Wm. Fraser, B.C.L.
"Obtains."—Every one must have observed the frequent recurrence of this word, more especially those whose study is the law: "This practice on that principle obtains." How did the word acquire the meaning given to it in such a sentence?
Y. S. M.
Army Lists for Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries.—Where are they to be found? Not at the Horse Guards, as the records there go back only to 1795. I want particulars of many officers in both centuries; some of them who came to Ireland temp. Charles I., and during Cromwell's Protectorate, and others early in the last century.
Y. S. M.
Anonymous Poet.—
"It is not to the people of the west of Scotland that the energetic reproach of the poet can apply. I allude to the passage in which he speaks of—
'All Scotia's weary days of civil strife—
When the poor Whig was lavish of his life,
And bought, stern rushing upon Clavers' spears,
The freedom and the scorn of after years.'"
Peter's Letters to his Kinsfolk, vol. iii. p. 263. Edin. 1819.
Who is "the poet?"
Anon.
John Bale.—Strype, in his Life of Parker, book iv. sec. 3. p. 539. edit. 1711, speaking of Bale, says: "He set himself to search many libraries in Oxford, Cambridge," &c.