White-Hall on Christmass Day, 1684. London.-4to, 18 leaves (on Gal. iii. 21, 22), 1685. Burnet, Gilbert, Bishop of Sarum. A Sermon Preached before the King & Queen, At White-Hall, on Christmas-Day, 1689. London.-4to, 20 leaves (on 1 Tim. iii. 16), 1690. The same. A Sermon Preached before the King at Whitehall, on Christmas-Day, 1696. London. 4to, 18 leaves (on Gal. iv. 4), 1697. Ibbetson, Richard, M. A., Fellow of Oriel. The Divinity of our Blessed Saviour prov'd from Scripture and Antiquity. A Sermon before the University of Oxford, at St Mary's, on the Epiphany, Jan. 6th, 1711/12, in which Mr. Whiston's Attempt to revive the Arian Heresy is consider'd. Oxford. -8vo, 20 leaves (on 1 Tim. iii. 16), 1712. Anonymous. A Pindaric on the Nativity of the Son of God. London: Printed for St. John Baker, at Thavies-Inn-Gate in Holborn.-8vo, 8 leaves, with notes, 1712. "Phileleutherus Cantabrigiensis." Letter to the reverend Dr. Mangey. Occasioned by his Sermon on Christmas-Day, entitled Plain Notions of our Lord's Divinity. London.-8vo, 24 leaves, 1719. Anonymous. (See Curteis, below.) Genethlia: a Poem on the Blessed Nativity. Design'd to excite an Awful Sense of Religion both in the Indolent and the Unbelieving Part of Mankind. London.Fol., 12 leaves, 1727. Tilly, W., S.T.P. Beata Maria Virgo ab Angelo Gabriele Salutata: Carmen Heroicum Sacrum ; aliquot antè annis conditum, nunc verò primùm editum. London.-4to, 1729. Dedicated to Alexander Pope, from Albury, com. Oxon., 11 Oct., 1729. Curteis, T., rector of Wrotham, Kent. Genethlia : a Poem on the Blessed Nativity.-Before 1733; probably identical with Genethlia,' 1727, above. Barnard, John, of Marblehead, in New England. Sermon on Christmas Day, 1729.-See next. Pigot, George, W. D. M [sic]. A Vindication of the Practice of the Antient Christian, As well as the Church of England, And other Reformed Churches, In the Observation of Christmas-Day; In Answer to the Uncharitable Reflections of Thonias de Laune, Mr. Whiston, and Mr. John Barnard of Marblehead: In a Sermon preach'd on the 4th of January, 1729/30. Boston, printed by T. Fleet, at the Heart and Crown in Cornhill, and Sold by Gillam Phillips at the Three Bibles and Crown in King-street.-8vo, 35 leaves (on Deut. xvi. 16), 1731. [Pearson, William ?] Divine Recreations: being a Collection of Psalms, Hymns, and Canons, in two three, and four parts: with easy, grave, and pleasant tunes......part i. For the Christmass quarter. London. 8vo, 1736. Hymn I. For Christmas Day. These following, with several others, were anciently called Christmass Carols, because they were composed and frequently sung in the Reign of King Charles the First." I. A song of joy unto the Lord we sing And publish forth the favours He hath shewn. II. A Virgin unspotted the Prophets did tell. III. O thou man! ("being of an ancient composition, is therefore to be sung swifter"). Scott, Rev. William, M.A.. late scholar of Eton, and Trin. Coll., Cambr. A Sermon on ChristmasDay, almost Fourteen Hundred Years old, of...... St. Chrysostom, translated. London. 8vo, 24 leaves, 1774. Anonymous. A Few Christmas Words. Derby, John and Charles Mozley.-8vo, 4 leaves (1858). Sedding, Edmund. A Collection of Antient Christmas Carols, Arranged for four voices. London, Novello.-12mo, 16 leaves, 1860. Anonymous. Christmas, Easter, and S. Mary Magdalene. The lost Epistles and Gospels for these Feast days, recovered from the First Book of Common Prayer...... With a preface. London, C. J. Stewart.-8vo, 8 leaves, 1862. Historical Notices Hatfield, Charles William. of Doncaster. Second series. 1868.- Minstrels, Waits, and Christmas Carols,' pp. 181-90. Inman, Rev. Thomas. B.A., Queen's College, Cambridge. The Star of Bethlehem and the Eastern Magi; or, A Christmas Lecture on the Messiah, and the doctrines of Salvation and Immortality, as predicted and revealed in the Avesta of the Magi, and in the books of Enoch, Job, and Ezra. London. 