Supposed Inscription in St. Peter's Church, Rome.—When at school in France, some twenty years ago, I was informed that the following inscription was to be found in some part of St. Peter's Church in Rome:
"Nunquam amplius super hanc cathedram cantabit Gallus."
It appears that the active part taken by the French in fomenting the great schism of the Church during the fourteenth century, when they set up and maintained at Avignon a Pope of their own choosing, had generated an abhorrence of French interference in the Italian mind; and that, when the dissensions were abated by the suspension of the rival Popes, the ultramontane cardinals had posted up this inscription to testify their desire for the exclusion of French ecclesiastics from the Papal chair. In one respect the prediction remains in force to this day; for I believe I am correct in saying that no Frenchman has worn the triple crown for the last 450 years. But that portion of it which is implied in the second meaning of "Gallus," has been woefully belied in our time by the forcible occupation of Rome by a French army, on which occasion the Gallic cock had all the "crowing" to himself.
I have never had an opportunity of ascertaining the existence of this inscription, and shall be obliged to any correspondent of "NOTES AND QUERIES" who will afford information on the subject.
HENRY H. BREEN.
St. Lucia, April, 1851.
Rag Sunday in Sussex.—Allow me to ask the explanation of "Rag Sunday" in Sussex. I lately saw some young gentlemen going to school at Brighton, who had been provided with some fine white handkerchiefs, when one observed they would not stand much chance of escape on "Rag Sunday." He then told me that each boy, on the Sunday but one preceding the holidays, always tore a piece of his shirt or handkerchief off and wore it in the button-hole of his jacket as his "rag." When a boy, I remember being compelled to do the same when at school at Hailsham in Sussex, and all boys objecting had their hats knocked off and trod on.
H. W. D.
Northege Family.—Can any one tell me the county and parish in which the family of Northege were located in the sixteenth century?
E. H. Y.
A Kemble Pipe of Tobacco.—In the county of Herefordshire, the people call the last or concluding pipe that any one means to smoke at a sitting, a Kemble pipe. This is said to have originated in a man of the name of Kemble, who in the cruel persecution under Queen Mary, being condemned for heresy, in his walk of some miles from the prison to the stake, amidst a crowd of weeping friends and neighbours, with the tranquillity and fortitude of a primitive martyr, smoked a pipe of tobacco! Is anything known of this Kemble? and where can I find any corroboration of the story here told?