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NOTES AND QUERIES. [9 th s. ix. FEB. 15, 1902.

still how strangely a word in our own living tongue can alter, when in a few hundred years the letters sealt can now by many be represented by the sound sorlt. Evidently, then, the Italians may just as easily have altered the sound vas (or vazz) into varze ; though possibly few of them will have as yet Romanced the word into vorze, as some of us have done. The modern Italian sound, then, for the commodity salt does not attract my attention nearly so much as the uncommon French sound, and that sound seems to the present writer to require some explanation. As to the A.-S. word sealt, if that is indeed our root-word, it and the French sel seem apparently very similar in the vowel - sounds, which is noteworthy. We are told that all living languages are ever moving ; thus we might expect that the word sel, if it were not a Latin fossil, preserved, as fossils are apt to be, in a foreign tongue, would have drifted to sal in sound, and possibly into sol, just as our sealt has drifted into sorlt. I submit, then, that the sel sound is one not to be expected, and requires accounting for. That the word vas has also the form vasum does not seem to me altogether conclusive against what I had sub- mitted. The lack of absolute knowledge of what the old sounds were was the point I was more particularly endeavouring to urge, and I note that M. HAULTMONT only contends for what, to that writer, seem the pro- babilities. W. H. B.

VANCOUVER (9 th S. viii. 504; ix. 34). George Vancouver was born about 1750. He was a midshipman in the Royal Navy, and served under Capt. James Cook. He was appointed ^to the command of an expedition to ascertain whether there was any com- munication between the North Pacific and North Atlantic oceans. The island which now bears his name was originally called Nootka, discovered in 1774, but was first circumnavigated by Capt. George Vancouver m 1792. He compiled an account of this voyage under the title of Voyage of Dis-

?r e $ *? N 2^t Pacific Ocean and round the World in which the Coast of North-West

America has been carefully examined and accurately surveyed, principally with a view to ascertain the existence of any navigable Communication between the North Pacific and -North Atlantic Oceans, 1790-95,' 3 vols., 1/98. Ihis work was ready for publication when the author died on 10 May, 1798.

EVERARD HOME COLEMAN.

George Vancouver was born at King' Lynn, 22 June, 1757. Which after the pLc

of my nativity, the town of Lynn in Norfolk, obtained the name of Lynn Canal": so writes Vancouver in vol. iii. p. 249 of his book ' A Voyage of Discovery to the North Pacific Ocean and round the World.' St. Margaret's register contains the following : " Mar., 1761, George s. of Mr. John Gaspar Vancouver, and Bridget his wife (born 22 June, 1757)."

ALFRED SMITH. Stonegate House, King's Lynn.

SIR THOMAS SMITH, OF PARSON'S GREEN ,9 th S. ix. 29). He was son of Thomas Smith, Mayor of Abingdon in 1584, by Joan, daughter of Thomas Jennings He was born 1556 ; matric. at Christ Church, Oxon, in 1573

ee Foster's 'Alumni Oxon.'); M.P. for ^ricklade, 1588-9; Tamworth, 1593; Ayles- bury, 1597-8 ; secretary to the Earl of Essex ;

lerk of the Privy Council, 1587 ; Clerk of the Parliament, 1597 ; Latin Secretary to James I., 1603 ; knighted at Greenwich, 20 May, 1603; and appointed one of the Masters of Requests in 1608. He died at Fulham, 27 Nov., 1609, and was buried there 7 December following. Will dated 12 Sept., 1609; proved in P.C.C., 21 Dec., 1609. He married Frances, eldest daughter of William Brydges, fourth Lord Chandos, and she after- wards, about 1610, became the second wife of Thomas Cecil, first Earl of Exeter, whom she survived forty years, dying in 1663 at the age of eighty-three, and was buried in Winchester Cathedral. Her will, dated 20 Jan., 1662, was proved 17 July, 1663. By Sir Thomas Smith she had an only son, Robert Smith, who died s.p. in 1626, and a daughter Margaret, who became the wife successively of Sir Edward Herbert, Attorney-General to Charles I., and of Thomas Carey, second son of Robert, Earl of Monmouth. Sir Thomas Smith, the Secretary of State to Queen Eliza- beth, died in 1577, so before Frances Brydges was born. Sir Thomas of Parson's Green must also be distinguished from Sir Thomas Smith, the well-known Treasurer of the Virginia Company and ambassador to Mus- covy. He was knighted in the same month as his namesake, but died in 1625.

W. D. PINK. Lowton, Newton-le- Willows.

Sir Thomas Smith was son of Thomas Smith, of Abingdon, by Jone, daughter of Thomas Jenings (Harl. MS. 1551, Visitation of Middlesex). Born at Abingdon about the year 1556. In 1573 a student of Christ Church, Oxford ; B.A. 1574, M.A. 1578. He became Public Orator and Proctor in 1584 ; 1587, Clerk of Privy Council ; M.P. for Crick- lade, 1588-9 j Tamworth, 1593 ; 1597, Clerk of