Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 7.djvu/384

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NOTES AND QUERIES, r^s.vn. MAY 11,1901.

was connected with the ancient Dacia, and that this word was also applied, as by Atiam of Bremen, to designate Dania or Denmark.

2. That the Northmen who had invaded Russia under Rurick in 862 A.D., and who had settled at Kief, had long been in communica- tion with the Crimea, and would be led to apply St. Clement's legend to their more familiar Denmark.

3. That the basilica of St. Clement was, pre- vious to its destruction by Robert Guiscard in A. p. 1085, one of the most conspicuous buildings in Rome, and that the frescoes which adorn it dating from A.D. 863 in the pontificate of Nicholas L, who was the con- temporary of Ansgar, Bishop of Hamburg, one of the earliest Christian missionaries to Scandinavia nearly all relate to saints such as Cyril and Methodius, who were connected with the Christianization of the Slavonic countries ; to St. Clement himself, whose martyrdom at Cherson is represented ; and to St. Andrew, the patron of Scotland and Russia.

In other words, the basilica was evidently as much the church of the Northern visitors to Rome as Sari Luigi dei Francesi is the French church, or San Giovanni dei Fioren- tini that of the Florentines. Hence San Cle- mente would be as familiar a name to the Scandinavian nations as St. Augustine or St. Gregory was to the English, and, given the double entente between Dania and Dacia, I think the connexion both with St. Olaf who, with St. Magnus, as COL. PRIDEAUX points out, is one of the two specially Scan- dinavian saints commemorated in London dedications and with St. Clement Danes may be accounted for. I may add that Murray's 4 Guide to Kent ' states that St. Clement's, Sandwich, is on the site of a Roman cemetery. Local guide-books state St. Clement's at Hastings to have been dedicated A.D. 1046, in the time of Pope Clement II. The other saints commemorated in the Roman frescoes include St. Vitus, who is patron of Saxony (the country of Ansgar), Silesia, and Bohemia. St. Andrew himself is said to have preached at Kief. H.

THE BELLMAN (9 th S. vi. 350, 417, 471 ; vii. 75). Hazlitt has a charming little essay on 'The Letter-Bell' in the volume published as "Sketches and Essays,'now first collected by his Son," 1839, and reissued in 1852 under the twofold title 'Men and Manners: Sketches and Essays.' The work is a varied miscellany, consisting of articles supplied to the Scots Magazine and other publications between 1818 and 1827. One of them, 'On Reading

New Books,' bears to have been written at Florence in May, 1825, and is thus one of the literary products of the continental trip following on the author's second marriage. There is nothing to show the date or the place of writing in the case of ' The Letter- JBelj' ; but it has literary and descriptive fasci- nation, and it characteristically enshrines a picturesque feature of London life in the early nineteenth century. The sound of the bell recalls to the writer his duties as a correspondent, and prompts the reflection that he has interests far from the metropolis, which had threatened to engulf him after settling in it from country parts. The essayist proceeds :

" This sound alone, startling me with the recollec- tion of a letter I had to send to the friends I had lately left, brought me as it were to myself, made me feel that I had links still connecting me with the universe, and gave me hope and patience to persevere. At that loud-tinkling, interrupted sound, the long line of blue hills near the place where I was brought up waves in the horizon, a golden sunset hovers over them, the dwarf -oaks rustle their red leaves in the evening breeze, and the road from Wem to Shrewsbury, by which I first set out on my journey through life, stares me in the face as plain, but from time and change not less visionary and mysterious than [sic] the pictures in the ' Pil- grim's Progress.' "

Hazlitt indulges in several interesting varia- tions on his theme, incidentally mentioning the " scarlet costume " of the bellman, and the fact that the official went his rounds when the author was on the point of dining or preparing to spend the evening at the theatre. The essay closes with a bright and vigorous description of what struck the writer as the finest sight in London the display of the mail coaches setting off from Piccadilly.

THOMAS BAYNE.

NELL GWYN (9 th S. vii. 229). The Genea- logical Magazine for last January contains a list of 311 persons now living who are de- scended from this lady. The list includes many names of famous and notable persons among the peerage, the baronetage, and the commonalty, and has all the authority which attaches to genealogical articles in that well- informed magazine. The list, with its accom- panying note, is a remarkable and interesting one. TYEO.

PASSAGE IN POPE (9 th S. vii. 308). The passage quoted is from Pope's 'Temple of Fame,' 11. 468-72. HARRY TOWNEND.

"To SIT BODKIN" (9 th S. vii. 228, 376). This appears to mean simply to squeeze one- self in, to " wedge in " between others. There may be only one on each side, as often occurs