nuisance, which is supposed to be of French origin, is also a form of the French barre, for in the dictionary of the French Academy and in Bescherelle I find one of the meanings given certaines maladies," though I cannot find it in Littré. A French friend tells me, however, that one still often hears people say in France, when they have a cramp or colicky pain running across the stomach or abdomen, "Je me sens [or j'ai, or j'ai comme] une barre dans l'estomac [or le ventre]." F. CHANCE. Sydenham Hill. LORD NELSON'S DRESS AT TRAFALGAR.-In an article in the Daily Telegraph (Oct. 22, 1887) on the Victory, Nelson's ship at Trafalgar, there occurs the following description of the hero enter meeting of two tides or by the rushing of the tide up a narrowing estuary." No. 1 meaning does not seem to be satisfactorily established, for it is marked with?, but it is supposed to come from "O.N. bára, wave, billow." And as for No. 2 meaning," malaise qu'on éprouve au travers du ventre dans it is considered doubtful whether it is the same word, and no other origin is offered. Still it is the only meaning with which we are familiar at the present time. Now, on September 23, an accident to a vessel (apparently an English one) was recorded in the Daily News as having taken place on the 22nd near Villequier, at no great distance from the mouth of the Seine, in consequence of the "great tidal bore wave which rises on the Seine near Caudebec whenever a high flood-tide sets in strongly against the downward course of the river." I thought this would be an excellent opportunity for making out the real French equivalent for bore in this sense,t and I accord-ing into the battle :ingly referred to the French Figaro of the same date, and there, in the description of the same accident, the word used was barre ("une barre, haute de dix pieds, a pris en travers le navire, qui a été balayé et a chaviré "). This looks as if bore and barre were the same word, and, if so, the French word is evidently the older. We can perfectly understand also why the word barre (=bar) has been applied to such a tidal wave, for this forms just as great a barrier for the time being as the bar of a river (also called barre) does permanently. The Daily News speaks of this frequently occurring tidal wave in the Seine as "this wall of water." The only difficulty is, Why is the French barre ordinarily represented by bar in English, and in this particular case by bore? It is possible, however, that bore="malady of ennui" (N.E.D.'), whence ennui, annoyance, The only example given is, curiously enough, spelled bare, and it seems to me somewhat doubtful whether it is a substantive at all. Stratmann, however, has four examples of the form bare (he writes it bare), to which he gives the meaning of "bore, fluctus, unda "; whilst in the N.E.D.,' s.v." Bare," this meaning is not even mentioned and no reference is given to bore. In Ducange I find the Low Latin bara fluctus, unda. †The only equivalent I had hitherto been able to find was ras (or raz) de marée (see Gasc and Littré), but according to Littré this is an upheaval of the sea due to something more than the tide. "The memory pictures the dauntless little sea-lord nines, as if for a court day or ball, with gold-bound tripping forth upon his quarter-deck, dressed 'to the coat, epaulettes, and glittering orders upon his breast, jewelled sword at his side, gay with the gladness of a heart," &c. Now it so happens that my late father-in-law, the Rev. Dr. Scott, who was Lord Nelson's chaplain, and was with him when he died, has appended a note, now before me, in correction of an equally stilted account of the hero's dress given in Harrison's 'Life of Lord Nelson': "This is wrong: he wore the same coat he did the day before, nor was there the smallest alteration in his dress whatsoever from other days. In this action he had not his sword with him on deck, which in other actions he had always carried with him.-A. J. SCOTT." ALFRED GATTY, D.D. "OTHER" AS A PLURAL.-It is common to illustrate the plural use of other from writers not later than the Elizabethan age, and thus to convey the impression that it is not to be found later than the seventeenth century. Thus Dr. Morris, in his English Accidence,' p. 150, gives "some other" as used by Ascham and Shakespeare, and "other some" as occurring in Acts xvii. 18; and then adds, "A new plural was afterwards formed by the ordinary plural suffix s." Dr. Abbott ('Shakespearian Grammar,' p. 25), after explaining the correctness of other as a plural, proceeds, "Our modern 'others said' is only justified by a custom." It would be important to settle at what period the plural use of the form was discontinued and the modern practice established. The following sentence, which occurs in one of the letters of Beattie, author of 'The Minstrel,' and a reputed stylist in § It is admitted in the N.E.D.,' however, that bore his day, shows that "some other" was still in wave was at one time spelled bare. See note And fashion in 1759. Speaking of Richardson's boar (the animal) was sometimes spelled bare in M.E. Clarissa,' which was then a new book, Beattie (N.E.D.), whilst in Old French barre was sometimes observes, "They who read more for amusement spelled bare, especially when it meant barrier (Godefroy than instruction will not be so much captivated with and Littré). Very probably there has been some confusion with the name of the animal. See note ‡. 