somewhat frequently by the binders of the early part of the fifteenth century. I possess a copy of the Textus Biblie with Nicholas de Lyra's notes, printed at Basle in 1506-8, in highly ornamental calf binding. It is in six volumes, and there are slight differences among them. I describe the first volume. The first board is ornamented with a device six times repeated, consisting of what seems to be a beggar. The figure is dressed in torn clothes, with a long stick in his hand of the sort heralds would call a ragged staff; at his left side hang a sword and a wicker basket; over the shoulder is flung a long bag which seems to contain apples. The feet are not shown, as the figure is represented as if walking behind a hedge of wattles. On the last board there is a device four times repeated, consisting of six animals which it is not easy to identify enclosed in a border formed of the inscription, Deus det nobis suam pacem et post mortem vitam eternam." EDWARD PEACOCK. Bottesford Manor, Brigg. The arms, or rather badges, here described seem clearly to indicate Catherine of Aragon. The rose and the fleur-de-lys are for England and France, which she used in right of her husband, the pomegranate and the castle Granada and Castile, in her own. Similar devices are to be seen on the vaulted ceiling of the choir of Winchester Cathedral. T. W. THE DEATH OF SOCRATES (6th S. vii. 304).— Do not the last words of Socrates imply that he considered himself, now on the eve of death, as at length fairly cured of the disease of life? P. J. F. GANTILLON. paille; but I only say this to invite further inquiry, as the question can only be settled by ascertaining, if possible, when peggle was first used, and how the pronunciation varies, if it does vary, in different localities. W. T. LYNN. Blackheath. GOVERNOR DINWIDDIE (6th S. vii. 164) was the second son of Robert Dinwiddie and Elizabeth Cumming. Robert Dinwiddie was a merchant in Glasgow and owner of the lands of Germistown (which he bought in 1690) and of certain parts of the lands of Balornoc (which he bought in 1692). He died before October 6, 1712, of which date there is in possession of the Merchants' House of Glasgow a Decree Arbitral between his eldest son, Matthew, and Elizabeth Cumming, who is therein described as the widow of the deceased Robert Dinwiddie. Elizabeth Cumming was of an old family of Glasgow merchants, of whom Matthew Cumming (apparently her father) was baillie in 1691, 1696, and 1699, and was owner of the lands of Carderock, in the parish of Cadder, near Glasgow. Robert Dinwiddie and Elizabeth Cumming had (beside a posthumous child, name unknown) Matthew, Robert, Jean, John, Mary, Lawrence, Sarab, Janet, and Christian Dinwiddie.* Matthew Dinwiddie, merchant in Glasgow, succeeded as eldest son to the Germiston and Balornoc lands, but he had fallen into difficulties in 1725, and in 1725 and 1726 there were three "adjudications" of his lands for debt. These three adjudications (of which one was at the instance of Elizabeth Cumming, the mother) subsequently centred in the Merchants' House of Glasgow, and by "expiry of the legal" the House became absolute proprietors. In 1738 the unfortunate Matthew was put on the roll as a hospitaller of the Merchants" House, to which in 1681 his father (or his grandfather?), Robert Dinwiddie, had gifted 561. Scots. A year before, 1737, Sarah Gartshore, relict of Lawrence Dinwiddie, had been put on the roll of Hutcheson's Hospital. This Lawrence Dinwiddie seems to have been brother of Robert, Matthew's "Merchants in Glasgow and forraign Traders father. Both he and Matthew are among the connected with Shipping," who in 1718 entered into an agreement for the relief of poor decayed mariners. The two may have been partners and have been ruined together. Trade in Glasgow was very bad in 1725. Of the younger sons of Robert Dinwiddie and Elizabeth Cumming: PAIGLE (6th S. vii. 405, 455).—I think it was the greatest of living statesmen who on one occasion divided subjects into matters of opinion and matters of fact. In regard to matters of opinion on such points as the above, I should be sorry to put mine in competition with that of PROF. SKEAT. But in regard to matters of fact, I may mention that I have been long enough in Cambridge to notice how the country people in the neighbourhood pronounced the only name by which they seemed to know the cowslip-a name which I never heard till I went into that neighbourhood. Now my memory is very distinct that they called that well-known flower not paigle, but peggle. It difficult to see the connexion between peggle and p. 602, 1. Robert, b. 1692, d. 1770. This was Governor Dinwiddie (line extinct). 