Notes and Queries, Number 179, April 2, 1853.

Scott, Nelson's Secretary.—Can any of your readers give me information as to the pedigree and family of John Scott, Esq., public secretary to Lord Nelson? He was killed at Trafalgar on board the Victory; and dying while his sons were yet very young, his descendants possess little knowledge on the subject to which I have alluded. He was, I think, born at Fochabers, near Gordon Castle, where his mother is known to have died.

    A Subscriber.

The Axe which beheaded Anne Boleyn.—A friend of mine has excited my curiosity by stating, that in his school-boy readings of the history of England, he learned that the axe which deprived Henry VIII.'s second wife (Anne Boleyn) of her head was preserved as a relic in the Northgate Street of Kent's ancient citie, Canterbury. I have written to friends living in that locality for a confirmation of such a strange fact; but they plead ignorance. Can any of your numerous readers throw any light relative to this subject upon the benighted mind of

    Philip West.

Roger Outlawe.—A friend of mine in Germany has met with some ancient rolls, said to have been from the Irish Court of Common Pleas, chiefly of the time of Edward III., and headed thus:

"Communia placita apud Dublin coram fratre Rogero Outlawe priore hospitii sancti Johannis de Jerusalem in hibernia tenens locum Johannis Darcy le Cosyn Justiciarii hiberniæ apud Dublin die pasche in viiij mense anno B. Etii post ultimum conquestum hiberniæ quarto."

Can any person state who this Roger Outlawe was? And is it not singular that a prior of a religious and military establishment should be qualified to sit as locum tenens of a judge in a law court?

    H. T. Ellacombe.

Clyst St. George.

"Berte au Grand Pied."—I should be glad to know what is the history or legend of the goose-footed queen, whose figure Mr. Laing, in his Norway, p. 70. 8vo. edition, says is on the portals of four French cathedrals.

    Thos. Lawrence.

Ashby-de-la-Zouch.

Lying by the Walls.—What is the origin of the phrase "Lying by the walls," an euphemism for dead? It was very commonly used in this county some years ago. Instead of saying "Poor M. or N. is dead," they always said "Poor M. or N. lies by the walls."

    R. P.

St. Ives, Hunts.

Constables of France (Vol. vi., pp. 128. 254.).—Has no person been appointed to fill that high office since the death of the Duc de Luynes, in 1621?

    A. S. A.

Wuzzeerabad.

St. John's Church, Shoreditch.—The church of St. John, within the priory of Holywell, Shoreditch, and the chapel adjoining it, built by Sir Thomas Lovel, treasurer of the household to King Henry VII., knight of the most noble Order of the Garter, &c.

Is there any better or other account of this priory, church, and chapel than that given in the Monasticon? Judging by the statement copied by Mr. Lysons from the original entry in the books of the College of Arms, the chapel must have been a splendid building. Sir Thomas Lovel was buried there on the 8th June, 1525, "in a tombe of whyte marbell which both hit and the chappell were founded by hym, and it stondeth on the southe syde of the quyre of the saide churche." At his funeral there were present the Bishop of London, Lord St. John, Sir Richard Wyngfield, and many others, nobles and gentlemen. The Abbot of Waltham, the Prior of St. Mary Spital, four orders of friars, the Mayor and all the aldermen of London, the gentlemen of the Inns of Court, the Lord Steward, and all the clerks of London, &c., also attended. What a contrast to the present condition of the place, now a scavenger's yard, once the apparently last resting-place of the councillor of a mighty sovereign! "They that did feed delicately, that were brought up in scarlet, embrace dunghills. The holy house where our fathers worshipped is laid waste."

    Warden S. Hendry.

P. S.—Part of the chapel is now to be found under the floor of the "Old King John," Holywell Lane. The stone doorway into the porter's lodge of the priory still exists; but, from the accumulation of earth, the crown of the arch is six feet below the ground. I took a sketch of it, and some other remains of the priory, also under ground, about ten years ago.

    W. S. H.

Minor Queries with Answers

Sir John Thompson.—What are the crest, arms, motto, and supporters of Sir John Thompson, Bart., created Baron Haversham, of Haversham and Newport Pagnel, about the eighth year of William III.?

    R. P. D.

[Or, on a fesse indented az. three etoiles ar.; on a canton of the second, a sun in his glory, ppr.—Crest, an arm, erect, vested gu. cuff ar. holding in the hand ppr. five ears of wheat or. Motto, "In lumine luce."—Robson's British Herald, vol. ii. s. v.; and for the plate, vol. iii. pl. 50.]

Ring, the Marriage.—When and how did the use of the ring, in the marriage ceremony, originate? Is it of Christian origin; or is it derived from the Jews, or from the Greeks or Romans?

    Jonathan Pim.

