Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 8.djvu/491

 .9* s. VIIL DEC. 14, i9oi.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

483

Lacour declared that he belonged to no club, nor ever had. He never played ; he did not know how to play. Gambetta came to speak for his friend. He described the Tablettes d'un Spectateur as * * une officine tene'breuse ou Ton distille la calomnie en toute surete contre ceux qu'on veut perdre." Chal- lemel-Lacour was about to fill a diplomatic post at Berne, and the object of the calumny was to bring him into discredit with his col- leagues and so destroy the influence of the representative of the Republic. There is an interesting passage in Gambetta's pleading appreciative of English notions in cases of this kind. He said :

" Je n'entends pas, messieurs, une condamnation corporelle, une peine physique qui enverrait en prison ceux qui ne sont que les hommes de paille, les instruments des machinations d'autrui. Non, messieurs, je vous demande de frapper les vrais coupables, de les frapper de haut, efficacement, virilement, a la faxjon des Anglais, c'est-a-dire non d'envoyer en prison les malheureux inculpe"s, mais d'atteindre ceux qui les mettent en avant et restent derriere eux, les possesseurs de 1'officine dont je vous parlais, les actionnaires, ceux qui font ce 'commerce de diffamation que je vous signale."

B. D. MOSELEY. Burslem.

WE must request correspondents desiring infor- mation on family matters of only private interest to affix their names and addresses to their queries, in order that the answers may be addressed to them direct.

" ODOUR OF SANCTITY." I require for the ' Dictionary ' the origin of this phrase and instances of its use before 1800.

J. A. H. MURRAY. Oxford.

"ODIUM THEOLOGICUM." This well-known phrase occurs in a note to Hume's 'Essays and Treatises,' ed. 1758, p. 121, where it is said that " the Odium Theologicum, or Theo- logical Hatred, is noted even to a Proverb, and means that degree of rancour which is the most furious and implacable." Can any reader of 4 N. & Q.' tell us who first used the phrase, or give an instance earlier than 1758? A direct communication (in the first place) addressed Dr. Murray, Oxford, will oblige. J. A. H. MURRAY.

HENRY MASSEY, VICAR OF KENDAL, 1645- 1650. In 1645 the Master and Fellows of Trinity College, Cambridge, presented Henry Masaey, M.A., to the vicarage of Kendal. He is mentioned as " minister of Kendall " in a letter from the mayor of Kendal to Speaker Lenthall, dated 10 March, 1645/6. On 22 April,

1646, the Committee for Plundered Ministers voted 50. per annum out of the revenue of the Dean and Chapter of Durham "for in- crease of his maintenance." He would seem to have ceased to be vicar on 6 January, 1650, for in that year the same committee ordered the sum of 381. 18s. arrears of the aforesaid sum of 501., calculated from "25 of March, 1649, to the 6th of January last" to be paid to him or to Mr. Richard Massey " to his use."

Can any of your correspondents tell me to what branch of the Massey family this vicar of Kendal belonged, and, if possible, his father's name, his birthplace, or any par- ticulars respecting him 1 About the time when Henry Massey was~ vicar of Kendal there was a Richard, third son of John Massey, of Coddington, in Cheshire, and brother of Major- General Edward Massey of the Parliamentarian army. There was also a Richard, fourth son of Sir William Massey, of Poddington, about the same period, and ne had a brother Edward, married to Alice, daughter of Richard Braithwaite, of Burne- side Hall, in Kendal parish. 1 do not, how- ever, find a Henry Massey in any pedigree I

J. A.

have been able to consult.

M.

LECTERN IN DURHAM CATHEDRAL. The lectern in Durham Cathedral is in the form of a pelican in her piety, the drops of blood falling from her wounded breast into the mouths of her young ones being very curiously represented. Is there any other known in- stance of a pelican, either " in her piety " or " vulning herself," being used as a lectern in a church 1 At the exhibition of the London Church Congress in South Kensington, 1899, there was to be seen a lectern in the form of a web-footed eagle. The attendant, on being questioned as to this, expressed his surprise at it ; had not noticed it ; supposed it was a copy of some ancient lectern. Is this form of eagle recognized in ecclesiastical furniture? The Durham lectern is explained by the fact that a pelican in her piety was the crest or rather badge, for a bishop has no crest of Bishop Fox (1495). Of course we all know that pelicans do not do as the heraldic legend says they do. MICHAEL FERRAR.

Little Gidding.

CURE BY THE HAND OF A CORPSE. Relative to the supernatural powers attributed to a dead hand (9 th S. iii. 68, 172, 294) the follow- ing extract from the Universal Magazine and fieview for July, 1790, p. 94, may be worth recording in ' N. & Q.' :

"Domestic Intelligence. Dublin, July 1. Some fishermen in the neighbourhood of Castlelyona,