of pedigree, for each bundle contains the whole of the proceedings, pleadings, affi- davits, reports, inquisitions, and findings of all kinds, which in our cumbrous Record Office, with its ridiculous checks upon the honesty of its own officials, would take a search of weeks or months to collect if, indeed, they could ever be found.

But if in the department of wills and records we have much to learn from the American officials, they have something to learn from us in the simple matter of the registration of births, marriages, and deaths. Their system is cumbrous, expensive, and utterly inefficient. The indices, which in England are open to any searcher for the fee of Is., are closed at any price ; but for a fee of 2s., with a dime (10 cents) for every additional year, the Health Depart- ment will itself make a search for any one name. But nothing like a general search is permitted, nor can the names be collected with a view to selection or arrangement. The parish churches do not show their registers, though they are willing (through their vestry clerks) to give certain details ; ,

but these I found to be untrue, on the evi- dence of the Health Department. It is sur- prising that, with an excess of freedom and liberality in all the other departments of State, this most important to the people should be practically closed. Nor do the cemeteries give much help in the record of burials. At the Greenwood Cemetery in Brooklyn, for the fee of a dollar, the guide, a most intelligent man (who would doubtless make searches for Englishmen by letter for this fee), found a monument at once. At other cemeteries there were no guides, no regis- ters, and no help of any kind ; but a weary tramp amidst miles of monuments was the only mode of attempting to find anything.

PYM YEATMAN. Dakeyne Cottage, Barley Dale, Derbyshire.

SANDWICH MEN. It would appear that Charles Dickens was the first to apply the expression "animated sandwich" to the perambulating advertisements which are now known as " sandwich men." In chap. ix. of ' Sketches by Boz' Mr. Augustus, the nero of the dancing academy, is described as "walking down Holborn Hill and won- dering how he could manage to get intro- duced into genteel society," when he met "an unstamped advertisement [advertisements in newspapers were stamped in those days] walking leisurely down Holborn Hill, announcing to the world that Signor Billsmethi, of the King's Theatre, intended opening for the Season with a Grand Ball."

Signor Billsmethi's announcement struck him as the very thing he wanted, "so, he stopped the unstamped advertisement an animated sandwich, composed of a boy between two boards and, having procured a very small card with the Signer's address indented thereon, walked straight to the Signor's house." 'Sketches by Boz,' chap. ix. p. 223.

'Sketches by Boz' appeared at intervals during the years 1834-5 in the Morning Chronicle and Evening Chronicle, which fixes approximately the date when the expression "animated sandwich" was first employed. Thackeray made use of the term "en sand- wich," but in a different sense, in 'Vanity Fair,' and that was subsequently to Dickens.

JOHN HEBB. [See 6 th S. viii. 434 ; 8 th S. vi. 498.]

"Qui VIVE?" This sentinel's challenge has passed into a proverb, and is often used in this country almost as a substantive, "on the qui vive" being synonymous with "on the alert" or " ready for action if necessary." But what is its origin? The 'Stanford Dictionary' explains it to mean "Who lives? who goes