—In the Oxford Manual of Sepulchral Brasses, pp. 168-175., will be found a curious list of monumental representations of skeletons and emaciated figures in shrouds (1472-1598), which may, perhaps, prove interesting to BURIENSIS. It is by no means improbable that some of the examples are intended to commemorate persons whose deaths occurred in consequence of fasting.
E. N.
London Genealogical Society (Vol. v., p. 297.).
—I presume your correspondent W. P. A. refers to the Heraldic and Genealogical Society of Great Britain and Ireland for the Elucidation of Family Antiquity, which issued a prospectus a few years ago; but whether or not it is still in existence I am unable to say. Gentlemen desirous of joining the society were requested to transmit their names to the secretary, "William Downing Bruce, Esq., K.C.J., F.S.A., United Service Institution, Whitehall, London," to whom all communications respecting it were to be addressed.
E. N.
Shortly after its establishment, I was appointed corresponding member to the London Genealogical Society, but on going to their rooms one morning, found the concern had "vanished into thin air."
METAOUO.
Martinique (Vol. v., p. 11.).
—There must be some inaccuracy in the reply of MR. PHILIP S. KING (p. 165.) to the Query of your correspondent W. J. C.
A reference to the few authorities to which I have access leads me to suppose that the period of the actual discovery of this island is involved in some obscurity. Washington Irving assumes its identity with the island called by its inhabitants "Mantinino," and that it was the first land made by Columbus on his fourth voyage to the West Indies in 1502. Mr. Major, in his Introduction to the Select Letters of Columbus, published for the Hakluyt Society, inclines to the same opinion. It is extremely probable that Columbus had heard reports of this island when he was among the group of the Caribbees in 1493, but he does not appear to have been then further south than the latitude of Dominica. Peter Martyr, however, alludes to Mantinino, an island of Amazons, as having been passed by the admiral to the north of Guadaloupe, when on his course to Hispaniola. Assuming this to be an error of position, and that the discovery of the island did not really take place until the year 1502, the period at which Columbus was there (June) could have had no influence on its new name, since the days of the two Saints Martin are in November.