2. John, b. 1694, d. (merchant ?) in Virginia *See Decree Arbitral above referred to. + See History of the Merchants' House of Glasgow, (male line extinct, but numerous Virginian descendants in the female line). of General Dinwiddie, of London, with the promise of a photograph of the portrait of Governor Dinwiddie, and of 3. Lawrence, b. 1697, d. 1764, merchant in These last, with what has been, and I hope may be, addicopies of documents illustrating the early part of his life. Glasgow; baillie 1734, 1738, 1741; provost tional'y gleaned by you, will afford, I doubt not, all 1742/43; one of six commissioners chosen to treat essential data for the biography desired. From a brief with the rebels in 1745;* left 200 merks Scots letter of Governor Dinwiddie, for which I am indebted to the Merchants' House of Glasgow. In 1748 to my friend Dr. Benson J. Lassing, it appears that he was in the colony of Virginia in 1744 as Surveyor-General he bought back from them the Germistown and of the Royal Customs. He may have accompanied Balornoc lands, and these are now in possession Governor Gooch to America, but must have preceded of General David Blair Lockhart of Germistown him to England, as he came thence again to succeed (his representative but not his descendant). Law-him in the government. From familiar allusions in the rence Dinwiddie had twenty-one children. His letters of Dinwiddie it is intimated that he resided for a time in the province of North Carolina. Of this I fifth son, William, married Miss Anne Hamilton have no confirmation." of Cramond, and was the father of the late ComABHBA. missary-General Gilbert Hamilton Dinwiddie, who has left three sons and two daughters-Robert, Lawrence, Gilbert Craigie, Mary, and Anne Hamilton-the only descendants of Lawrence Dinwiddie. Of the daughters of Robert Dinwiddie and Elizabeth Cumming: 1. Mary married Rev. J. Stewart. 2. Janet married Rev. W. McCulloch. Glasgow. The name Dinwiddie (sometimes spelt Dinwooddie) is not uncommon in the south of Scotland. There is a station of the name on the Caledonian Railway between Lockerbie and Moffat, and some of the best farmers in the district are Dinwiddies. Lawrence Dinwiddie of Germiston, in Lanarkshire, married, about 1770, Margaret, daughter of Sir James Campbell, third baronet of Aberuchill, and his daughter Elizabeth married, about 1790 (as his first wife), Rev. Dr. John Lockhart, and was mother of Col. Lockhart of Wicketshaw (Dr. Lockhart's son by his second wife married Sir Walter Scott's daughter and heiress). I have asked several persons in Dumfriesshire of the name of Dinwiddie if they knew anything of the Governor of Virginia, but none of them seemed to have heard of him. The following entries in the Gentleman's Magazine may possibly bear on the subject: "1768. Rev. Mr Stacey, of Bristol, m' Miss Dinwood." "1783. Mr Dinwoodie, of Queen's Sqre, London, ma Mrs Cobb." "HE FRIETH IN HIS OWN GREASE "9 (6th S. vii. 229).-This proverb occurs one hundred years before Clarke's Paroemiologia. It is to be found in John Heywood's Proverbs, printed in 1546: "She frieth in her owne grease, but as for my part, If she be angrie, beshrew her angrie hart!" Chaucer, in the Wyf of Bathe, has:"But certeynly I made folk such chere That in his owne grees I made him frie." JULIAN SHARMAN. Fuller used this proverb more than once, a year or two after John Clarke: "He laid heavy impositions on the people: the Duke affirming that these countreys were fat enough to be stewed in their own liquor" (Holy and Profane State, 1642, life of Duke d'Alva). And again, in his Church History, 1655, p. 136. Here is a later example:"My Father's Ghost comes through the door, Though shut as sure as hands can make it, And leads me such a fearful racket, I stew all night in my own grease." Boston, Lincolnshire. Virgil Travestie, 1771, p. 104. THE SUFFIX -SOME (6th S. vii. 267). — When MISS BUSK writes that her Italian friend has coined the word bothersome she may be right as far as he is concerned, but the word is not a new one-I have known it as a North Yorkshire expression all my life. The word is used also in Lincolnshire-vide Mr. Peacock's Glossary (E.D.S.) and I have no doubt that it will be found employed in many another county. Bartlett gives the word in his Dictionary of Americanisms (ed. 1877), and quotes the Winstead Herald, Oct. 1, laughably bothersome subject to the New York 1861: "The great naval expedition has been a press." Longsome tedious, is also a North Country term, being pronounced langsum. The following passages illustrate Margaret Caton's use of the word: "But yet nae cuintray in her sight appears, The word is pure A.