192 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[2-4 S. NO 114., Mar. 6. '68. 



legend — mabta mavdalei. The second seal 

 bears on a shield a cross patonce, charged with 

 an escallop : legend — sigillvm willelmi de 



GEENDONE. 



I have been unable to meet with any informa- 

 tion respecting this William de Grendone. He 

 was evidently not a member of the Warwickshire 

 family, as the following arms are assigned to the 

 Grendones of Warwickshire by Dugdale and others, 

 " Argent, two chevrons, gules." 



I would add that the deed is witnessed by John 

 Deynes, William Dykeman*, John atte More, 

 William Hewrede, and Nicholas de Twyford. 



J. J. H. 



Lee, Kent. 



Sones filled with Lead. — In the Gentleman's 

 Magazine for 1748 there is a discovery mentioned 

 as having taken place at Axminster, co. Devon, 

 of many human bones filled with lead, A similar 

 discovery was also made at Newport Pagnell, and 

 a correspondent from Gravesend proposes to solve 

 the mystery by adducing the case of his own town, 

 in the parish church of which bones similarly 

 treated had been found. 



He says that the parish-church was burnt to 

 the ground ; that the molten lead from the roof of 

 the church ran in all parts amongst the ruins, and 

 so filled the bones. Now this does not seem a 

 very satisfactory solution, and would necessitate 

 the fact of the churches of Axminster and New- 

 port Pagnell having shared the same fate at some 

 distant period. Can any of your readers tell me 

 if this is known to have been the case ? J. B. S. 



Woodhayne. 



" When Winds breathe Soft." — Who wrote the 

 words of Webbe's celebrated glee, " When winds 

 breathe soft ? " 



The Secbetakt of the Banbuet Glee 

 and Choeal Union. 



Burton and Graham. — Who were Burton and 

 Graham, referred to in the following lines, which 

 in Moore's Almanac for 1811 head the Calendar 

 for the month of June ? — 



" God save the King ! — and he that wo'n't say so, 

 Burton and Graham's blessings with him go." 



c.c. 



Rum^ its Derivation. — Can you inform me 

 whence the name of this spirit is derived ? In 

 cant phraseology "rum" is synonymous with ex- 

 cellence or superiority of some kind. Bailey, in 

 his Dictionary, says, " Rum-ville " was the cant 

 name of London, and " Rum-cuUey " of a rich 



* William Dykeman, citizen and ironmonger, served the 

 office of Sheriff of London in 1368. He was buried in the 

 church of St. Olave's in the Jewry, 



fool. Was the term so applied to the spirit dis- 

 tilled from molasses ? G. W^ J. 



[Rum, the liquor, formerly spelt, as in French it still 

 is, rhum, has been derived from rheum, or peC/ua, a flowing, 

 on account of its manufacture from the juice of the sugar- 

 cane. It is scarcely supposable, however, that either pro- 

 ducers, venders, or consumers would ever have offered or 

 called for the article under so very uninviting a name. 

 As rum has of all distilled liquors that are taken (not as 

 physic) the strongest odour, it may possibly owe its name 

 to aroma. This derivation seems at any rate to be sug- 

 gested in Besch. Fr. Diet, (on rhum), where it is re- 

 marked, that " le tafia differe du rhum en ce qu'il n'a pas 

 un arome aussi prononce." To this derivation it may be 

 objected, that rum had its name, and was convivially im- 

 bibed, long before we began to describe the fragrance 

 which attends the drawing of a cork by the term aroma. 

 But the employment of aroma in the sense of vinous fra- 

 grance, at least with reference to spiced wine, is as old as 

 hippocras. We read in Pliny of " aromatites vinum " 

 (odoramentis conditum) : and in a mediaeval writer cited 

 by Du Gauge, " vinum optimum .... a speciebus retinet 

 aromaticitatem et odorem." Halliwell, on " aroint," seems 

 to think that the word arome once existed in our lan- 

 guage ; and it certainly does not appear impossible that, 

 when the first rum trickled from the still, its rich fra- 

 grance may have gained for it the name of arome or 

 aroma. Oi aroma we should soon make rum, just as of 



amoca we have made muck. Rum, the adjective, 



which is now applied vernacularly to what appears odd 

 or strange, formerly signified, as it still does in the north 

 of our island, superior or excellent. " Rum," according 

 to Jamieson, is in Lothian anj'thing that is " excellent in 

 its kind." The primary meaning of the word rum, as 

 derived from the Hebrew, is high. Hence, in this sense, 

 the Jews called London Rum-Ville, or Rom-Ville, lite- 

 rally high-town, or the chief of all cities. Rum, as 



applied to persons, and which originally signified a per- 

 son of importance, has lapsed by use into a term of ridi- 

 cule ; just as we now hear it said ironically, " he is a very 

 important personage;" meaning not what he is, but what 

 he considers himself. This is one of the many instances 

 offered by our language, in which terms have become 

 vulgarised by use.] 



Fights in the Seventeenth Century. — The fol- 

 lowing passage occurs in the third chapter of Lord 

 Macaulay's History, containing his celebrated de- 

 scription of the social state of England in 1685. 

 To what custom does it refer ? 



" Fights compared with which a boxing match is a re- 

 fined and humane spectacle were among the favourite 

 diversions of a large part of the town. Multitudes as- 

 sembled to see gladiators hack each other to pieces with 

 deadly weapons, and shouted with delight when one of 

 the combatants lost a finger or an eye." --- -His^. of Eng- 

 land, vol. i. p. 423. 



L. 



[This reprehensible divertissement, during the reigns of 

 Charles I. and Charles XL, was designated Buckler-Play ; 

 but more anciently known as the Sword-Dance, or a 

 combat with swords and bucklers, exhibited by our 

 Saxon gleemen. Henry VIII. made the professors of this 

 art a company by letters patent, wherein the art is en- 

 titled "The Noble Science of Defence." In the 6th 

 James I., 1609, by a decree of the Star-Chamber, buck- 

 ler-play, bear-baitings, &c. were utterly prohibited. From 

 the reign of Charles II. to that of George 1. these prize- 

 combats were mostly exhibited in the bear-gardens of 