8vo, 12 leaves (pref. dated Witham, Essex, 3 Nov., 1879). Jewitt, W. Henry. The Nativity in Art and Song: its varied Treatment with Pen and Pencil, ancient and modern, with illustrative notes, historical and legendary.-Cr. 8vo, many illustrations, 1898. Mummers in North Berks.-An article in The Times, 24 December, 1904. Keeping Christmas in the Heart. By the Rev. J. R. Miller, D.D.-Pp. 19, 1905. Christmas Superstitions. By W. Henry Jewitt.In The Treasury, December, 1905. The Pre-Christmas Antiphons. The Antiphons to the Magnificat, of which one was sung formerly on each of the days between December 16 and 23. S.P.C.K. W. C. B. FRENCH PROVERBIAL PHRASES. (See 10th S. i. 3, 485; ii. 404; iii. 203.) A d'autres, dénicheur de merles.-This saying is used to express want of confidence in the person to whom it is addressed. Its origin is wittily explained in an anecdote in one of the Lettres of Edmé Boursault (1638-1701). A similar anecdote occurs in L'Art de désopiler la Rate' (published in 1758), which has been put into rime by the Chevalier de Fontenailles. Here is the rimed version :Devant messire Jean Chouard, Magister et coq du village, Pierrot se vanta par hasard D'avoir trouvé sous le feuillage Un nid de merles: "Par ma foi ! C'est une fortune pour toi ; Il n'est pas loin d'ici, je gage. -Tenez, voyez-vous ce bocage? -Oui, je le vois.-Eh bien, l'ormeau qui fait le coin Est le séjour du nid que je garde avec soin. Messire Jean mit la nichée en cage, Et ne publions pas que je ne suis qu'un sot." Il se vanta, l'amour est imprudent, Aux environs. "Vas-tu la voir souvent? -Oui, monsieur.-Où demeure-t-elle ? Sans doute, et ce n'est pas pour enfiler des perles A d'autres, dénicheur de merles!" At one time dénicheur de fauvettes or de moineaux was applied to a chevalier d'industrie, or a person keenly alive to his own interests, and not to be trusted. Il ne faut pas mettre tous ses œufs dans un panier. This phrase has, of course, its English literal equivalent, but the following rime by Boursault is a good illustration of its meaning : Un homme avait des œufs, et voulait s'en défaire ; Pour en décharger sa peau A quatre pas de la donna du nez en terre. Je jure de ne plus mettre Tous mes œufs dans un panier. Graisser la patte.-To use palm-oil, bribe. According to La Mésangère, this phrase is found in a fabliau of the thirteenth century, from which he gives an extract : "Une vieille femme avait deux vaches qui la faisaient subsister. Elles entrèrent un jour dans les pâturages du seigneur, et y furent saisies par son prévôt. La bonne femme à l'instant courut au château supplier cet officier de les lui rendre. Il fit entendre qu'il lui fallait de l'argent; et celle-ci, qui n'avait rien à donner, s'en revint bien désolée. En chemin elle rencontra une de ses voisines, qu'elle consulta sur son malheur. Il faut en passer par ce qu'il demande, lui dit l'autre, et vous résoudre à lui graisser la patte. La vieille, qui était fort simple, n'y entendit pas finesse; et prenant le conseil à la lettre, elle mit dans sa poche un vieux morceau de lard, et retourna au château. Le seigneur se promenait devant sa porte, les mains derrière le dos. Elle s'avance doucement sur la pointe du pied, et lui frotte les mains avec son lard. Il se retourne pour lui demander ce qu'elle fait: 'Ah! monseigneur, s'écrie-t-elle en se jetant à genoux, le l'on m'a dit que si je voulais les ravoir, il fallait lui prévôt a saisi mes deux vaches dans votre pré, et graisser la patte. Je venais pour cela; mais comme je vous ai vu à la porte, et que vous êtes son maître j'ai imaginé que vous méritiez bien mieux qu'on graissât la vôtre." At the time when bell-cords were more common than knockers, they usually terminated with the foot of a deer or other animal. Later, graisser le marteau was substituted for graisser la patte, but in the sense of "to tip the porter." Cf. Racine's 'Les Plaideurs,' Act I. sc. i. EDWARD LATHAM. Eau bénite de cour (ante, p. 204).