-S. and is given in Bosworth's Both bothersome and longsome are in common use in Scotland. A "bothersome creatur"" is one who is apt to prove rather exasperating to his neighbours, while a lingering cold in the head or a smoky chimney is a "real bothersome thing." Longsome is, in certain districts, very common in the sense of late, especially in reference to school. Abothersome laddie may report to some fond mother of an afternoon that her "Johnnie was langsome for the schule this mornin'." In the Fortunate Shepherdess of Ross of Lochlee (1768) langsome occurs frequently with reference to both space and time. The English reader will understand this couplet: "Heigh hey! she says, as soon as she came near, There 's been a langsome day to me, my dear!" THOMAS BAYNE. Helensburgh, N.B. OLD ENGLISH MORTAR (6th S. vii. 288).-The extract given by Mr. North from the church accounts of St. Martin's, Leicester, is of much interest. Our forefathers believed, whether rightly or not I am unable to determine, that beer, eggs, and various other such like things, if put into mortar made it stronger. In Eastwood's History of Ecclesfield there is, I believe, mention of beer used for this purpose at p. 221. In the church accounts of South Lincolnshire, at present unprinted, there is an entry under the year 1616 "for ix quartes of ale to make his [Craven's] morter strong, xviiid." Craven was evidently a master mason. He and two of his men were employed at this time in repairing the steeple and the chancell end." In the same accounts, under the year 1714, there occurs the following: "For 2 quarts of ale & 2 pound & a half of cheese for Simond morter, 1a 14." 61 In a bill for the repair of the steeple of Newark Church in 1571, printed in The Midland Counties Historical Collector, vol. i. p. 263, we find: "6 Strike of Malte to make worte to blende with the lyme & temper the same, 7 24." "three hundreth and a halfe eiggs to temper the same lyme with, 4 84" "for bruing the Malte, 1s 24" There was formerly a notion that mortar was at times mixed with blood. Whether there exists any satisfactory evidence I know not, but the following passages point to the tradition: “The besieged take refuge in a tower, stabling their horses underground. The Tower is Saracen work, all its mortar was boiled with blood; it fears no engine."Ogier of Denmark, quoted in J. M. Ludlow's Epics of the Middle Ages, ii. 283. Clement Walker, in his History of Independencie, among other rhetorical flourishes has the following: "When usurped Tirrany layes its foundation in bloud, the whole Superstruction must be built with Morter tempered with bloud."-Part iii. p. 3. Wine seems to have sometimes been used for this following passage is from Sir John Forbes's Sightpurpose on the Continent as beer was here. The Seeing in Germany and the Tyrol, 1856. He is speaking of the Stephanskirche at Vienna:— "The completed tower was founded with the rest of the church in 1359, and, after being advanced under several architects, was finally completed by Hans Buchsbaum in the year 1433. The second tower was founded by the same architect in 1450 (the mortar on the occasion, according to tradition, being mixed with wine), but was never carried beyond its present height."-P. 87. Oil also appears to have been used for the same purpose in the East. In the Hon. Fred. Walpole's The Ansayrii, 1851, this passage occurs: "Merkab is two miles inland......There are several remains of buildings about, which probably once joined the mina to the castle. In a field near may be seen a huge reservoir of water......There is likewise a story that the mortar was mixed with oil instead of water, and that the huge tank to be seen near the walls was full of it. They allude to an inscription which says, We 15,000 men, well paid, well treated, worked at this. Every stone was cut and brought, every stone was set with oil, oil one para the bottle.'"-Vol. iii. p. 386. It has been suggested to me by one whose opinion I value highly that the using such things as blood or eggs in mortar may possibly have been intended symbolically to replace the ancient practice of burying a living victim beneath the foundation of a new building. EDWARD PEACOCK. Bottesford Manor, Brigg. That the old mortar was infinitely better than that of the present day there is no question. I have had occasion to pull down old walls in which the mortar was so hard that the bricks themselves would break in many cases before it would give way, and I have had modern walls pulled down where the bricks came out almost clean, and the mortar itself crumbled into dust. Builders are rather puzzled to know what processes the old mortar passed through in order to give it this superior hardness and tenacity, but MR. NORTH'S interesting note gives us a clue. An examination of old mortar shows that the lime is not