Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 9.djvu/45

 9* s. ix. JAN. ii, 1902.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

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elegance of the English language," but also, and above all, "the utmost simplicity and plainness, suited to every capacity." That this last desideratum is so often lacking in ' Hymns Ancient and Modern ' is no doubt partly owing to the fact that so many of the hymns in this collection are translations, but this is no excuse. If a translator cannot turn a Latin hymn into English, he can at any rate let it alone. John Wesley's own trans- lations from the German are models in this respect ; they are amongst the most cherished hymns in his collection, and comparatively few of his followers suspect that they are translations.

I do not think the reading of Mrs. Adams's hymn which O. O. H. quotes is much better tli an the generally accepted one, and the subject of alterations in hymns is too wide for these columns. I may say, however, that a compiler has surely as much right to correct an author's grammar as to tamper with his theology. C. C. B.

The history of that most beautiful hymn Con way's 'Centenary History of the South Place Society' (London, 1894), where a fac- simile of the draft in Sarah Flower Adams's handwriting is given. The verse under dis- cussion reads :
 * Nearer, my God, to Thee,' is given in M. D.

Tho like the wanderer The sun gone down Darkness be over me

Nearer ray God to thee Nearer to thee

Of the alternative readings here given, the first in each case was adopted an instance that second thoughts are not always best. Dr. Garnett regards her hymn beginning "He sendeth sun, He sendeth shower," as superior to the more famous ' Nearer, my God, to Thee,' but the latter has found its way to acceptance by the most diverse of creeds and temperaments. Mrs. E. Bridell- Fox issued from the Christian Life office in 1894 a pamphlet of forty-six pages, contain- ing a memoir of Sarah Flower Adams, her hymns, and 'The Flock at the Fountain,' a catechism for children. This is a modest and inspiring memorial of a woman who has given voice to the spiritual aspirations of millions. WILLIAM E. A. AXON.

Manchester.

ROWE OF CORNWALL (9 th S. viii. 305, 349, 470). I am inclined to think that the tradi- tion of an ancestor of the West-Country Rowes

joining one of the Crusades arose in the following manner. An ancient family of " a-Rowe," or Rowe, was long seated in Kent. A very fine seventeenth-century illuminated pedigree of this family in the British Museum (Add. 29,797) shows that " Richard Rowe of Kent married the da' and heire of Phillipp Rurd," and was the father of William Rowe, who " married y e Daughter of Viueon " (i.e., Vivian, a West-Country name), whose son "John Rowe, Sergeant at Lawe in the tyme of H. 8," married " Agneta, daug. and heir of Will Barnhouse of Kingston in Deuon- shiV

Turning to the Visitation of Devon, 1620 (Harl. Soc., p. 247), the above-mentioned three generations of Rowes are given as the ancestors of "John Rowe de Kingston in parochia de Staverton in com. Devon, set. 76 superstes 1620," who duly enters and signs the pedigree.

This, I think, is strong evidence that the Devonshire family of Rowe was a branch of the old Kentish stock.

From what I can gather, the Crusade story appears to be based on the fact that the West -Country Rowes bear as their arms Gules, three holy lambs argent, which are said to have had their origin in one of the Crusades. Now these were not the ancient arms of Rowe, which were Gules, a quatrefoil or, and later, Argent, a chevron azure between three trefoils slipped per pale gules and vert. The arms of the Rurd family, however, whose heiress married the Richard Rowe mentioned above, were Gules, three holy lambs couchant argent, and this coat was at the time of the Visitation of 1620 merely quartered by the Devonshire Rowes (see pedigree of Rowe of Lamerton, Harl. Soc. 248) ; subsequently, however, they were borne alone, unsupported by the paternal coat, as they are at the present day (the lambs becoming passant instead of couchant). The ancient paternal Rowe coats, having thus been discarded, were soon forgotten, while the Crusade tradition, which was not improbably imported into the West-Country branch of the Rowe family along with the holy lambs at the time of the Rurd alliance (Edward III.), continued to live, being kept in remembrance by the exclusive use of the more favoured Rurd quartering with which it is associated.

ARTHUR F. ROWE.

Walton-on-Thames.

" MACHINE "^PUBLIC COACH (9 th S. viii. 462). Beckmann, in his article on 'Coaches' ('History of Inventions,' 1846), omits any mention of the " machine " carriage, or " New