—In 'King Lear,' III. ii., the Fool says: "O nuncle, this rain water out o' door." court holy water in a dry house is better than M. N. G. 66 WAITS. (See 10th S. ii. 503.) In 1679 Nathan Harrison, musition," afterwards described as "wait," was admitted a freeman of York, "gratis" (Surt. Soc., vol. cii. 152, 218). Many minstrels, musicians, and harpers are mentioned in the same volume. The late Robert Davies, town clerk of York, supplied notes on the city waits in Marmaduke Rawdon' (Camd. Soc.), where it is recorded that the waits of Linlithgow, in 1664, had drums and bagpipes (pp. 136, 137). W. C. B. BLACK CAT FOLK-LORE.-For a black cat, a strange one, to enter a house without an invitation is considered to be a piece of good luck, if the cat is not driven out, but allowed kind of black cat brings good luck under to remain until it goes of its own will. Any such conditions, but if the cat has not a white hair to show, the good luck is stronger. This, with variations, is a pretty general belief. But there is another phase in which the appearance of a black cat in a sudden fashion is a portent of death-the worst of luck. This, however, necessitates the sudden apsuch things as a rule, and so far it does not pearance of the black cat out of doors. It is the women folk who note and speak of seem that men are troubled in this way. A young unmarried woman told me a short taste, and even a little heady into the bargain. time ago that, whenever she saw a black cat There was tea also as a drinking, but not in cross her path a few feet before her, she much favour, for the worker in the open heard in a short time of the death or serious liked something "rough on th' tongue," as illness of a close friend. When the cat came he would put it, and nothing he could get to her and rubbed against her dress, the could be too strong for his taste. Some called death of a member of her family followed. it "bite and sup time"-that is, the forenoon She gave me two instances of the latter, and pause; but most of them favoured "drinkmentioned several instances of the former.ings" and "drinking time." She has a particular aversion to a black cat, THOS. RATCLIFFE. and had this aversion even before she noted trouble coming after such visitations. Other cats she likes. THOS. RATCLIFFE. Worksop. "DRINKINGS" : "DRINKING TIME."-It is many years since I heard the terms "drinkings and "drinking time," and I wonder whether they are still in use, now that the working conditions of farm and other labourers are so altered from what they were upwards of fifty years ago. In the fields, by the roadside, and in quarry work of every kind there were set terms for taking "drinkings." The "leven o'clock was the recognized "drinking time" in the forenoon, and "five o'clock in the past noon. The leader of a gang of men, looking upwards where the sun was or ought to be, said, "Leven o'clock, 'tis drinking time," or Let's hev ar drinkings"; and supping kegs and stone bottles were drawn from cool recesses, and, with or without tots, each man had his 'lowance" in ale, small beer, or "bang-up"-the last a compound from various herbs, worked with barm, or "bang-up barm," stingy to the 66 Worksop. "JACK TAR, HAVE YOU HEARD OF THE NEWS?"-I give the first few lines of an old song I heard in my childhood, and somehow it is often very present with me. It used to be sung by an old nurse : Jack Tar, have you heard of the news? Fololderololderoladdie. Rathcoursey, co. Cork. SIR JAMES PENNETHORNE AND 'THE SATURDAY REVIEW. (See ante, p. 402.)