'Clarissa as with some other of our English Littré's definition of barre in this sense is "les premières lames que la marée montante pousse dans un fleuve." Bescherelle's, which pleases me better, is "ligne ou vague élevée, transversale, constante, que produit le choc des eaux des grands fleuves, descendant avec force contre les eaux de la mer, qui remontent par l'effet de la marée." To love mercy And to walk humbly with thy God Deceased without Issue Aug. 27 1760. After the statement "The inscription runs as follows," this is how Mr. Walford copies it on p. 501, vol. i., of 'Greater London': "In memory of Smart Lethieullier, Esq., a gentleman of polite literature and elegant taste, an encourager of art and ingenious artists, a studious promoter of literary inquiries, a companion and a friend of learned men; industriously versed in the science of antiquity, and richly possessed of the curious productions of nature, but who modestly desired no other inscription on his tomb than what he had made the rule of his life-to do justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with his God. He was born Nov. 3rd, 1701, and died without issue Aug. 27th, 1760." JOHN T. PAGE. Holmby House, Forest Gate. Queries. We must request correspondents desiring information 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, JAMES II. AT Tunbridge Wells.-James II., when Duke of York, often stayed for months at a time at Tunbridge. Can any one give me information as to where he lived there? Was there any royal residence near Tunbridge Wells in Charles II.'s reign? WOLSELEY. ficient abundance to repay this "dreadful trade." There are several plants now known as samphire; for instance, we have golden samphire, prickly samphire, marsh samphire, rock samphire. But, before dealing with their several claims, I may state that I cannot trace samphire in Anglo-Saxon times. Our early ancestors knew all about fennel, pimpernel, and hemlock; rock_parsley was stonsuc, safflower was lybcorn, but I cannot recognize any synonym for a samphire. It seems that popular opinion among us clings to rock samphire as the original, because the prefix "rock" is recognizable in Petrus crescentius, so perce pierre, herbe de St. Pierre, and finally samphire, but I do not find that it was ever called "rock-cress" in England; if not, what was its name before samphire came into use upon the above barbarous corruption? I see that 1580 is the earliest approximate date quoted by Prof. Skeat, so the mention in Lear' of 1608 is an early instance of its use. Did Shakspere mean safflower? But, to resume. Rock samphire is botanically known as Crithmum maritimum; it is universally known, and some nations call it a fennel. Perhaps the Anglo-Saxons recognized it thus. It certainly would not have done for Shakspere to dilate on the dangers of gathering fennel, which is a common pot-herb, yet found "in dry chalky soil near the sea." A writer in the nearly obsolete 'Penny Cyclopædia,' vol. xx. p. 354, puts it thus, "The true samphire (Crithmum maritimum) is found on the cliffs at Dover, and has been immortalized by Shakspere. Sowerby disposes of it more shortly as "growing sparingly on the white cliffs of Dover." In the present day samphire is still recognized as a "pickle," and I find that marsh samphire is the popular favourite, meaning Salicornia herbacea, or salthorn; it is also known as glasswort, because of its economic use as an alkaline called barilla. It seems to me to be true kelp, or a genuine seaweed, that has changed its habitat and become a root or vegetable; it now belongs to the Chenopodiacea, and it is of great interest to note that it is classified next to the beets, all derived from Batis maritima, or sea beet, which thus, under cultivation, furnishes another good "pickle." called Inula crithinoides; it frequents salt marshes Golden samphire belongs to the Composita, being and rocks, having a bright yellow daisy-like flower. Does it pickle? Prickly samphire, or Echinophera ; the plant spinosa, is called extinct in Britain flowers like the Crithmum maritimum, and comes next in classification to the ill-omened hemlock. Would the latter prove innocuous if grown in a saline region, and does the E. spinosa pickle? In concluding I renew the question, What comSAMPHIRE.-Shakspere's reference to the sam-mercial use did Shakspere imply by the dreadful phire in Lear,' IV. vi., points to a plant the uses of which should be well known, and found in suf trade he so graphically described; and are we to assume that people hawked this plant about, as is now done in towns, with watercress and SHAKING HANDS.