Ogresse, or Gunne-bullet (must be sable) in The Old Fr. word is ogoesse in Cotgrave, who defines it "An Ogresse, or Gunne-bullet (must be sable) in Blazon." It is probably akin to O. Fr. ogive or augive, a wreath, circlet, round band, in Architecture" (Id.), for which word see Skeat, Etymolog. Dict., 8. v. "Ogee." 66 consult a letter by W. B. Scott in the Athenæum, March 27, 1880, p. 415, and a reply by P. at p. 477 of the same volume. Differing from MR. BATES, who styles Mirabeau's adaptation "an interesting tale," P. says, 'Mirabeau, in his three volumes of Contes et Nouvelles, manufactured a dull romance out of the very few facts he could lately been writing on the subject, and I saw elicit from the story." Mr. Sidney Colvin has something on the book, with fac-similes of one or two of the cuts, in one of the American magazines of the book besides those mentioned by MR. a few weeks ago. There are other French editions BATES. I had one of a different date, in which the engravings had been redrawn and " very much improved" (!) by an eminent French artist, which ORDER OF ST. LAZARUS (6th S. vi. 228).—I quickly got rid of when I purchased the genuine FIDELIS will find a very good account of the book. Of course, all the French editions have vicissitudes of this order in Carlisle's Orders of copies only of the original engravings. Knighthood, pp. 136-40. Pope Innocent VIII. abolished the order in 1490, but the bull was not recognized in France. J. WOODWARD. Leacroft, Staines. A. SMYTHE PALMER. POLIPHILE AND POLIA (6th S. vi. 88, 133, 250). -I have a very fine and perfect copy of the second edition of the Poliphilo, Aldus, 1545, which I bought of Mr. Quaritch many years ago for about 51. or 61. To-day it is worth 30l. at the least. Some time ago I collated it with a first edition, and found one was an exact reprint of the other. The book is not excessively rare, but is extremely beautiful; hence its continually increasing price. AS MR. BATES seems to have partly relied on the very inaccurate old pretender Froggy" Dibdin for his account of the book, it may be well to let readers of "N. & Q." see what the accurate Mr. Quaritch says in his Catalogue of Romances, February, 1822, p. 735. When authors of handbooks, manuals, and other "authorities" say one thing and Mr. Quaritch (or his cataloguer) another, I generally find Mr. Quaritch is the safest guide. very "The second edition is equally rare with the first, and has exactly the same woodcuts. This curious work is by no means in macaronic language, as Brunet states; but simply in pedantic Italian, with slight Latinizing peculiarities in the spelling. The Hebrew, Arabic, and Greek are merely introduced as inscriptions to show off the learning of the author. He was a Venetian monk, Francesco Colonna, and composed his strange Love-Dream at Treviso in 1467." Those who wish to know more on the subject may If MR. BATES, or any one else, will help me to a sight of the English edition of 1592, I shall esteem it a great favour. R. R. Boston, Lincolnshire. Z W TSR PNM LHGF DOB the letter may be easily read. Then the date,— stands for OXFOZ. 30 THON POMWOM, OCTOB. 30 FROM LONDON. MILTON'S BROTHER (6th S. vi. 187).-Besides three sisters, of whom Anne was the mother of Edward and John Phillips, and the others died in infancy, Milton had a brother named Christopher, who was about seven years younger than himself. He began his career as a lawyer at Reading, and was some time thereafter at Exeter, where, being a Royalist and active in the cause, he had to He is compound for his delinquency in 1646. described in his composition-paper as having "no personal estate," but as being possessor of " certain Messuage or Tenement scituate in St. Martin's Parish, Ludgate, called the Signe of the Crosse Keys, which was of the Yeerly Value, before theis troubles, £40." By-and-by we find Christopher a man of considerable substance at Ipswich, of which place he was nominated deputyrecorder in the charter granted to the town by Charles II. In the reign of James II. Christopher a Milton was knighted, and became a judge and a Roman Catholic. He had taken the covenant without scruple, and so now, says Keightley, "his conscience, with its usual elasticity, allowed him, when beyond his seventieth year, to adopt the Roman Catholic creed in the hope of legal preferment." He fitted up part of his house in Ipswich for the celebration of the Roman Catholic worship. Sir Christopher Milton died at Rushmore, near Ipswich, in 1692, in his seventy-seventh year. He had a family of three daughters and one son. THOMAS BAYNE. Helensburgh, N.B. ST. BLAIZE (6h S. vi. 44, 155).