Mar. 25. 1854.] 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



267 



Us, and having well pondered the grounds and 

 reasons in which your highness 1 replies are based, 

 we judged it right to announce farther to our 

 said subject, that in our opinion the power of 

 appeal to the Supreme Court of Audience offered 

 to him by your highness, after his attorney's pre- 

 vious neglect in the first instance, ought not by 

 any means to be slighted ; and that it did not seem 

 to Us there remained, all things considered, any 

 other hope of future remedy. This we did the 

 more willingly, in order to prove to your highness 

 more clearly, that being so dear, and so highly 

 esteemed by Us, as is your highness personally, 

 and all your knights, that we have preferred ac- 

 cepting any mode of properly settling this affair, 

 rather than, by recurring to any harsher measures, 

 diminish our friendship and affection towards so 

 celebrated an Order. This, our determination, 

 We have also made known by our letters to the 

 Grand Prior of France ; and of which testimony 

 may be borne by the bearer of the present, to 

 whom we have thought proper particularly to re- 

 commend the urging of your highness, in Our 

 name, to see that such certain and speedy method 

 of justice be established in the affair of our sub- 

 ject as may be lawful, and as was offered ; and 

 such as may afford new and sound proof of our 

 ancient amity, and establish and affirm a mutual 

 faith worthy of the Christian name. 



In the mean time, We, from our heart, recom- 

 mend your highness, and all your knights, to the 

 safeguard of the Most Good and Most Great God. 



Given from our Palace of Westminster on the 

 7th day of June, in the year of our Lord 1669, 

 and of our reign the twenty-first. 



Your Highness' good Cousin and Friend, 



Charles Rex. 

 No. X. 



Charles by the Grace of God, of Great Britain, 

 . France, and Ireland, King, Defender of the 

 Faith, &c. &c. &c. 



To the most eminent Prince, the Lord Nicholas 

 Cottoner, Grand Master of the Order of Malta, 

 our very dear cousin and friend, Greeting : 



We apprehend that long since it must have 

 come to the knowledge of your eminence, that a 

 vessel of war of our Royal fleet, named the " Sap- 

 phire," went ashore some months ago on the coasts 

 of Sicily; and was so much damaged, that she 

 became entirely unseaworthy. We have however 

 heard, that some guns which belonged to the said 

 ship have been taken to the island'of Malta, and 

 there preserved. Having, in consequence, ordered 

 our well-beloved and faithful subject Rudolf 

 Montague, the Master of the Horse of our most 

 serene Consort, and our Minister near his most 

 Christian Majesty, to send there some fitting per- 

 son to inquire after any remains of the said wreck, 

 and to dispose of them in a manner most advan- 



tageous to Us, we, as friends, beg your eminence 

 to be pleased to interpose your authority ; so that 

 the persons already sent, or hereafter to be sent 

 by our said Minister, may experience no delays 

 nor impediments, but rather find all favour and 

 due aid from each and every chief of the arsenal, 

 ports and customs, and other officers to whom it 

 may appertain ; which we, in a similar case, will 

 endeavour fully to reciprocate to your eminence. 



In the mean time we recommend, with all our 

 heart, your eminence to the protection of the 

 Most Good and Most Great God. 



Given from our Palace of Whitehall, on the 

 28th day of November, 1670. 



Your Eminence's good Cousin and Friend, 

 Charles Rex. 



FATA MORGANA. 



Not having met with the following account in 

 any English newspaper, of a phenomenon said to 

 have been witnessed quite recently in Germany, I 

 beg to send you a translation from the Allgemeine 

 Zeitung (generally quoted in England by the name 

 of the Augsburgh Gazette) of February 13, de- 

 tailing, in a communication from Westphalia, the 

 particulars of a phenomenon, new, perhaps, to 

 your pages, but by no means new to the world. 



" Westphalia. — If the east has its Fata Morgana, 

 we, in Westphalia, have also quite peculiar natural 

 phenomena, which, hitherto, it has been as impossible 

 to explain satisfactorily, as to deny. A rare and 

 striking appearance of this description forms now the 

 subject of universal talk and comment in our province. 

 On the 22nd of last month a surprising prodigy of 

 nature was seen by many persons at Biiderich, a village 

 between Unna and Werl. Shortly before sunset, an 

 army, of boundless extent, and consisting of infantry, 

 cavalry, and an enormous number of waggons, was ob- 

 served to proceed across the country in marching order. 

 So distinctly seen were all these appearances, that even 

 the flashing of the firelocks, and the colour of the ca- 

 valry uniform, which was white, could be distinguished. 

 This whole array advanced in the direction of the 

 wood of Schafhauser, and as the infantry entered the 

 thicket, arjd the cavalry drew near, they were hid all 

 at once, with the trees, in a thick smoke. Two houses, 

 also, in flames, were seen with the same distinctness^ 

 At sunset the whole phenomenon vanished. As 

 respects the fact, government has taken the evidence of 

 fifty eye witnesses, who have deposed to a universal 

 agreement respecting this most remarkable appearance. 

 Individuals are not wanting who affirm that similar 

 phenomena were observed in former times in this 

 region. As the fact is so well attested as to place the 

 phenomenon beyond the possibility of successful dis- 

 proof, people have not been slow in giving a meaning 

 to it, and in referring it to the great battle of the 

 nations at Birkenbaum, to which the old legend, par- 

 ticularly since 1848, again points." 



J. Macray. 