- "What is the origin of the custom of shaking hands?" is a question which appeared in 'N. & Q.' in the second year after that work began to be published (1 S. iii. 118). Again, ELLCEE (5th S. iv. 487) inquired whether the custom was not originally British. He said that when in Paris in 1817 no one offered him his hand, though he was received with kindness. Frenchmen also spoke to him concerning shaking hands as, "l'accollade Britannique." Other correspondents have traced the custom back to the Elizabethan era, quoting a line from Ancient Pistol, "Give me thy fist, thy forefoot to me give." The earliest allusion cited has been " Arreptaque manu," in Horace. But shaking hands was a far more ancient custom among Greeks. In the fifth century before our era Aristophanes describes Strepsiades as calling on his son to give him his right hand. There is also a phrase in the Iliad' (x. 542) which may show hand-shaking to be even prehistoric. When Ulysses returned to the Grecian camp with the horses of Rhesus he had stolen, Nestor saluted him with the right hand and with honeyed words. Will not some Grecian writer for N. & Q.' give us the true interpretation of the Nestorian salute, δεξιῇ ἠσπάζετο JAMES D. BUTLER. Madison, Wis., U.S. 'THE DIARY OF A NUN.'-Can any reader of does this expression first occur? COURT OF TRAILBASTON.—What is the origin CHARACTERS IN CUTHBERT BEDE'S 'MATTINS AND MUTTONS.'-Two of the characters in this clever novel of your old correspondent, viz., the Rev. Mr. Sand and Dr. O'Lion, were readily Clay (of St. Margaret's Church) and the Rev. James identified by Brightonians with the Rev. Edmund O'Brien, D.D. (of St. Patrick's), respectively. May I venture to inquire if any other characters in the book represented actual persons, and who was the original of the Rev. Mr. Pordage, famed for his "nectar"? FREDERICK E. SAWYER, F.S.A. Brighton. HERALDRY OF THE SURNAME OF FRENCH. Can any of your learned authorities kindly inform one, generally interested in heraldry, but at a distance from the valuable manuscript and antiquarian libraries of old England, what was the coat of arms of Henry Franche, the York Herald in the time of Edward IV. (1461 to 1483)? Information also desired as to where were the locations in England of the Frenches which bore the following old coat armour, viz.: or. or. ва. 1. Sa., a bend between two dolphins ar. 3. Sa., a bend ar., between two dolphins hauriant 4. Ar., two bendlets between as many dolphins 5. Sa., a bend between two barbels ar. 6. Per pale sa. and ar., a wolf saliant changed. 7. Per pale sa. and az., a wolf passant ar. 8. Ar., a fess engrailed gu., in chief a rose of gagement off Ushant with the French frigate La the last. 9. Ar., a cross triparted sa. CAPT. GEORGE FARMER.-An engraving by John Murphy, after the portrait of this naval counter-celebrity by Charles Grignion, jun., painted in 1778, bas lately been acquired by a relative of mine. Capt. Farmer commanded the Quebec in the enSurveillante on Oct. 6, 1779. After having silenced her, the Quebec caught fire and blew up, and her brave commander perished with her rather than fall into the hands of the enemy. The print was published in 1780 (February 14), by “John Boydell, engraver, in Cheapside." Can any one kindly inform me in whose possession the original portrait now is? Also, what is known of the painter, Charles Grignion, jun. ? 10. Sa., a cross tripleparted and fretted ar. With the dolphins, wolves, and crosses ancient armorial differences are indicated, and it would be pleasing to know which were the principal coats of arms, and who were the first bearers. A. D. WELD FRENCH. Boston, Mass., U.S. IRON PERFORATED BY HAILSTONES.-Allusion was made in a newspaper last year to an exhibit in the Colonial and Indian Exhibition of one or two sheets of corrugated iron roofing which had been perforated by hailstones, either in one of the Australian colonies or in New Zealand. A precisely similar case occurred within my own personal knowledge in the case of the corrugated iron roof of one of my gardeners' cottages at my country residence near Liverpool, distant about twenty miles from Sydney, New South Wales, which roof was perforated in several places by hailstones during a very severe hail-storm which occurred on the afternoon of Sept. 21, 1867. I may mention that after the hail-storm in question was over hailstones were picked up in front of my house which were too large to go into an ordinary tumbler. As these statements have been received with some degree of doubt by persons to whom the facts have been mentioned in this country, will some one of your readers be so kind as to let me know through your colomns whether he had seen the exhibit above referred to; and, if so, in which of the colonial catalogues of exhibits it is mentioned ? AN EX-AUSTRALIAN M.P. THE FIRST OXFORD UNIVERSITY LIBRARY.Formerly I had charge of a MS., being a versified treatise on husbandry. In the prologue there is ALPHA. where the clock was made will be indicated by the language or dialect in which the names are given. ness. Replies. ST. GEORGE'S, BLOOMSBURY. (7th S. iv. 325.) O. M. MR. PUGH's suggestion that the original design of Hawksmoor's fine steeple at St. George's, Bloomsbury, so seriously mutilated a few years back to gratify some pedantic purism, should