—The article on the Rebuilding of the Public Offices' in The Saturday Review of 17 November, 1855, was probably written by Mr. Beresford Hope, an enthusiastic advocate of the Gothic style for public buildings-indeed, for buildings of to live to see a Gothic theatre, and must have every kind. He once declared that he hoped been disappointed at the result of his advice in the designs for the Gaiety Theatre, London, and the Shakespere Theatre at Stratford-on-Avon. Mr. Beresford Hope did scant justice to Sir James Pennethorne (not Pennington, as at p. 402), the surveyor to the Office of Works, who was an accomplished architect, and not merely a surveyor, as suggested in the article. He was brought up in the office of his uncle, John Nash, under whom and Augustus Pugin he received his professional education, which was supplemented by an extensive tour in France and Italy during the years 1824-6. The article enumerates some of Pennethorne's works, including the offices for the Duchy of Cornwall, Buckingham Gate, and the west wing of Somerset House, fronting on Lancaster Place, but omits to mention the Museum of Economic Geology in Piccadilly, his finest work at that time, and by many considered to be not surpassed by his later work for the University of London, Burlington Gardens (1866-70), now occupied by the Civil Service Commission. A proof of the esteem in which Sir James was held by his colleagues may be found in the fact that on the completion of the west wing of Somerset House he was presented with a gold medal subscribed for by seventy-five of the leading architects of the metropolis; and in 1865 he received the Royal Gold Medal placed at the disposal of the Royal Institute of British Architects. The design of the Record Office, Chancery Lane, may not commend itself to many at the present day, but Pennethorne's design was completed by Sir John Taylor, of the Office of Works, and earned for him the distinction of K.C.B. JOHN HEBB. Downing Street, 17th October, 1780. It would be worth (knowing at what date the custom originated. H. [Many articles on Whips in the House of Commous will be found in 8th S. iv., v., vi., vii., viii.] "INFANT PHENOMENON." The "Infant Phenomenon," daughter of Mr. Vincent Crummles, has long been known to us, though it is not so well remembered that Dickens had previously caused Sam Weller to give the like nickname to the Fat Boy. But there were brave men before Agamemnon, and a much earlier use of the term is to be found in the following extract from The Times of Saturday, 20 October, 1804 : "Amongst the infantine phenomena of the day may be justly reckoned a boy, not four years old, the son of Mr. Wigley, music-seller, opposite St. Clement's Church, in the Strand, who performs the most difficult passages on the bugle-horn with all the full-toned powers of a regimental trumpeter. ALFRED F. ROBBINS. JOHN PENHALLOW.-Some years ago several of the members of Clifford's Inn inspected an old oak room at No. 3 in the Inn, with the view of determining if the oak was worth selling. We all agreed that it would cost Of course Grinling Gibbons's name at once occurs to the visitor; but there is no authority for attributing the work to him. The label says the oak was put up for John Penhallow, who occupied the room from 1688 till his death in 1716. Over the fireplace is a shield of arms, Penhallow quartering Penwarn. Is anything known about him? There is an account in Boase and Courtney's 'Bibliotheca Cornubiensis' of Samuel Penhallow (1665-1726), who embarked for New England and arrived there 1686. RALPH THOMAS. TWIZZLE-TWIGS.—This name of the jointed rush, Juncus articulatus, in use here, is not mentioned in the English Dialect Dictionary.' J. P. STILWELL. Yateley, Hants. ROCKEFELLER.-This name is attracting the curious attention of those taking an interest in American genealogy. So far the familyhistory explorer, whether amateur or trained, has gathered in little worth recording. Kegs of ink, in sooth, have been wasted by newspaper and magazine scribblers in vainly trying to explain and disclose the business steps of a certain individual enjoying the cognomen, one J. D. Rockefeller, of Cleveland, Ohio, of Standard Oil Company notoriety, largely because of his having attained that preeminently solitary position, viz., of being "the richest man in the world." By the side of his accumulations the combined wealth of the European Rothschilds is a bare zero mark, if public opinion throughout the United States is to be believed. His forbears appear to have originated in the British Isles, despite the odd, hard patronymic