The form and weight of the projectile fired from rifle, at a considerable elevation, say 25º to 30º, with sufficient charge of gunpowder, is the cause of the range and of the accuracy, and has nothing whatever to do with the construction or means by which it is fired, whether flint or percussion. The discussion of this subject is probably unsuited to your publication, or I could have considerably enlarged this communication. I will, however, simply add, that the Zündnadel is very liable to get out of order, much exposed to wet, and that it does not in reality possess any of the wonderful advantages that have been ascribed to it, except a facility of loading, while clean, which is more than counterbalanced by its defects.
HENRY WILKINSON.
Thomson of Esholt (Vol. ii., p. 268.).—Dr. Whitaker tells us (Ducatus, ii. 202.) that the dissolved priory of Essheholt was, in the 1st Edw. VI., granted to Henry Thompson, Gent., one of the king's gens d'armes at Bologne. About a century afterwards the estate passed to the more ancient and distinguished Yorkshire family of Calverley, by the marriage of the daughter and heir of Henry Thompson, Esq., with Sir Walter Calverley. If your correspondent JAYTEE consult Sims's useful Index to the Pedigrees and Arms contained in the Genealogical MSS. in the British Museum, he will be referred to several pedigrees of the family of Thomson of Esholt. Of numerous respectable families of the name of Thompson seated in the neighbourhood of York, the common ancestor seems to have been a James Thompson of Thornton in Pickering Lythe, who flourished in the reign of Elizabeth. (Vice Poulson's Holderess, vol. ii. p. 63.) All these families bear the arms described by your correspondent, but without the bend sinister. The crest they use is also nearly the same, viz., an armed arm, embowed, grasping a broken tilting spear.
No general collection of Yorkshire genealogies has been published. Information as to the pedigrees of Yorkshire families must be sought for in the well-known topographical works of Thoresby Whitaker, Hunter, &c., or in the MS. collections of Torre, Hopkinson, &c.
In the Monasticon Eboracense, by John Burton M.D., fol., York, 1778, under the head of "Eschewolde, Essold, Esscholt, or Esholt, in Ayredale in the Deanry of the Ainsty," at pp. 139. and 140., your correspondent JAYTEE will find that the site of this priory was granted, 1 Edward VI., 1547, to Henry Thompson, one of the king's gens d'armes, at Boleyn; who, by Helen, daughter of Laurence Townley, had a natural son called William, living in 1585 who, assuming his father's surname, and marrying Dorothy, daughter of Christopher Anderson of Lostock in com. Lanc. prothonotary became the ancestor of those families of the Thompsons now living in and near York. He may see also Burke's Landed Gentry, article "Say of Tilney, co. Norfolk," in the supplement.
Minar's Books of Antiquities (Vol. i., p. 277.).—A.N. inquires who is intended by Cusa in his book De Docta Ignorantia, cap. vii., where he quotes "Minar in his Books of Antiquities." Upon looking into the passage referred to, I remembered the following observation by a learned writer now living, which will doubtless guide your correspondent to the author intended:—
"On the subject of the imperfect views concerning the Deity, entertained by the ancient philosophical sects, I would especially refer to that most able and elaborate investigation of them, Meiner's very interesting tract, De Vero Deo."—(An Elementary Course of Theological Lectures, delivered in Bristol College, 1831-1833, by the Rev. W.D. Conybeare, now the Very Rev. the Dean of Llandaff. )
A.N. will not be surprised at Cusa Using the term "antiquitates" instead of "De Vero Deo," if he will compare his expressions on the same subject in his book De Venatione Sapientiæ, e.g.:—
"Vides nunc æternum illud antiquissimum in eo campo (scilicet non aliud) dulcissima venatione quæri posse. Attingis enim antiquissimum trinum et unum."—Cap. xiv.
T.J.