be made good is excellent, and I trust that it will be carried out. But why should he call the missing objects "dragons"? The animals which stood at the base of the spire, and so admirably broke the transition from the tower to the stepped pyramid, now too abrupt, were the royal supporters, the lion and the unicorn. These supporters, however much out of keeping with modern ideas of religious propriety, were an essential part of the architect's conception, and their loss has grievously marred its completeNew churches built at the end of the seventeenth or beginning of the eighteenth centuries, and they were few enough, were commonly named after the reigning sovereign or some royal personage. I may instance St. Ann's, Soho; St. Ann's, imehouse; St. James's, Piccadilly; and, in addition to the church now under consideration, St. George's, Hanover Square; St. George's-in-theEast; and St. George the Martyr, Queen Square. St. George's, Bloomsbury, may be regarded as the crowning example of this not very reverent adulation. Consecrated in 1731, in the early years of the reign of George II., and bearing his name, the steeple was designed as a memorial of the reigning "Defender of the Faith," with the statue of the king at the summit of the spire, and the royal supporters "hugging" the base. Horace Walpole condemns the steeple as "a masterpiece of absurdity." But though the purity of its taste is more than questionable, it is a composition of great dignity and considerable originality. The idea of a stepped pyramid surmounted by a statue, it is true, was borrowed by Hawksmoor from Pliny's description of the mausoleum of Halicarnassus, but the carrying out the idea was his own. Nor can any one see it, now that the houses are cleared away, without agreeing in Mr. Fergusson's opinion that the whole fabric "forms as picturesque a group as almost any church in London." I do not know whether the epigram elicited by the unusual character of the steeple at the time of its erection is so familiar as to forbid its reproduction here : When Henry the Eighth left the Pope in the lurch, The Protestants made him the Head of the Church; But George's good subjects, the Bloomsbury people, Instead of the Church make him head of the steeple. EDMUND VENABLES. The outlines of Bloomsbury Church are in many respects fine, but they are not improved by the demolition of the neighbouring house, for Hawksmoor, Wren's pupil, built the church for its niche, and not for a western exposure. The studied plainness of the lower part of the singular tower proves this to have been his intention. MR. PUGH'S boyish memory has played him false here. The figures are not dragons, but the royal supporters, which "hugged" the steeple, as Walpole gives it. Their position looked a little hazardous, as if they might slide off on a gusty night; but we may rest assured that nothing of Hawksmoor's designing would be structurally dangerous. Walpole regards the steeple as "a master stroke of absurdity." It is remarkably original, but I do not know that it is absurd. It is a copy of one of the seven wonders of the world-the tomb raised by Artemisia to her husband Mausolus at Halicarnassus, in Caria (Pliny, xxxvi. 4, § 9). It was surmounted by a splendid marble quadriga, the work of Pythis. Noble, in his very interesting continuation of Granger, iii. 257, relates that Willia: lucks, a very opulent and loyal brewer of London, placed the statue of George I. upon the steeple of BloomsThe king is in Roman costume, and is placed on a bury, he being brewer to the royal household. short column. Walpole and Noble both say the figure is that of George I., and Cunningham is silent; but C. J. Partington, in his 'Views of London,' says it is George II. Timbs gives it to George I. Partington is no great authority, of course, but those who are interested in the point can see that the evidence preponderates for its having been meant for George II. (5th S. vi. 454). An argument that is not there adduced is that Hucks must have been a very loyal subject indeed he did not stick his then customer, George II., up if in 1731, four years after the death of George I., aloft in his stead. I should be glad to learn if Hawksmoor's original designs are yet to be seen, and whether the figure of the king forms a part of it. If so, why did Hucks furnish the funds? It is disputed whether the portico is as fine as, or finer than, St. Martin's. One thing is certain, that the steeple is in the right place, standing on its own basis, and springing direct from the earth. No pupil of Wren's would be likely to make the blunder Gibbs has in St. Martin's, where the wedge of the pediment seems to be splitting the tower into two parts. There are two versions of the clever epigram that brought down so much ill-deserved ridicule upon this church : When Henry the Eighth left the Pope in the lurch, The Protestants made him the Head of the Church; But George's good subjects, the Bloomsbury people, Instead of the Church made him head of the steeple. Cunningham gives no other reference for this than 'Contemporary Epigrams.' Noble gives it iii. 258, |