-Blasius, a saint and martyr, was Bishop of Sebaste, in Cap. padocia, when Licinius began a bloody persecution of the Christians. Blasius left the town and hid himself in an unknown chasm in the rocks, but his abode was discovered by Agricola while out hunting. The saint was conveyed to Sebaste, and as he steadfastly refused to deny Christ and worship the heathen gods, he was put to death (A.D. 316) with circumstances of the most horrible cruelty. At one period his cultus must have been widely diffused, judging from the extent of territory over which his relics were scattered. The woolcombers claim him as their patron, for the singular reason that he was tortured, among other instruments, with a wool-comb. At Bradford, in Yorkshire, there is a septennial procession of that craft on his day. The practice of invoking St. Blasius in cases of sore throats is said to have originated in the circumstance that when young he saved the only son of a rich widow from being choked by a fish bone. It has been conjectured, however, that the wool-comb has probably been mistaken for a fish bone, and that the story of the rich widow's only son is simply a myth elaborated in explanation of the circumstance (Chambers's Encyclopædia). F. C. When a boy, some fifty years ago, I remember seeing a small inn, situated in one of the poor streets leading to the Quay at Exeter, bearing the sign of "The Bishop Blaize." I wonder if it still exists. G. H. H. O. K. (6th S. vi. 147).-These letters in America signify "all right." Their use, it is said, originated with old Jacob Astor, the millionaire of New York. He was looked upon in commercial circles as a man of great information and sound judgment, and was a sort of general referee as to the solvency or standing of other traders. If a note of inquiry as to any particular trader's position came, the answer to which he intended to be satisfactory, he was accustomed to write across the note the letters "O. K.," and return it to the writer. The letters O. K. he supposed to be the initials of "all correct," and in this sense they are now universally current in the States (Edwards's Words, Facts, and Phrases). F. C. An American gentleman with whom I crossed the Atlantic last spring explained this expression to me as having its origin in telegraphy, being a contraction for "open key." The opening of the transmitting key, it appears, is a signal that all is right, and that the receiving station is quite prepared for the message. This theory would seem to be corroborated by your correspondent's statement that the expression was used to announce the successful laying of the first Transatlantic cable. In any case it appears to have been imported from America; for it has there made for itself a better social position than it has yet succeeded in doing here. For instance, clerks frequently mark the letters "O. K." upon invoices to show that they have been examined and found correct. J. W. CROMBIE. Balgownie, Aberdeen. This is a telegraphic symbol, signifying "all right." A. R. could not be used for the purpose, as already appropriated for place-names beginning with A and ending in R, and so the letters O. K. were chosen. I first heard it from a stationmaster on the Grand Trunk of Canada-" It's O. K."-and the above was his explanation. This was in 1861 or 1862. BOILEAU. abbey will suit the latter part of the query, there is the following in the Chronicle of the Monastery of Abingdon : "Will of Ingulf the Abbot. "Concessi et finaliter concedo conventui nostro omnes consuetudines quas habuit in singulis obedientiis suis ......sicut eas inveni: Videlicet, in cellario, in refectario, in eleemosynario, in mandato, in sacristario, in domo infirmorum, in coquina, in camera, in consuetudine servientium, in curia, in hospitibus suscipiendis, in lignagio, et in operibus ecclesiæ.”—A.D. 1154–1189, vol. ii. p. 242, Rolls Series. ED. MARSHALL. MS. SERMONS (6th S. vi. 189).—John Gumbledon, a Hampshire man, born about 1598, entered at Christ Church, Oxon., in 1616, chaplain to Robert, Earl of Leicester, and Rector of Coytie, in Glamorganshire. A. à Wood (iii. 436) gives a list of his published sermons, and states that he died in 1657, and was buried in the church at Coytie, leaving several MSS. fit for the press, which had he lived he would have published. The dates of his degrees are, B.A. Nov. 20, 1621, and B.D. May 2, 1632. He was preacher at Longworth, in Berkshire, for several years. EDWARD SOLLY. E. M. S. Examples of the word in its more common mediæval sense may be found, with the relative CAPTAIN THOMAS MEDWIN (6th S. vi. 168).