[Brand quotes Vallancey and Leo Modena for the use of the marriage ring among the Jews (Popular Antiq., vol. ii. p. 103. edit. 1849). Wheatly, however, has given the most detailed account of its origin:—"The reason," he says, "why a ring was pitched upon for the pledge rather than anything else was, because anciently the ring was a seal, by which all orders were signed, and things of value secured (Gen. xxxviii. 18., Esther iii. 10. 12., 1 Maccab. vi. 15.); and therefore the delivery of it was a sign that the person to whom it was given was admitted into the highest friendship and trust (Gen. xli. 42.). For which reason it was adopted as a ceremony in marriage to denote that the wife, in consideration of her being espoused to the man, was admitted as a sharer in her husband's counsels, and a joint-partner in his honour and estate: and therefore we find that not only the ring, but the keys also were in former times delivered to her at the marriage. That the ring was in use among the old Romans, we have several undoubted testimonies (Juvenal, Sat. vi. ver. 26, 27.; Plin. Hist. Nat., lib. iii. c. i.; Tertull. Apol., c. vi. p. 7. A.). Pliny, indeed, tells us, that in his time the Romans used an iron ring without any jewel; but Tertullian hints, that in the former ages it was a ring of gold."—Rational Illustration of the Common Prayer, p. 390. edit. 1759.]

Amusive.—Is this word peculiar to Thomson, or is it made use of by other poets? Its meaning does not appear to be very definite. In the Spring it is applied to the rooks, with their "ceaseless caws amusive;" in the Summer to the thistledown, which "amusive floats;" and in the Autumn, the theory of the supposed cause of mountain springs is called an "amusive dream." Thomson seems to have been partial to these kind of adjectives, "effusive," "diffusive," "prelusive," &c.

    Cuthbert Bede, B.A.

[A reference to Richardson's Dictionary will show that, however fond Thomson may have been of this word, it is not one peculiar to him. Whitehead says:

"To me 'twas given to wake th' amusive reed,"

and Chandler, in his Travels in Greece, speaks of the wind "murmuring amusively among the pines."]

Belfry Towers separate from the Body of the Church.—At Mylor, near Falmouth, there is an old tower for the bells (where they are rung every Sunday), separate from the church itself, which has a very low tower. Are there many other instances of this? I do not remember to have seen any.

    J. S. A.

[If our correspondent will refer to the last edition of the Glossary of Architecture, s. v. Campanile, he will learn that though bell towers are generally attached to the church, they are sometimes unconnected with it, as at Chichester cathedral, and are sometimes united merely by a covered passage, as at Lapworth, Warwickshire. There are several examples of detached bell-towers still remaining, as at Evesham, Worcestershire; Berkeley, Gloucestershire; Walton, Norfolk; Ledbury, Herefordshire; and a very curious one entirely of timber, with the frame for the bells springing from the ground, at Pembridge, Herefordshire. At Salisbury a fine early English detached campanile, 200 feet in height, surmounted by a timber turret and spire, stood near the north-west corner of the cathedral, but was destroyed by Wyatt.]

An Easter-day Sun.—In that verse of Sir John Suckling's famous Ballad upon a Wedding, wherein occurs the simile of the "little mice," what is the meaning of the allusion to the Easter-day sun?—

"But oh! she dances such a way,
No sun upon an Easter-day
Is half so fine a sight!"

    Cuthbert Bede, B.A.

[It was formerly a common belief that the sun danced on Easter-day: see Brand's Popular Antiquities, vol. i. p. 161. et seq. So general was it, that Sir Thomas Browne treats on it in his Vulgar Errors, vol. ii. p. 87. ed. Bohn.]

Replies

HAMILTON QUERIES

(Vol. vii., p. 285.)

On reference to the Peerages of Sir Harris Nicolas and Wood, I feel no doubt that the father of Lord Spencer Hamilton, as Tee Bee remarks, was the fifth Duke of Hamilton, and not the third, as Collins (edition Brydges) states, who misled me. Perhaps the perplexity, if any, arose from Anne Duchess of Hamilton, the inheritress of the ducal honours by virtue of the patent of 1643, after the deaths of her father and uncle s. p. m., having obtained a life dukedom for her husband, William Earl of Selkirk, and, subsequently to his decease, having surrendered all her titles in favour of their eldest son, James Earl of Arran, who was in 1698 made Duke of Hamilton, with the same precedency of the original creation of 1643, as if he had succeeded thereto.

Sir William Hamilton, the ambassador, married first, Jan. 25, 1752, the only child of Hugh Barlow, Esq., of Lawrenny in Pembrokeshire, with whom he got a large estate: she died at Naples, Aug. 25, 1782, and was buried in Wales. His second lady was Emma Harte, a native of Hawarden in Flintshire; where her brother, then a bricklayer working for the late Sir Stephen Glynne, was pointed out to me forty years ago. In Wood's Peerage it is stated that Sir W. Hamilton's second marriage took place at London, Sept. 6, 1794: he died in April, 1803, and was buried in Slebech Church.

I well remember Single-speech Hamilton, who was a fried of the family, dining with my father when I was a little boy; and I still retain the impression of his having been a tall and thin old gentleman, very much out of health. He left a treatise called Parliamentary Logick, published in 1808. The brief memoir of the author prefixed to the work, makes no mention of him as a member of the House of Hamilton; but it is said that he derived his name of Gerard from his god-mother Elizabeth, daughter of Digby, Lord Gerard of Bromley, widow of James, fourth Duke of Hamilton, who fell in the duel with Lord Mohun, which looks as if some affinity was recognised. The same authority tells us that William Gerard Hamilton was the only child of a Scotch advocate, William Hamilton, by Hannah Hay, one of the sisters of David Bruce, the Abyssinian traveller; and that he removed to London, and practised with some reputation at the English bar. Mr. W. G. Hamilton died, unmarried, in July, 1796, æt. sixty-eight.

    Braybrooke.