appellation which is his; I say hard, knowing our national American weakness, outside of Indian designation, to generalize the majority of queer surnames under "Dutchy "probably taken from a German original. The or "Frenchy." That clever creature Miss book has long been out of print, and it might Tarbell, in her voluminous, quite ferocious be worth while for some publisher to reissue biography of Mr. Rockefeller, pretends to it. have traced his will-o'-the-wisp grandfather JOHN HEBB, to a natal spot in Western Massachusetts called Mud Creek. No such spot exists. Moreover, no early trace of the surname is found in any of the New England States. Except when "raised" out in the Far West, the New Englander seldom uses the word "creek" to denote a brook. Now it is beginning to be whispered that the first Rockefeller to illuminate the American continent (labelled Rockafellow) was none other than an indigent, untitled, hard-headed, hardworking, seventeenth century immigrant yeoman, emitting the rough irregular "early Saxon English" peculiar to one raised" in Scotland. In view of this whispering I shall be glad to be favoured with examples of Rockefeller either as a British place-name or full-fledged British surname of late or early days. Boston, Massachusetts. Queries. J. G. C. WE must request correspondents desiring information on family matters of only private interest to affix their names and addresses to their queries, in order that answers may be sent to them direct. 66 'KING NUTCRACKER.' There is a little Christmas book of which the title-page runs: King Nutcracker and the Poor Boy Reinhold, a Christmas Story with Pictures. Rendered into English Verse, from the celebrated German Work of Heinricn Hoffman, by A. H. Published by W. S. Orr & Co. 1854." Who was A. H.? The verses are unequal, but are rather cleverly turned, as, for example, the following: The King makes sign; and prodigy! I am inclined to think that Struwelpeterie is an interpolation of the translator A. H. The illustrations to the book appear to have been designed by Alfred Crowquill, and are QUEEN ELIZABETH'S PORTRAIT IN HOLYROOD.-In the Palace of Holyrood there is a portrait of Queen Elizabeth, traditionally reported to have been a birthday gift from her to Queen Mary. This is doubtful, as the painting is considered to belong to the school of Gheeraedts, a painter who did not come to England till 1580, when Queen Mary was a prisoner far from Holyrood. Lately, a version of this picture has been discovered at Siena, supposed to have been a present to differs from the other only in the backthe Grand Duke about 1588. This painting ground. The Queen holds in her left hand a colander, inscribed in both paintings with the following legend: A TERRA IL BEN-IL MAL DIMORA IN SELLA; which may be interpreted "The good [falls] to the ground; the evil remains in the saddle." At first sight I was inclined to suspect that this inscription upon the Holyrood portrait had been added sarcastically by some devoted adherent of Queen Mary; but its repetition on the Siena painting puts this out of the question. It is evidently a reference to the sifting action of the colander, allowing the good material to fall through, and retaining the bad. I should feel grateful were anybody well acquainted with Italian literature able to recognize the sentence as a quotation or proverbial saying. HERBERT MAXWELL. tion of the following extract from Domestic The Gable House, Bilton, Rugby. HERALDIC.-Can any of your readers kindly say whose the following arms were?-Argent, a chevron sable charged with a bezant or, between three mullets of the third. SADI. MAIDLOW.-Will some reader kindly explain the etymology of the name Maidlow? Was the name known before the year 1800? W. "PASSIVE RESISTER."-Is there any literary history for this phrase? Who is the coiner of the current term? In Edersheim's 'Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah,' chap. v. p. 67 (first published October, 1883), occurs the following reference |