146 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[2nds. No84., Aug. 23.'56. 



after awhile, abundant raia fell. Of course they ascribed 

 this result to the ducking of the marabouts. — Galignani." 

 From The Morning Star, May 22, 1856. 

 K. P. D. E. 



Print of Felton the Assassin. — The following 

 passage in Dr. Heylin's Extraneus Vapulans, or 

 the Observator Rescued, Sfc, 8vo., 1636, p. 306., is 

 curious, as showing that a portrait of Felton, the 

 murderer of the Duke of Buckingham, must at 

 one period have been common : 



" The man [Felton] might possibly be set on, and his 

 discontents made use of to this barbarous murder, by 

 some of those who wished well to the remonstrance ; and 

 it may be believed the rather, because the pictures of the 

 wretch being cut in brass, and exposed to sale, were caught 

 up greedily by that party; and being (because) the 

 copies of these letters were printed in the bottom of it, it 

 is more probable that our author might have them 

 tllence." 



Edwakd F. Rimbault. 



Dancing over a Husband's Grave prevented. — 

 The following entry, bearing date May 20, 1736, 

 occurs in the parish register of Lymington, 

 Hants : — 



" Samuel Baldwyn, Esq., sojourner in this parish, was 

 immersed without the Needles, in Scratcher's Bay, sans 

 ceremonie. " 



It is said that he ordered his remains to be thus 

 deposited, to prevent his •wife from executing a 

 threat of dancing over his grave. I hope, for 

 Mrs. Baldwyn's sake, this was not the case. 



R. W. Hackwood. 



Raphael as a Phoenix. — It is evident to me, 

 notwithstanding the glosses of Newton and Pearce, 

 that Milton {Paradise Lost, book v.) intended 

 the angel Raphael to assume the appearance of a 

 phoenix. The description — 



" . . . . to all the fowls he seems 

 A phoenix, gaz'd by all, as that sole bird," &c., — 



does not appear to have been understood by any of 

 the commentators. It is evidently an allusion to 

 Tacitus {Annals, book vi. chap. 28.) : " Multo 

 ceterarum volucrum comitatu, novam faciem 

 mirantium." C. Mansfield Inglebt, 



Birmingham. 



Farinelli. — It is related (I know not upon what 

 authority) that for several years Farinelli sang the 

 same two songs every night to the King of Spain, 

 and in Mr. Bunn's work concerning the stage is 

 a letter, in which the writer speaks of possessing, 

 what he supposes to be a rarity, a copy (MS.) of 

 one of these very songs, " Pallido il Sole." The 

 writer had no idea that it was printed. Both that 

 and the other, " Per questo dolce amplesso," are 

 to be found in Walsh's Le Delizie delV Opere, 

 vol. i. From Mr. Bunn's remarks upon the letter 

 which was addressed to him on the occasion of 

 his bringing out Mr. J. Barnett's opera of Fari- 



nelli, we find that Mr. Barnett also was not aware 

 of the existence in print of the two airs in ques- 

 tion. We have the Curiosities of Literature, and 

 these airs might find a place in the •' Curiosities of 

 Music." A. RoFFB. 



Somers Town. 



A Tailor reduced to Zero. — You are welcome 

 to the following if you think it worth embalming 

 in "N. & Q." I found it in Raikes's Journal : it 

 appeared originally in the Chronique de Paris, 

 1835, and is founded on the sayings : — "a cat has 

 nine lives," — " nine tailors make a man : " 



1 cat = 9 living men, 

 1 man = 9 living tailors, 

 If -I 9 cats = 9 X 9 or 81 men, 

 9 men = 9 x 9 or 81 tailors, 

 9 cats = 81 X 81 or 6561 tailors. 

 According to this calculation, the value of a tailor 

 seems mathematically reduced to zero. 



Henry Kensington. 

 Note from a Fly-leaf. — On the fly-leaf of an 

 old Prayer Book, I lately found the following 

 memorandum : 



" Lines attached to the Door of St. Mary's Church on the 

 Day of Thanksgiving for Lord Duncan's Victory. 



" Ye wicked people, are these your pranks. 

 To murther men and give God thanks ? 

 O pray leave off, and go no further. 

 For God requires no thanks for murther." 



I am unable to fix the locality, but am of 

 opinion that the place indicated is Chester : the 

 owner of the book having resided there about that 

 period. Hugh Owen. 



ETON MONTEM. 



If this should meet the eye of any gentleman 

 who walked in either of the Montem processions 

 of 1790 or 1793, and who remembers having 

 afterwards sat for his portrait in a picture of the 

 ceremony, he will very much oblige me if he will 

 be so kind as to communicate his name and address, 

 as I have recently become possessed of the very 

 curious picture, and am endeavouring to identify 

 the personages. There are about eighty portraits 

 of Etonians, and about twenty of spectators, gen- 

 tlemen and ladies. J. W. Croker. 

 Alverbank, Gosport, Aug. 18, 1856. 



KNOWLEDGE OF EUROPEAN HISTORY AMONG BAR- 

 BAROUS NATIONS. 



Niebuhr, in his Lectures on Ancient History, 

 calculates that Herodotus composed his historical 

 work sixty years after the expedition of Xerxes, 



