Minor Queries Answered.
Polynesian Languages.
—Where could I obtain Testaments in the various languages of Polynesia, more especially in the Feejeean and Samoan? I have applied at the British and Foreign Bible Society without success. These Testaments have been published by this society.
EBLANENSIS.
[Our correspondent should consult The Bible of every Land, lately published by Bagster and Sons, which gives some account of the different Polynesian and Malayan versions.—See Class V., pp. 299-312.]
Arms of Thompson.
—Will any of your Lancashire correspondents be kind enough to inform me whether they have ever met with the following arms in connexion with the name of Thompson in any work on the history of Lancashire, or on any monument in that county, namely, "Per pale, argent and sable, a fess embattled between three falcons, countercharged, belled or?" I believe a family of the name to which the arms are attributed held landed property in the neighbourhood of Hornby and Gressingham.
JAYTEE.
[We know nothing beyond the fact of such a coat being described in an ordinary of arms for Thompson of Lancashire, without any particular locality.]
The Silent Woman.
—What is the origin of the old sign-board "The Silent Woman?" She is represented headless, holding her head under her arm. There is, or was, a sign of this at a small ale-house not far from Ledbury, in Herefordshire, and I was told it was not an uncommon sign in these parts.
F. J. H.
Edinburgh.
[Has not this sign, which we have seen also described as that of The Good Woman, its origin in the satirical spirit which prompted the Dutch epigrammist to write,—
"A woman born without a tongue,
I can conceive it;
But silent, with a tongue in her head,
Review of Hewett's Memoirs of Rustat.
—In what literary paper can I find review of Mr. Hewett's Memoirs of Tobias Rustat?
C. W.
[A review of this work will be found in the Gentleman's Magazine of June, 1850, pp. 638-640.]
Robert Recorde.
—Can any of your readers inform me whether Robert Recorde, who in 1549, or possibly some years later, was Comptroller of the Mint at Bristol, was the same person as the author of The Whetstone of Wit, and other mathematical works? Also, whether there is any fuller account of his life to be met with than that given by Hutton?
J. E.
[It does not appear that Robert Recorde, the celebrated mathematician, was ever connected with the Bristol mint. The best account we have met with of the author of The Whetstone of Wit, is in Mr. Halliwell's pamphlet on The Connexion of Wales with the Early Science of England, 8vo., 1840. Consult also a very able and learned article in the Companion to the British Almanack for 1837, pp. 30-37., by Professor De Morgan.]
Strange Opinions of great Divines.
—I shall be obliged to any of your correspondents who can give me references to the following quotations from the works of two great divines:
(1.) "I would that we were well rid of this [the Athanasian] Creed."
(2.) "The Apocalypse either finds a man mad, or leaves him so."
C. MANSFIELD INGLEBY.
[1. The first quotation will be found in a letter of Archbishop Tillotson's to Bishop Burnet, dated Oct. 23, 1694. The archbishop says, "The account given of Athanasius' Creed (i.e. in Burnet's Exposition of the Thirty-nine Articles) seems to me no-wise satisfactory. I wish we were well rid of it." Dr. Birch adds, "The archbishop did not long survive the writing of this letter."—See Birch's Life of Tillotson, edit. 1752, p. 343.; ed. 1753, p. 315. Consult also Remarks upon Dr. Birch's Life of Tillotson, 8vo., 1753, p. 53., anonymous, but attributed to George Smith, a Nonjuror.
2. The second quotation is probably the following, which occurs in Dr. South's Sermon on the Nature and Measures of Conscience (Serm. XXIII.): "Because the light of natural conscience is in many things defective and dim, and the internal voice of God's Spirit not always distinguishable, above all, let a man attend to the mind of God, uttered in His revealed Word: I say, His revealed Word; by which I do not mean that mysterious, extraordinary (and of late so much studied) book called 'The Revelation,' and which, perhaps, the more it is studied, the less it is understood, as generally either finding a man cracked, or making him so; but I mean those other writings of the prophets and apostles, which exhibit to us a plain, sure, perfect, and intelligible rule; a rule that will neither fail nor distract such as make use of it.">[
Inquisitiones Post Mortem.
—What are these, extending to seven volumes, regularly paged, and coming down to 1656, referred to in Oldfield's History of Wainfleet? Are they printed works? It is quite a different publication to the Calendarium, &c. in four volumes.
When did the Post Mortem Inquisitions cease?
W. H. L.
[The Inquisitiones quoted by Oldfield are sometimes called Cole's Escheats, and will be found in the Harleian Collection in the British Museum, the first five volumes in Nos. 756. to 760., and the sixth and seventh, Nos. 410, 411.]
Derivation of Carmarthen.
—What is the derivation of this word Carmarthen?
LLEWELLYN.
[Caermarthen appears to have been the Maridunum of Ptolemy, and the Muridunum of Antoninus, one of the principal stations in the country of the Dimetæ, situated on the Via Julia, or great Roman road. Its modern name of Caermarthen, or Caer Fyrdden, as it is called by the Welsh (by a change of the convertible consonants f and m, common in their language), implies "a military station fortified with walls," and perfectly agrees with the description given by Giraldus Cambrensis, who calls it, "Urbs antiqua coctilibus muris.">[
"Mediæval and Middle Ages."
—These terms are now in constant use, and very differently and vaguely defined. Will any of your correspondents, antiquaries or historians, say what period is comprehended in these terms, and give the date when it should commence, and when terminate?
L. T.
[The late lamented Rev. J. G. Dowling, in his Introduction to the Critical Study of Ecclesiastical History, fixes upon the Council of Chalcedon, A.D. 451, as the commencement of the Mediæval, or Middle Ages, which he thinks ended with the revival of classical literature in the fifteenth century, "that age of transition and revolution, combining in itself several of the most striking characteristics of the two states of society between which it forms the interval." This able work ought to find a place in the library of every ecclesiastical student.]
Garlands hung up in Churches.
—It is said that the pretty wild flower, the small Woodruff (Asperula Cynanchica), was formerly employed in adorning the walls of churches. Is this true? If so, what was the origin of the custom? Was this particular flower thus used for the reason that it long preserves its scent? Is it mentioned by any early poet in connexion with the decoration of churches?
R. VINCENT.
[Garlands of Rosemary and Woodroof were formerly used to decorate the churches on St. Barnabas' day, as appears by many old entries and church-books; e.g. in the churchwardens' accounts of St. Mary-at-Hill, in the city of London, 17 and 19 Edward IV., the following entry occurs: "For Rose garlondis and Woodrove garlondis on St. Barnebe's daye, xjd." The reason Woodroof was used, Gerard tells us in his Historie of Plants, p. 965.: "It doth very well attemper the aire, coole and make fresh the place, to the delight and comfort of such as are therein.">[