J. S. Warden.
I accidently met with a scrap of evidence on this point lately, as I was driving at midnight on a sudden call to visit a dying man. The nightingales were singing in full choir, when my servant, an intelligent young man from the country, remarked, "A cheerful little bird the nightingale, Sir. It is beautiful to hear them singing when one is walking alone on a dark night."
Unsophisticated judgment of this sort, when met with unsought, seems to be of real value in a question depending for its decision so much upon the faithful record of impressions.
Oxoniensis.
Walthamstow.
Mr. Cuthbert Bede gives, in his list of epithets of the nightingale, "solemn," as used by Milton, Otway, Graingle. How the last two employ the term I do not know, perhaps they
copied from Milton; but he uses it, not as an epithet exactly, but to express the frequency of the bird's appearance. "Night, her solemn bird," means the customary attendant of the night: solemn being used in the classical sense, and derived front soles. So Virgil, "Solemnes tum forte dapes et tristia dona ante urbem in luco," &c.
The word solemn probably acquired its present signification from the staid manner in which Englishmen go through their customary ceremonies. "They took their pleasure sadly," as Froissart has it.
Sydney Gedge, B.A.
Mysterious Personage (Vol. viii., p. 34.).—There is no mystery about the legitimate claimant of the British throne. He is the Duke of Modena, lineally descended from Henrietta of England, youngest daughter of Charles I.: she married Philip Duke of Orleans, son of Louis XIII. and Anne of Austria, and had two daughters; Louisa married to Charles II. of Spain (she died without issue), and Anna Maria, married to Victor Amadeus, Duke of Savoy and King of Sardinia. Their son Charles Emanuel III. succeeded in 1730, and was succeeded by his son Victor Amadeus III. He was succeeded by his eldest son Charles Emanuel IV., who died without issue, and was succeeded by his brother Victor Emanuel, who left twin daughters, the elder of whom, Mary Beatrice, married Francis Duke of Modena, while the crown of Sardinia passed to her father's heirs male. The Duchess Mary Beatrice of Modena has left two sons, the elder of whom (born June 14, 1819) is the direct, undoubted heir of the House of Stuart.