Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 8.djvu/417

 a* s. VIIL NOV. iG, ion.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

409

London, convenient for carrying on his charitable work. On the day Pyat reachec London my friend who later came to tak tea with me, and told me of the incident was sitting reading in his front room, wher the door burst open and an excited French man rushed at him, threw his arms round hi: neck, and began "Ah, Pyat, mon ami ! " then seeing his error, a little scene followed, which ended by it being ascertained that the man he was looking for was the gentleman in th< first-floor apartments, who had arrived tha morning. All this at the time of its occurrenc< I kept to myself. So, also by an accident, ] could name the author of * The Coming K , but 1 suggest that the matter be dropped for twenty years longer, in order to excite no animosities and to wound no susceptibilities " A young clerk in the War Office," therefore a servant of the Crown, was not the author I am glad thus to remove an odious suspicion but do not think it right to say any more at present. H. G. K.

A ' Key to Edward VII.,' by One Behind the Scenes, was published, and illustrated with portraits of the authors. These carica- ture portraits are S. O. Briety=S. O. Bee ton Philander Dirty = Doughty (?) ; and A Modern Juvenile=Evelyn Douglas Jerrold. WALTER JERROLD.

Hampton-on-Thames.

THE CHEWAR (9 th S. viii. 306). Halli well in his 'Dictionary of Archaic and Provincial Words,' and Wright in his 'Dictionary of Obsolete English,' give the meaning of this word to be " a narrow passage or road be- tween two houses," in which sense it is used in Westmoreland. The latter adds as an illustration " Go and sweep that chewar"

EVERARD HOME COLEMAN. 71, Brecknock Road.

Is this word similar to "chare," used in Newcastle-on-Tyne, which signifies a " close " as in Edinburgh, or a " row " in Yarmouth ?

G. L.

Halli well has " C hewer, a narrow passage. West." C. C. B.

S. Du Bois, SEVENTEENTH-CENTURY PAINTER (9 th S. viii. 245). ' Musgrave's Obituary,' Harleian Society's Publications, vol. xliv. (1899), p. 207, has, " Simon Du Bois, pictor, claruit in Angl. 26 May, 1708," and gives references for consultation, including MSS.; and vol. xlviii. (1901), p. xii, says, "There are engraved portraits of those persons marked MS., but for the description of these prints vide my MS. Catalogue of Engraved Portraits [Add. MS. 5727]." Is MR. FERRAR

correct in saying Dr. Mapletoft died "in his ninetieth year in 1720"? The'D.N.B.' has, "John Mapletoft, born 15 June, 1631, died 10 Nov., 1721, in the ninety-first year of his age, and was buried in the chancel of the church of St. Lawrence Jewry." ' Musgrave's Obitu- ary ' has " aet. 94," and the reference for consultation is ' The Chronological Diary to Historical Register,' 25 vols. 8vo, London, 1714-38 (P.P. 3407). H. J. B.

SPIDER-EATING (9 th S. viii. 304). Anna Maria Schurmann enjoyed the nut - like flavour which she affirmed Arachnida possessed, but seems to have been conscious that further reasons would be required by most people in palliation of her habit. She therefore pleaded that she was born under the sign Scorpio. More valid is the reason given by the German immortalized by Rosel, and mentioned by Kirby and Spence in their ' Introduction to Entomology.' This sage was not content to eat his succulent victims seriatim, but spread them upon his bread like butter, observing that he found them useful "urn sich auszulaxiren."

CHAS. GILLMAN. Church Fields, Salisbury.

In Mr. Bram Stoker's extraordinary book ' Dracula ' one of the characters, Mr. Ren- field, who is slightly mad on some points, catches numerous flies by means of sugar, and then many spiders to eat the flies, several birds to eat the spiders, and a cat to eat the birds, intending himself to eat the cat, and so devour thousands of lives in one aody, with the hope of thus prolonging his own existence. Perhaps Anna Maria Schurmann lad something of the same idea, but did not get beyond the spiders.

CHARLES R. DA WES.

Anybody who eats spiders may safely be aid to have a depraved appetite, and 1 am lot aware that such a diet has ever been upposed to have medicinal or other virtue. Ipiders, indeed, were until lately almost iniversally considered poisonous, though low, I believe, the tarantula is the only one >f which this is held true. In Ramesey's reatise 'Of Poysqns' four other poisonous arieties are described, with the symptoms vhich follow upon being bitten by them, or accidentally " swallowing any of them. "The >art affected," we are told,

will be seised on with a stupor, with horrour and old, the belly is filled with wind and swells, the ace growes pale, the eyes drop tears involuntarily, be extrearn and remote parts of the Body tremble, nd are, in a manner, convulst, a continuall in- lination and desire to evacuate by urine followes