2"'> S. No 107., Jan. 1G. '58.] 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



47 



mour, in tbe person of its representative, the titular King 

 or Emperor of Delhi. But the prosperity of that house 

 is another name for the downfall of the British, and the 

 reascending of Mohammedan power." 



Can it be possible that such prayers have been 

 utlcred in the public mosques, and not been 

 known by the authorities? It is not many years 

 since a foreign preacher was banished from this 

 island, at ten days' notice, for touching on subjects 

 in the pulpit which it was rightly supposed neither 

 concerned him nor the soldiers whom he addressed. 



w. w. 



Malta. 



Hope Makers Procession at Chatham. — As I 

 presume your journal is for the purpose of re- 

 cording old customs, I take the opportunity of 

 sending a " note " of one. 



" On Wednesday (the 25th) night last the towns of 

 Chatham, Rochester, and Brompton, exhibited consider- 

 able excitement in consequence of a torchlight procession 

 appearing in the streets, headed by a band of fifes and 

 drums. Notwithstanding the late hour (11 o'clock) a 

 large number of persons of both sexes accompanied the 

 party. The demonstration was got up hy the rope- 

 makers of the dockyard to celebrate the anniversary of 

 the founder of the ropery (Queen Catharine). The female 

 representing her majesty (who was borne in a chair of 

 state by six ropemakers) was dressed in white muslin, 

 wore a gilt crown, and carried in her hand a Koman ban- 

 ner." 



John Ndesb Chadwick. 



King's Lynn, Nov. 28, 1857. 



The safest Seat in a Railroad Car. — l!^ow that 

 accidents are so frequently occurring on railroads, 

 for there is hardly a month in which one or more 

 arc not recorded, the question is often asked by 

 travellers, where is the safest seat ? 



" The American engineer, as the result of scientific 

 calculations and protracted experience, says the safest 

 seat is in the middle of the last car but one. There are 

 some chances of danger, which are the same every where in 

 the train, but others are least at the above-named place." 



w.w. 



Malta. 



eauerfeiS. 



PKIVATE COREESPONDENCE : WHOSE PKOPEETT IS 

 IT ? 



A few days since I went into the shop of a very 

 respectable bookseller, who occasionally deals in 

 autographs. I had made a small purchase, and was 

 leaving, when he said he had bought the Papers of 



the late Mr. , and was making a Catalogue of 



them for sale : that among them were a couple of 

 letters written by me, which he would show me, that 

 I might destroy them if they contained anything 

 which I did not wish published. They did not, and 

 I therefore hesitated to avail myself of his offer. 

 But as this system of selling the letters of living 

 persons, without their consent, seems to be gain- 



ing ground, and is unquestionably a great moral, 

 if not a legal offence — will some of your readers 

 tell me whether there exists any law to prevent 

 it, or what steps I, or any other gentleman who 

 may find his letters — perhaps his confidential 

 letters — exposed for sale, may take to prevent so 

 great a breach of propriety ? T. 



[Since the foregoing Query was in type, the point in- 

 volved in it has become of great interest to a considerable 

 number of persons. A well-known literary man lately 

 deceased, who held an important public position, has left 

 the whole of his correspondence, from the early part of the 

 present century to the year 1857, arranged in some twenty 

 or thirty volumes. These have been ofi'ered for sale to 

 one of our public institutions, and if not so disposed of, are, 

 it is understood, to be put up to public auction. It has 

 recently been held, we believe, that such letters are the 

 joint property of the writer and the party to whom they 

 are addressed, and cannot be dealt with or published un- 

 less by consent of both. The words of Lord Eldon in 

 1818 were — 



" I think that the decisions represent the property as 

 qualified in some respects ; that by sending the letter, the 

 writer had given, for the purpose of reading, and, in some 

 cases, of keeping it, a property to the person to whom the 

 letter was addressed, yet, that the gift was so restrained, 

 that ultra the purposes for which the letter was sent, the 

 property was in the sender. .... The principle on 

 which the Court interferes recognises a joint property in 

 the writer and the person to whom they are addressed." 



Lord Hardwicke, on the other hand, of whom Lord 

 Campbell says, " the wisdom of his decrees was the theme 

 of universal eulogy," held, in the well-known case of 

 Pope and Swift's Liters, " the property of letters sent 

 in correspondence to De in the sender." See Appendix to 

 Lord Dudley's Letters to Bishop Coplestone, late of Llan- 

 daff, 8vo., 1840, where the highest legal opinion is con- 

 cisely and clearly defined. 



Private letters, it is clear, cannot be published without 

 the consent of the writer; and it may be a grave point 

 whether the exposure of private correspondence for sale 

 does not amount in law to a publication of it.] 



PEERAGE ANB PRIvr COUNCIL QUERIES. 



1. By what authority are all peers styled " Right 

 Honourable ? " 



2. Are all peers members of the Privy Council 

 by courtes)', although not necessarily called by 

 the sovereign to deliberate in the counsels of the 

 state ? 



3. Is the Lord Mayor of London a Privy Coun- 

 cillor by virtue of his office, or is he called and 

 sworn after his election to the Mayoralty ? 



4. Are there any members of the Privy Coun- 

 cil who are so by virtue of their offices or rank 

 only, and not specially called by the sovereign 

 and sworn ? and if so, who are they ? 



Answers to the above Queries will much oblige 



H. M. C. 



[The Lord Mayor is not a Privy Councillor. This 

 question has been very fully discussed in our 1'' S. iii. 

 496. ; iv. 9. 28. 137. 157. 180. 236. 284. ; ix. 137. 158.] 