— explanation, in the Chronicon Monasterii de In the pedigree of Michell, Shelley, and Pilfold, as Abingdon (Rolls Series), glossary of Latin words, given by Cartwright in his History of Western vol. ii. p. 453:-" Obedientia, an office under the Sussex, the wife of Thomas Medwin is described head of a monastic establishment"; "Obedien- as "Anne Hamilton, Baroness Hamilton of Sweden, tiarius, an officer, one who holds an obedientia." | by her first marriage Countess of Stainforts." Ducange, I think, throws the most direct light on the second sense of which an explanation is sought, when he says of obedientia that it is munus ac officium omne monasticum, quod per obedientiam injungitur." And thus, he says, even the very office of the abbot is an obedientia. The word is also used for the monastic profession, and for cells, granges, &c., to which the religious who inhabited them were sent vi obedientiæ. The sense in which Sismondi uses it in the passage cited is the one most usually to be found in historical works. It is thus used, e. g., by the late Canon Robertson in his History of the Christian Church, and is applied to the followers of the rival Popes in any case of a double election. Ducange refers the origin of this use to the period of the Great Schism of the West, 1378. I am not sure that it might not be traced back to earlier schisms in the Roman See. Anglicans sometimes use the phrase Latin or Eastern obedience to connote the churches in communion with Rome and Constantinople. C. H. E. CARMICHAEL. ST. DEVEREUX (6th S. vi. 149).-Can the place named St. Devereux, mentioned by MR. WATERTON, and which is not very far from St. Weonards, get its name from that of the family of Devereux, Viscount Hereford, the premier viscounty in the peerage of England, the creation dating from 1549? JOHN PICKFORD, M.A. Newbourne Rectory, Woodbridge. TRADITIONS OF THE CORNISH LANGUAGE (6th S. vi. 165). Two sentences in this ancient tongue are given in The Book of Family Crests, 1845, vol. ii. They are "Keuz al tra ouna Diu matermo yn," the motto of the family of Sonkin, translated, "Before all things, fear God through the king "; and "Kur, deu, res, pub, tra," the motto of Harris of Hayne, translated," For God and the commonwealth." These two sentences may be unknown to MR. LACH-SZYRMA.' HIRONDELLE. Chichester. OLD ROMNEY: MS. SERMONS (6th S. vi. 168). -In Archæologia Cantiana, vol. xiii. p. 413, Old Romney, 1690-1739, rector John Defray; and at p. 487, Brookland, 1677, vicar Thomas Johnson, who died 1727. W. M. B. Hasted states that from 1690 to 1738 the incumbent of Old Romney was the Rev. John Defray, and that he is buried in Old Romney church. FREDK. RULE. In the old dictionary referred to for Lichfowl I find cann hooks, "Iron hooks made fast to the end of a rope whereby things weighty are helped out of ships." Does this throw any light on Cann Office? C. A. WHITE. Preston-on-the-Wild-Moors, Salop. TWO PORTRAITS (6th S. vi. 248).—The lady represented in E. C. B.'s picture was pretty certainly a member of the family of Leefdale of Flanders, which bore the arms described. I am not so clear about the gentleman. Arg., three fleurs-de-lis sa. was borne by the Dutch family of Bloote; Lintre of Liège; von Lilien of Westphalia; and the Barons von Roepert of Mecklenberg. Azure also is frequently undistinguishable from sable in old paintings, and if the coat were, as is possible, Arg., three fleurs-de-lis az., the por trait might represent one of the Dutch Kenen- of binding drawn up in due form, and signed by bergs, or of the Craninghes of Flanders. Montrose, N.B. JOHN WOODWARD. LIBRARIES IN CHURCHES (6th S. iv. 205, 266, 304, 327, 387; vi. 15, 96, 258).-I can well remember in 1852 paying my first visit to Beverley, and inspecting the noble perpendicular church of St. Mary in that town, eclipsed only by the glories of Beverley Minster. The nave of it was at that time filled with pews of every conceivable shape and size, and a large one with a glass front pre-eminently conspicuous was appropriated to the mayor and corporation. In one of the vestries in the north transept was a small library, consisting mainly of goodly folios, chiefly theological, covered with dust, in a most dilapidated condition, and, as I was then informed, the fires in the church had usually been lighted from this literary source for some time. Thirteen years afterwards-that is to say in 1865-a second visit was paid to the same church, then undergoing restoration. The pews had gone, and also the small collection in the library had become "fine by degrees, and beautifully less," for it was apparently reduced to one book, a copy of the Hexapla. the churchwardens. When I was there last July, Science Club, Savile Row, W. To SHIVER (6th S. v. 328, 471; vi. 38, 158): To DITHER: To NERL: TO CHATTER.