Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 9.djvu/93

 9 s. ix. F. i.iwa) NOTES AND QUERIES.

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'James.' What I had long ago found want- ing in the treatment of ' Accredited ' and 'Court' I was confident I should find sup- plied in the article 'James.' There was reason for my expectation, for both the Apostles of that name are mentioned, and the sacred day of one of them. The name James is brought forward in connexion with a crowbar, a coin, and a sheep's head. We are told what St. James's wort and St. James's powder signify, but regarding St. James's Palace there is utter silence.

It is to be hoped that this omission did not escape the eye of the lamented Fitzedward Hall, and that it will be made up in the supplementary volume which will crown the lifelong labours of a lexicographical legion.

Readers who despair of seeing this far-off consummation will not refuse to read a note concerning the most noteworthy phrase, in the eyes of English speakers, in which the Apostolic names have entered. At some point in the present London park of St. James a hospital bearing his name had been built before the Conquest as a home for fourteen leprous maidens by the Londoners a tradition which Maitland says cannot be questioned, for he saw in the Cotton Library a MS. stating that Gisbert, Abbot of West- minster, visited it anno 1100, &c.

In 1532 Henry VIII. bought the hospital and eighty acres of marsh ground around it to form a deer park, and therein erected a goodly palace, but never made it his own home, though it still exists in part, and bears the name of St. James.

Soon after William came over, at the Revo- lution, Whitehall was burnt, and he made St. James's the royal residence. During the Stuart dynasty it had been a Stuart nursery, and was the site of the royal Court during the whole era of George III., and perhaps long before.

The phrase "Court of St. James," in the sense of the British Royal Government, may be as old as the Revolution, or may not be older than the accession of George III. ; or may it not have been coeval with the second or first King James 1 It is used in the latest 'Encyclopaedia Britannica.'

How early a use of the words in the sense desiderated can be found, who first used them, and in what connexion, are facts which some among the multitudinous readers ought to have early ascertained for Dr. Murray. In America the locution "Am- bassador to the Court of St. James" has been long common in the mouths of people too ignorant to supply the ellipsis of " palace," and at a loss for a reason why James was

preferred as a patron saint to George. Eng- lish antipathy to Spaniards would have for- bidden, one would think, the bestowal of such a high honour on one who, as Dr. Murray tells us, was chosen as the patron saint of Spain JAMES D. BUTLER.

Madison, Wis., U.S.

[Our correspondent in his last paragraph settles his own difficulty. The ellipsis in " Court of St. James's" is merely of the word " Palace."]

SIR THOMAS BROWNE'S SKULL. The Nor- folk Chronicle of 18 January has an account of the casket for Sir Thomas Browne's skull presented to the Norfolk and Norwich Hos- pital.

In July last Dr. Osier expressed to Mr. Chas. Williams, surgeon, of Norwich, a wish to present a silver casket for the skull. The Museum Committee of the hospital were pleased to accept so generous an offer, but suggested that the casket should be formed not of silver, but of plate-glass.

Early in December it was presented by Mr. Williams in the name of Prof. Osier to the Committee, who directed that an appro- priate pedestal should be made for it.

The casket is of oblong shape, about 13 in. in length by 11 in. in width, and 11 in. in height. The four sides and top consist of crystal glass with silver-gilt mountings, and set on a stand of ebony. On the stand are placed four gilt plates, on one of which is engraved the name of the donor, &c., and on the other three quotations selected by Prof. Osier from the 'Religio Medici.' The in- scription runs :

"This casket was presented to the Norfolk and Norwich Hospital by William Osier, M.D., F.R.S., Professor of Medicine, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, 1901."

JOHN PICKFORD, M.A.

Newbourne Rectory, Woodbridge.

THE FEAST AND THE RECKONING. On turn- ing over the pages of a reprint of the debates on the Education Bill of 1870, 1 have come across a speech delivered by Col. Barttelot on 7 July of the year mentioned, in which the then gallant member for West Sussex quotes with excellent effect " the old saying," as he terms it,

We laugh and revel till the feast is o'er ; Then comes the reckoning, and we laugh no more.

I take it that the feeling expressed in the two verses is as old as civilization, for we should scarcely expect to find it existing at the time

When wild in woods the noble savage ran. But it may be otherwise ; if so, I trust that the distinguished artist E. T. Reed, who is