so intimately blended with the sand as we now mix it, but it remains in small lumps about the size of peas. It is always said-and I think this much is really known of it-that our forefathers did not slack their lime in pits as we do, pouring water over it and making it into a uniform soapy mass, but that they put the solid lime in heaps amongst sand and let it fall and mix gradually-it was thus slacked with very much less water. It appears from MR. NORTH'S extracts that equal parts of lime and sand were used. Nowadays we put a great deal more sand for common building mortar in proportion to the lime; but the mortar described was for pointing, not building, and was probably of an extra strength. For pointing builders still use a much stronger mortar than they do for mere building purposes, and our forefathers very likely did the same, and would not have used quite such an elaborate mixture for building their ordinary walls. The addition of albumen, gelatine, and mucilage furnished by the eggs, the "peeces," and the malt was no doubt an important feature. Their use is still known to a certain extent, for alum and size are often put into whitewash. The size renders the lime hard and prevents it rubbing off. What the effect of the alum is I do not know. Again, rosin and sand are known to make a very hard cement, which is used for fixing knives into handles, but it requires fire heat to blend it. The "peeces" mentioned are, I have no doubt, the rough trimmings from the edges of skins, but would hardly include feet. I live in a district where tanning is one of the staple industries, and I constantly see heavy loads of these trimmings going from the tan-yards to the glue-works. "Smythie coine" I take to be the ashes from a smithy fire, which are very frequently used in Cheshire, under the name of smithy ess, for making mortar for pointing. Such ashes are almost as fine as sand, and contain a large proportion of small scales of iron. Lime mixed with them instead of with sand makes an extremely hard mortar. I cannot suggest any derivation for the word coine. Frodsham, Cheshire. ROBERT HOLLAND. WELCHER (6th S. vii. 189).-Dr. Brewer, in his Dict. of Phrase and Fable, with reference to this word, says, "It means a Welshman, and is based upon the nursery rhymeTaffy was a Welshman, Taffy was a thief."" Mr. E. Edwards, in his Words, Facts, and Phrases, says, "The term is understood in sporting circles to have originated in the old nursery ditty," as above. Let us hope that the Cymri have nothing to do with the origin of the invidious name. Under this heading in the latest edition of Ogilvie's Dictionary appears the following entry: "Yorkshire, welch, a failure, a form of welk; see welk, to fail." It may, however, interest CUTHBERT BEDE to hear that in at least one village in South-West Wiltshire, Wales was, as recently as twenty-five years ago, regarded as a kind of Alsatia. To the family of one individual who took refuge there from the hand of the law (which sought to exact punishment for the misappropriation of a ham) their flight into Wales formed on their return a veritable Hegira, “two (three, four, &c.) 'ear avore vaather went to Wales," being the common form for giving a date; whilst if any member of the community disappeared under circumstances considered suspicious, it was ordinarily surmised that he must have gone to Wales. F. W. D. 66 THREE-WAY LEET (6th S. vii. 229).—The word leet is given in Ray's Collection of South and East Country Words, 1691 (ed. 1874, p. 85, E.D.S.): 'Leet, s. a three [-way] or four-way leet; trivium vel quadrivium; where three or four ways meet [now corrupted in Essex into three releet and four releet]." The reprint is edited by Prof. Skeat. The origin of leet is obviously the A.-S. ge-lá te, a going out, meeting, &c., cf. St. Matthew xxii. 9 (The Gothic and Anglo-Saxon Gospels, &c., Bosworth, 1865): "Gap nû witodlice to wega gelaetum, and clypiap to disum gyftum, swâ hidylce swà ge gemêton." This is rendered by Wycliffe, 1389, "Therefore go zee to the outgoyngis of weyes, and whom euere 3e shulen fynde, clepe to the weddyngis." It is worth noticing that in Cornwall the word leet means a water-way, a mill-stream, or a gutter. F. C. BIRKBECK TERRY. Card ff. THE NUNS OF GIDDING (6th S. vii. 209). MR. WOOLLEY will find what he inquires about in the Memoirs of Nicolas Ferrar, by Dr. P. Peckard (1790), quoted by Macaulay in chap. i. of his History; also in the more modern monograph by Prof. Mayor, published by Macmillan. My ancestor was born Feb. 22, 1592, and died Dec. 2, 1637, a young man. The nunnery was at Little Gidding, and Mr. Ferrar, although head of it, was never ordained a priest, but remained a MICHAEL FERRAR, C.S. deacon. Lucknow, India. There