132 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[No. 224. 



be communicated to the Convocation : the chief con- 

 tents of which are these : 



" ' After my very harty commendations, I doe take 

 this manner of proceeding by the Regent Masters (for 

 their sitting covered at Congregations and Convo- 

 cations) in soe good part, that although I might well 

 take some time to advise before I give answer, espe- 

 cially when I consider how long that custom hath con- 

 tinued, how much it hath been questioned, and that 

 upon a long debate it hath been withstood by so grave 

 and wise a Counsellor of State as your late Chancellor, 

 my immediate predecessor ; yet, when I weigh their 

 undoubted right, their discreet and orderly proceedings 

 to seek it, not to take it, the chief, if not the only, 

 cause why it was formerly denied ; the gpod congruity 

 this doth beare, not with Cambridge alone (though 

 that were motive enough), but all other places, it 

 being no where seen that those that are admitted 

 Judges are required to sit bare-headed ; I cannot 

 choose but commend and thus f3rre yield to theire 

 request as to referre it to the Convocation House. I 

 hope no man can have cause to think that I have not 

 the power to continew this custom as well as some 

 others of my predecessors, if I had a mind to strive ; 

 nor that I seek after their applause in yielding them 

 that now, which hath been so long kept from them, 

 but the respect I have to their due, to the decency of 

 the place, and honour of the University, which I can- 

 not conceive to bee anyway diminished, but rather in- 

 creased, by their sitting covered, are the only reasons 

 that have moved me, and carried me to so quick a 

 resolution, wherewith you may acquaint the Convoca- 

 tion House with this also, that what they shall con- 

 clude I shall willingly agree to. And soe I doe very 

 hartely take leave, and rest 



Your assured loving friend, 



Pembrooke. 

 Baynard's Castle, 



this 4 of December, 1620.' 



Which letter being publickly read in a Convocation 

 held 20 Dec, it was then agreed upon by the consent 

 of all there present, that all Blasters of what condition 

 soever might put on their caps in Congregations and 

 Convocations, yet with these conditions : That in the 

 said assemblies the said Masters should use only square 

 caps, and not sit bare, or without cap. And if any 

 were found faulty in these matters, or that they should 

 bring their hats in the said Assemblies, they should 

 not only lose their suffrages for that time, but be 

 punished as the Vicechancellor should think fit. 

 Lastly, it was decreed, under the said conditions and 

 no otherwise, that in the next Congregation in the 

 beginning of Hilary Term, and so for ever after, all 

 Masters, of what condition soever, whether Regents or 

 not Regents, should, in Congregations and Convoca- 

 tions, put on and use square caps. 



" All that shall be said more of this matter is, that 

 the loss of using caps arose from the negligence of the 

 Masters, who, to avoid the pains of bringing their caps 

 with them, would sit bare-headed ; which being used 

 by some, was at length followed by all, and so at length 

 became a custom." 



It would seem, from Lord Pembroke's letter, 



that the right of the senate of this university to 

 wear their caps had not been questioned. 



C. H. Cooper. 

 Cambridge. 



RUSSIA, TURKEY, AND THE BLACK SEA. 



(Vol. ix., p. 103.) 



Statements and complaints have often been made 

 respecting the imperfect knowledge possessed by 

 English navigators of the shores and coasts of the 

 Black Sea, and of the great danger thence arising 

 to ships and fleets from England, which would 

 thus seem to be without the charts necessary for 

 their guidance. The Guardian newspaper reite- 

 rates these complaints in its number for Jan. 11. 

 This deficiency of charts, howevei*, ought not to 

 exist, and probably does not; since, no doubt, 

 the English and French Governments would take 

 care to supply them at the present time. As 

 respects England, Dr. E. D. Clarke, in his well- 

 known Travels in Russia, Sfc. (see vol. i. 4th edit., 

 8vo., London, 1816, Preface, p. x.), states that he 

 brought — 



" Certain documents with him from Odessa, at the 

 hazard of his life, and deposited within a British 

 Admiralty." 



These documents, we are led naturally to infer, 

 were charts ; for he adds : 



" They may serve to facilitate the navigation of the 

 Russian coasts of the Black Sea, if ever the welfare of 

 Great Britain should demand the presence of her fleets 

 in that part of the world." 



Happening to meet with this passage, in con- 

 sulting Dr. Clarke's Travels, at the beginning of 

 December, when the Fleets of Great Britain and 

 France were on the point of entering the Black 

 Sea, and having read in many quarters fears ex- 

 pressed for the fleets from the want of charts, I 

 ventured to copy out the passage relating to these 

 remarkable documents, and sent it to Lord Aber- 

 deen ; in case, from the alleged poverty of charts 

 in the Admiralty Catalogues (see The Guardian^ 

 Jan. 11.), Dr. Clarke's "documents" should have 

 fallen out of sight, and were forgotten. No notice, 

 however, was taken of my communication ; from 

 which I concluded that it was wholly valueless. 



John Macrat. 



Oxford. 



HIGH DUTCH AND LOW DUTCH. 



(Vol.viii., pp. 478. 601.) 



If "N. & Q." were the publication in which 

 questions were cursorily settled, the answer of 

 James Spence Harry (p. 478.) might suffice 

 with regard to the Query of S. C. P. (p. 413.) ; 

 but your correspondent E. C. II., who seems also 