-I observe that MR. THOMAS NORTH quotes the word dither as a sort of antithesis to shiver, which he puts into the mouth of a Leicestershire housewife. He, however, does not explain its exact meaning, which I believe to be "to vibrate regularly and continuously," in opposition to shiver, meaning "to vibrate or shake spasmodically or convulsively." Thus, a person's teeth might be said to dither with cold, which is more commonly expressed by chatter. This, at least, is the manner in which the word is technically employed in engineering machine shops in England to express the peculiar vibration occasionally set up in the working of heavy lathes, which results in the cutting tool emitting a cry and the cut made presenting a wavy surface instead of a perfectly smooth one. I have, however, heard only some Englishmen use On a reference to Scaum's Beverlac, published in the term, though all understand it. The more 1829-a book which contains a tolerably exhaus-usual term employed is chatter. On the other tive account of the charities, and many curious hand, Scotchmen never use either term unless extracts from the registers and churchwardens' much Anglicized. They always speak of the tool books connected with St. Mary's Church- Inerling, which to one used to the word is most found no mention made either of the foundation of expressive. It conveys the idea of the sound the library, or even of its existence, or of the nature of its contents. Though the book is entitled Scaum's Beverlac, yet that seems to have been merely the name of the publisher, for it was, according to the title-page, compiled by "George Poulson, Esq., late of the University of Oxford," and was published by subscription in Beverley. Probably this is only one of the many instances of destruction which church libraries have met with in this country. JOHN PICKFORD, M.A. Newbourne Rectory, Woodbridge. There is an old parish library in the church at Minehead, Somersetshire. It contains a Bible, copies of Bishop Jewel's and Bishop Usher's Sermons, and four or five other books in black letter. They lie near the chancel, on a long desk or book-board, to which most of them are fastened by heavy chains passing through the wood, and secured by padlocks of antique appearance. The Bible at the present time has no chain. The books are in a sad condition, the title-pages of nearly all having totally disappeared, and in every case the first few leaves are torn or crumpled. Inside the covers the prices for binding are marked; in one case nine shillings, in another seven; and one emitted as well as of the actual vibration. Dither does not. I should be glad of some further clue to the exact and comparative etymology of nerl. I remember once hearing a friend who was a Welshman speak of "being all of a dither" when describing some one as trembling with fright. Nagpur, C.P., India. ENGINEER. Does MR. THOMAS NORTH intend us to understand from his note that to shiver (in Leicestershire), meaning "to shake with cold or terror," is used actively? If not, I fail to see the value of his information, for our grandparents and parents in childhood, as well as we ourselves, learnt metaphysics from a certain nursery rhyme called The Little Old Woman and the Pedlar, in which we were informed that "she began to shiver and she began to shake"; but we never understood from this expression that she began to shiver and shake the pedlar, well as he deserved such treatment for cutting off her petticoats and making her doubt her own personal identity till, despite the transformation, she was identified by her dog. M. I. FLOGGING AT THE CART'S TAIL (6th S. vi. 67, book has inside the cover a receipt for the expense 157).-Speaking upon this subject, Mr. W. An drews remarks, in his Punishment in the Olden Times (pp. 70-1): "We are told that men and women were whipped promiscuously at Worcester, till the close of the last century, as may be seen from the Corporation records. Male and female rogues were whipped at a charge of 4d. each for the whip's-man. In 1680 there is a charge of 4d. for whipping a wench.' In 1742, 1s. 'for whipping John Williams, and exposing Joyce Powell.' In 1759, for whipping Elizabeth Bradbury, 2. 