H. B. C.
U. U. Club.
Brydone the Tourist (Vol. vii., p. 108.).—A. B. C. inquires the birthplace of Brydone, "the tourist and author." I presume he refers to Patrick Brydone, who wrote Travels in Sicily and Malta, and who held, I believe, an appointment under the Commissioners of Stamps, and died about thirty years ago. Some four-and-twenty years back, I arrived, late in the evening, at the hospitable cottage of Hogg, the Ettrick Shepherd, at Altrieve, in the vale of Yarrow. It happened to be, as it often was, too full of guests to afford me a bed; and I was transferred by my host to the house of a neighbouring gentleman, where I slept. That gentleman was Mr. Brydone, of Mount Benger,
who I found was a near relative of Brydone the tourist, whose birthplace was in the Forest of Ettrick.
M. R—son.
Yankee (Vol. vii., p. 103.).—I am afraid Mr. Bell's ingenious speculations must give way to facts. Our transatlantic brethren do not, either willingly or unwillingly, adopt Yankee as their "collective name." Yankee was, and is, a name given exclusively to the natives of the New England States, and was never therefore applied, by an American, to the people of New Amsterdam or New York. Here, in England, indeed, we are accustomed to call all Americans Yankees; which is about the same thing as to call all Englishmen Devonians or Lancastrians.
Y. A.
Miniature Ring of Charles I. (Vol. vi., p. 578.).—One of the four rings inquired for is in the possession of Mrs. Andrew Henderson, of 102. Gloucester Place, Portman Square, formerly Miss Adolphus. It came to her in the female line, through her mother's family. The unfortunate Charles I. presented it to Sir Lionel Walden, on the morning on which he lost his life. It bears (as the other one alluded to in Hulbert's History of Salop) a miniature likeness of the king, set in small brilliants. Inside the ring are the words, "Sic transit gloria regum." Mrs. Henderson understood the four rings to have been presented as follows:—Bishop Juxon, Sir Lionel Walden, Colonel Ashburnham, and Herbert his secretary. Which of the four is now in the possession of the Misses Pigott is not mentioned.
Anon.
Bishop of Ossory—Cardinal's Hat (Vol. vii., p. 72.).—A. S. A. is quite correct, that the hat is common to all prelates, and that the distinction is only in the number of the tassels to the hat-strings; but I think he is wrong in attributing the hat to priors. I believe it only belonged to abbots, who had black hats and tassels; while the colour of the prelatical hats and tassels was green. (See Père Anselme's Palais d'Honneur, chap. xxii. and plate.)