is a minute and interesting, though hostile, account of a visit to their house in a contemporary tract entitled: "The Arminian Nunnery; or, a Briefe description and Relation of the late-erected Monasticall Place at mended to the wise Consideration of the present Par little Gidding, in Huntingdonshire. Humbly recom. liament. The Foundation is by a Corps of Farrars at Gidding," 1641. A quaint nun holding a stiff rosary, and a badly drawn belfry adorn the title-page. The tract winds up with wondering "that the Primate should connive at such canting between the barke and the tree." A eulogistic life of Nicholas Farrars, or Ferrar, the originator, was written by Dr. Turner, one of the Nonjuring bishops, which contained a good deal about the institution, and has been once or twice reprinted. Dr. John Kaye, well known for his connexion with Caius College, to which he gave his name, and for his controversy with his namesake of Oxford, also, I believe, wrote something on the subject. R. H. BUSK. See Sir J. Hawkins's "Life of Isaac Walton" in The Complete Angler, 1792. In a note he gives the following authorities: "Preface to Peter Langtoft's Chron. edit. Hearne ; Papers at the end of Car Vindicia; Hacket's Life of Archbishop Williams, part ii. p. 50; Biogr. Brit., Supplement, art. "Mapletoft"; "Life of Mr. Nicholas Farrar," written by Dr. Turner, Bishop of Ely, in the Christian's Magazine for the months of July, August, September, and October, 1762." D. C. If MR. WOOLLEY will refer to the Annals of England, Parker, Oxford, 1869, vol. iii., p. 345, he will find a very interesting account of the establishment of the Ferrar family at Little Gidding, in Huntingdonshire. Nicholas Ferrar and his family settled there in 1625, but the establishment of the so-called " "nuns "" was broken up some time before 1657. W. P. W. PHILLIMORE. MR. WOOLLEY will find an interesting account of this religious establishment in the life of George Herbert. H. A. C. See Wordsworth's Ecclesiastical Biography, vol. v., under the "Life of Farrer." P. P. PITCHO: FIASCO (6th S. vii. 289).-The following passage, from a leading article in the Daily News, May 17th, with reference to South Africa, will explain the former word: "A pilso had been held in Basutoland, but old Masuphia and other chiefs kept aloof, and the meeting was attended only by loyal natives, who accepted the Government proposals, as they have done more than once before." us from them. Though the word is occasionally quoted in French, it is not naturalized into the language so as to have found its way into any of the ordinary dictionaries. The common derivation is that the Italian flask (as any one can see by untwisting the rushes of an oil flask) is so slender that a slight tap will break it, so that metaphorically it becomes equivalent to our "bubble." But I have a better note on the subject among papers in Rome, which I will send you when I get back there, unless some one else contributes it in the mean time. I think the story of the expression having originated with the bottle conjuror who failed is one made up "after the event." R. H. BUSK. L'Italien This word is used in the Venetian dialect for a failure. Its derivation completely puzzled Littré, who gives it from the Italian fiasco, a bottle, and adds: "Mais l'origine de la locution et le sens primitif ne sont indiqués nulle part. ne paraît pas avoir fare fiasco, du moins on ne trouve dans la Crusca que appicare il fiasco, attacher Dialetto Veneziano, far fiasco is given as equal to le grelot." In Giuseppe Boeris's Dizionario del "far un buco nell' acqua, abortire," a vulgar way of speaking of one who undertakes to do something and fails. Ross O'CONNELL. The proverbial expression "To make fiasco," which is also commonly used in German ("Fiasko machen"), already occurs in Italian, "Far fiasco' having the same meaning of a ridiculous failure. what he proposes to do" ("Dicesi del non riescire "It is said of some one who does not succeed in in quello che si proponeva "). Cf. Tommaseo e Bellini, Dizionario della Lingua Italiana, vol. ii. (Torino, 1865, 4to), p. 768, where the Latin saying, too, is quoted: "Amphora cœpit......urceus exit." H. KREBS. Callis Court, St. Peter's, Isle of Thanet. Probably fiasco has been mistaken for the Spanish chasco, which, according to Neuman and Baretti's Dictionary, means foil, frustration, disappointment, an unexpected contrary event, &c. T. F. INVERSION OF REGIMENTAL PRECEDENCE (6th S. vii. 308). The precedence of the 5th and 6th Regiments gave rise to considerable disputes in the early part of William III.'s reign. point of precedence was, however, finally settled by a board of general officers in 1694 (see Cannon's The |