Aug. 19. 1854.] 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



147 



Church of St. Nicholas within-the-walls, Dublin. 

 — Where can I find copies of the following docu- 

 ments connected with this church : 



1. The foundation charter, by which Arch- 

 bishop Corayn granted to the then collegiate 

 establishment of St. Patrick the church of St. 

 Nicholas within-the-walls ? 



2. The confirmation of same by Pope Celes- 

 tine ? 



Is there any print of this church of an earlier 

 date than that in the Oentlemans Magazine fur 

 1786? 



Is there any print representing it at the period 

 ■when it was taken down, a. d. 1835 ? Enivei. 



Monkstown, Dublin. 



Age of Oaks. — What are the dimensions and 

 what are the ages of " The Parliament Oak," near 

 Mansfield, and of the " Major Oak" and " Sham- 

 bles Oak," near OUerton, Notts ? The " Green- 

 dale Oak " in the grounds of Welbeck Abbey is 

 probably in too shattered a condition to allow of 

 its age being determined. A comparison of any 

 admeasurements which may have been made fifty 

 or a hundred years ago with those made in late 

 years would be interesting. J. M. B. 



Phosphoric Light. — Why is phosphoric light 

 not always equally apparent on the surface of 

 salt Avater ? Is it owing to a difference in the 

 amount of phosphorus ? and, if so, what occasions 

 this difference ? Ignoramus. 



Prophecies respecting Constantinople. — The 

 following passage from Gibbon, containing an ac- 

 count of a prophecy, with his remarks upon it, is 

 curious and interesting at the present time. 



" By the vulgar of every rank, it was asserted and be- 

 lieved, that an equestrian statue in the square of Taurus 

 was secretly inscribed with a prophecy, how the Russians 

 in the last days should become masters of Constantinople. 

 In our own time a Russian armament, instead of sailing 

 from the Borysthenes, has circumnavigated the continent 

 of Europe ; and the Turkish capital has been threatened 

 by a squadron of strong and lofty ships of war, each of 

 which, with its naval science and thundering artillery, 

 could have sunk or scattered an hundred canoes such as 

 those of their ancestors. Perhaps the present generation 

 may yet behold the accomplishment of the prediction, of 

 a rare prediction, of which the style is unambiguous, and 

 the date unquestionable." — Gibbon's Roman Empire, 

 vol. V. ch. Iv. 



In a note to the passage he gives his authorities, 

 and adds : 



" They witness the belief of the prophecy ; the rest is 

 immaterial." 



Can any of your correspondents inform me 

 what is the authority for the existence of another 

 prophecy of which I have heard, that the Turks 

 were only to hold Constantinople for four hundred 

 years ? H. D. N. 



Minor HEiiietitS fioftfi ^nSiottg» 



Prohibition of the Rev. Mr. Maurice (about 1 721). 

 — In the sixteenth Number of the Terrce Filius 

 (a curious medley of scurrility and good sense), 

 it is said that the Vice-Chancellor of Oxford 

 " demanded Mr. Maurice's notes upon a com- 

 plaint made against a sermon which he preached, 

 that it contained something contrary to one of the 

 Articles of the Church of England, without any 

 particular allegation : and he was prohibited to 

 preach in the precincts of the University on that 

 account." Can any of your Oxford correspondents 

 give some particulars of this case ? The name 

 recalls to mind a recent occurrence of a somewhat 

 similar nature. Henry T. Rii.et. 



[The particulars of this case will be found in the fol- 

 lowing sermon : " The True Causes of the Contempt of 

 Christian Ministers. A Sermon, preached before the Uni- 

 versity of Oxford, at St. Mary's Church, by Peter Mau- 

 rice, A.M., Fellow of Jesus College, Oxon. With a Preface 

 in Vindication of it against the Censure passed upon it in 

 the University : London, 8vo., 1729." It was considered 

 at the time that certain passages in this sermon contra- 

 dicted the Twenty-sixth Article.] 



London Topographical Queries. — 1 . At which 

 house in the Polygon, Somers Town, did Mary 

 Wollstonecraft Godwin reside during the latter 

 part of her life ? 



2. What street in Somers Town did Theodore 

 Hook live in after the Mauritius affair ? And at 

 which house ? 



3. Which was Horace Walpole's town house in 

 Berkeley Square ? E. J. Sage. 



[Probably some topographical friend, resident in St. 

 Pancras, may be able to reply to the first Query. — Theo- 

 dore Hook never (as far as we know) dwelt in Somers 

 Town. At Kentish Town he sojourned for many months, 

 soon after his return from the Mauritius. The house 

 occupied by him is the second to the left hand, contiguous 

 to Providence Row, and nearly opposite to the Nag's Head 

 Tavern, as this suburb is entered from London. — No. 11. 

 Berkeley Square was the house in which Horace Walpole 

 died in 1797.] 



Archbishop Herring (Vol. vii., p. 158.). — Was 

 this prelate first Archbishop of York and then of 

 Canterbury ? If so, is he not the only instance of 

 the same person having filled both of those sees ? 



Henrt T. Rilet. 



[Four prelates were translated from York to Canter- 

 bur}'. In 1452, John Kemp; 1575, Edmund Grindalj 

 1747, Thomas Herring; 1757, Matthew Button.] 



William III. and Cooper. — Can you inform me 

 whether Samuel Cooper, who died in London ia 

 1672, painted a miniature portrait in oil of Wil- 

 liam Prince of Orange, subsequently King Wil- 

 liam III. of England ? If he did, where is his 

 painting to be found ? I possess a likeness of the 

 king in question in his younger days (when about 

 one-and- twenty years of age), said to be by Cooper, 