6d,' probably including the cost of hire of the cart, which was usually charged separately. We often find particulars of persons being whipped at the cart's tail, as well as at the whip: ping post. In the Public Ledger for 1764 we read: On Wednesday a woman, an old offender, was conveyed in a cart from Clerkenwell Bridewell to Enfield, and publicly whipped at the cart's tail by the common hang, man, for cutting down and destroying wood in Enfield Chase. She is to undergo the same discipline twice The whipping of female vagrants was expressly forbidden by a statute of 1791.” more. Cardiff. F. C. BIRKBECK TERRY. In a lecture which I delivered in Preston, in 1856, I mentioned, on the authority of a townsman, who had seen the occurrence, that a woman of bad character had been flogged through the streets of Preston at a cart tail. This occurrence would be between seventy and eighty years ago. WM. DOBSON. Preston. CHAINED BOOKS IN CHURCHES (5th S. xii. 485; 6th S. i. 161).-These are sometimes inquired after by your correspondents. I do not know whether any one has noticed those in the old church at Mancetter, in Warwickshire. There are five black-letter folios, all in good repair except that four have lost the title-pages, viz.: The Paraphrases of Erasmus upon the New Testament, 2 vols.; Jewel's Defence of the Apology, printed by John Norton, 1609; Foxe's Book of Martyrs, 2 vols. There is no Bible. These books are rendered more interesting by the fact that two Mancetter worthies are enrolled in the "noble army of martyrs," Robert Glover and Mr. Lewis. The handsome half-timbered house in which Mr. Glover was arrested adjoins the church. He was burnt at Coventry, A.D. 1555. G. L. FENTON. A MOTTO FOR A DRINKING CUP (6th S. v. 109, 155, 395; vi. 177).—I have a quaint drinking cup, modelled on one in the museum at Nuremberg, more like a deckelglas for beer than a wine cup, as it is formed of a pot-bellied' knecht, whose helmet, turning on a hinge, makes the lid; it bears the motto: "Willst Du Wein? Schenk mir ein!" R. H. B. The curious inscription BIBE MVLTOS ANNOS BIBAS is engraved on a rock in the parish of La Roque Estéron, Alpes Maritimes, near the follow ing, FAGO DEO BONXVS TAVRINI. F., which I merely add as a contrast to the former, both being engraved in the same style and undoubtedly Roman; or was the god of the beechwood the patron of drinkers ? GEO. A. MULLER. S. Martin Lantosque, Alpes Maritimes. ARMS OF PATE OF SYSONBY (6th S. v. 409; vi. 38, 231).-I have tried, without success so far, to trace the family of a lady of this name. Perhaps W. S. may throw some light on the subject, or perhaps her name might be of use to him in his search. C. F. Pate, born 1754, married in 1777 Edmund Shallett Lomax, Esq., eldest son of Caleb Lomax, Esq., of Childwickbury, co. Herts, by his first wife, Miss Shallett, sole daughter and heir of Edmund Shallett, Esq., of Sutton, Surrey. Mr. E. S. Lomax therefore settled in Surrey, where he inherited his mother's property, and his father's family by a second wife continued the line of Lomax of Childwickbury. Miss Pate's family I cannot trace; she had a sister who married Baron de Rolle. Mrs. E. S. Lomax died in 1841; her husband died in 1839, but there are no arms in the church where they are buried. It may be only a coincidence in the name, but Mr. E. S. Lomax's grandmother was a Miss Rose, family not traced. STRIX. Will W. S. send me his name and address? THE CAUSAL "Do" (6th S. iv. 408; v. 53, 179; vi. 117). I strongly suspect that we have an instance of this use in Shakespeare's Macbeth, IV. iii.: Mal. What's the new'st grief? Ross. That of an hour's age doth hiss the speaker; Each minute teems a new one. And possibly in Midsummer Night's Dream, V. i.: "And as she fled her mantle she did fall"; and in Richard II., III. iv.: "Here did she fall a tear." Of course there are undoubted instances in Shakespeare of the transitive use of the verb fall, as may be seen by reference to the Glossary in Dyce's edition; but it seems to me in the highest degree likely that this use had its origin in such expressions as the above, which survived after the causal do had in ordinary language either disappeared or sunk into the mere auxiliary. ARTHUR E. QUEKETT. A ROMAN EAGLE (6th S. vi. 68, 173).-In spite of the testimony at the latter reference to Mr. Joyce having searched all the European museums for one in vain, I have a very strong conviction that I have seen more than one in public collections, and notably among the vast array of Roman anti |