Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 7.djvu/511

 9-1- S.VU. JOSE 29, mi.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

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some magistrates whose displeasure he had incurred.

He seems to have continued his literary activity to the last, for, writes Mr. Thomas Mulock (now of Kilnagarna), "in 1869, after the disestablishment of the Irish Church, he wrote an article which was almost prophetic in foreshadowing the fate of the Irish land- lords."

Mr. Mulock died 11 Aug., 1869, in Lichfield Road, Stafford, aged eighty. He is described as having been a tali, handsome man of gentlemanly bearing, very witty, and an excellent conversationalist, but decidedly eccentric and obstinate to a degree.

He had two sons, Thomas Mellard (born 18 Nov,, 1827, died 22 Feb., 1847) and Benjamin Robert (born 18 June, 1829, died 1863), neither of whom married. In an article on the late Mrs. Craik in Macmillarts Maga- zine for December, 1887 (p. 82), Mrs. Oliphant made some insinuations against the character of Benjamin which were entirely without foundation, and could only have been made as the result of ignorance or some mis- understanding. Mr. Ben. Mulock was a civil engineer with considerable gifts, full of native wit, and highly honourable. He held several professional appointments in Brazil, Russia, and elsewhere. Though death came to him suddenly as the result of an accident, on his sister's own authority he died without owing a penny to any one.

The information I have been able to give is only scrappy, but may serve to provide some record of an able man and original character, who for sixty years lived a life of strenuous intellectual activity.

ALEYN LYELL READE.

Park Corner, Blundellsands, near Liverpool.

ORIENTATION AND THE EXIGENCIES OF CONTROVERSY.

CONTROVERSIALISTS of all sorts and kinds have constantly, as we are well aware, adopted the device of making quotations apart from their context. So striking an instance of the use of this method occurs in a recent number of ' N. & Q.' (ante, p. 431) that I am induced to occupy, with the Editor's permission, a certain amount of the space available in giving the particulars of the case. A correspondent signing himself IBAGUE quotes what he calls " MR. ARNOTT'S words," taking them from an article on ' Orientation ' which I wrote in the course of last year (9 th S. vi. 276).

My article consists of five paragraphs, and is headed * Orientation,' &c., and relates

partly to interments and partly to churches. At the end of the second paragraph the orientation of churches in England comes in. The churches are described as built to stand, according to the general rule, east and west. It is said that to that usage there were very few exceptions in the Middle Ages, but it is added there were some, and one is mentioned. It is further stated that, allowing for these exceptions, " the churches have also* by an almost invariable rule been built to stand east and west." It is further explained in my note that the custom of churches being built to stand east and west has been pre- served hitherto down to " the present day," i.e., generally preserved, though with certain exceptions, such as those noted above. The meaning is perfectly clear, viz., that the rule for the position of churches was a general one, but not so absolute as never to be broken. The phrase " down to the present day " is not explained ; its comprehensiveness would be understood by those acquainted with the subject of orientation, but this absence of explanation seems to have misled IBAGU& A break in the continuousness of the custom occurs for a short time just where he was taking his u walk " when he made notes on orientation and sent them to be published, with a reference to my words, in the columns of ' N. & Q.' The aforesaid exception to the custom occurred in the years preceding the Oxford movement, during which churches were not unfrequentiy built without regard to orientation, as in the case of St. John's at Chatham ; and other examples might easily be named. With the Oxford movement the custom of the orientation of churches was resumed.

I am sorry to trouble my readers with this long explanation, but I must ask their indul- gence while I add to what has been said the following statement relating to the contro- versial nature of IBAGUE'S proceeding. From my article at 9 th S. vi. 276 he makes this extract, calling it, as I said above, "MB. ARNOTT'S words " :

" Churches in England have always and by con- tinuous use in the Church of England from early times, through the Middle Ages, down to the present day been placed east and west."

IBAGUE here, using the controversial methods to which my opening words have reference, entirely ignores the context. In making his quotation he omits the necessary refer- ence to what had gone before, though the " words " he quotes cannot be understood apart from the context and are not fairly


 * " Also " refers to interments.