336 
NOTES AND QUERIES. 
[No. 21. 
John Bull. — Might I beg to ask, through your 
columns, the origin of the name ‘“* John Bull,” as 
applied to Englishmen? I have frequently heard 
the question asked; but I never heard it satis- 
factorily answered. An antiquary once told me 
that it was so applied from the number of Johns 
among our countrymen, and the profusion of bles 
in our language; an explanation which I placed 
to the credit of my friend’s ingenuity. R.F.H. 
REPLIES. 
LETTER ATTRIBUTED TO SIR ROBERT WALPOLE. 
I feel very confident that I once read the letter 
attributed to Sir R. Walpole (No. 19. p. 304.) in 
some magazine, long before I had ever seen Banks’ 
Extinct and Dormant Peerage. My impression is 
also, that I never believed the document to be 
authentic; and that opinion is confirmed by a 
reference to the Correspondence of Horace Walpole, 
vol. i. ed. 1840, and to the journals of the day. I 
find from these authorities, that the first of the 
memorable divisions which drove Sir Robert from 
the helm, took place on the 2ist Jan. 1741-2, when 
Pulteney’s motion for a secret committee was lost 
by three voices only. We are told that the 
speeches were very brilliant, and Sir R. Walpole 
particularly distinguished himself. He might have 
been tormented by his enemies, but not by the 
stone, (the excuse assigned in the letter for his 
inability to attend the king), for Horace left him 
at one o'clock in the morning, after the debate had 
terminated, “ at supper all alive and in spirits,” and 
he even boasted that he was younger than his son. 
The next struggle was on the 28th of Jan., on the 
Chippenham election, when the minister was de- 
feated by one, and his friends advised him to re- 
sign ; but it was not till after the 3rd of Feb., when 
the majority against him upon the renewal of the 
last question had increased to sixteen, that he in- 
timated his intention to retire. These facts, cou- 
pled with the inferences drawn by your corre- 
spondent P.C.§.S. as to the suspicious style of 
the letter, and the imprudence of such a commu- 
nication, go far to prove that it was a forgery: 
but the passage in Walpole’s Reminiscences, vol. i. 
p- evili. ed. 1840, with which I will now conclude 
my remarks, seems to set the question at rest : — 
“ Sir Robert, before he quitted the king, persuaded 
his Majesty to insist, as a preliminary to the change, 
that Mr. Pulteney should go into the House of Lords, 
his great credit lying in the other House: and TJ re- 
member my father's action when he returned from Court, 
and told me what he had done ; ‘ I have turned the hey of 
the closet upon him, making that motion with his hand.” 
BRAYBROOKE. 
Audley End, March 18. 1850. 
PORTRAITS OF ULRICH OF HUTTEN. 
It is pleasant to see that an answer to a query 
can sometimes do more than satisfy a doubt, by 
accidentally touching an accordant note which 
awakens a responsive feeling. Iam much pleased 
that my scanty information was acceptable to 
“R. G.”; and wish it was in my power to give him 
more certain information respecting the portraits 
of Hutten, who is one of my heroes, although I am 
no “ hero-worshipper.” 
The earliest woodcut portrait of him with which 
I am acquainted, is to be found in the very ele- 
gant volume containing the pieces relating to the 
murder of his cousin John, by Ulrich of Wirtem- 
berg (the title too long for these pages), which, 
from the inscription at the end, appears to have 
been printed in the Castle of Stakelberg, in 1519. 
It is a half-length, in a hat, under a kind of portico, 
with two shields at the upper corners: the in- 
scription beneath is in white letters on a black 
ground. It occurs near the end of the volume; in 
which is another spirited woodcut, representing 
the murder. 
The other two cotemporary portraits occur in 
the “‘ Expostulatio,” before noticed. The largest 
of these, at the end of the volume, is in armour, 
crowned with laurel, and holding a sword, looking 
toward the left. This is but indifferently copied, 
or rather followed, in Tobias Stimmer’s rare and 
elegant little volume, Jmagines Viror. Liter. Illust., 
published by Reusner and Jobinus, Argent. 1587, 
12mo. 
I have never seen a good modern representation 
of this remarkable man, who devoted the whole 
energies of his soul to the sacred cause of truth 
and freedom, and the liberation of his country and 
mankind from the trammels of a corrupt and dis- 
solute Church; and, be it remembered, that he and 
Reuchlin were precursors of Luther in the noble 
work, which entitles them to at least a share in 
our gratitude for the unspeakable benefit conferred 
by this glorious emancipation. 
Ebernburg, the fortress of his friend, the noble 
and heroic Franz von Sickingen, Hutten called 
the Bulwark of Righteousness. I had long sought 
for a representation of Sickingen, and at length 
found a medal represented in the Sylloge Numis- 
matum Elegantiorum of Luckius, fol. Argent. 1620, 
bearing the date 1522. 
Hutten’s life is full of romantic incident: it was 
one of toil and pain, for the most part; and he 
may well have compared his wanderings to those 
of Ulysses, as he seems to have done in the follow- 
ing verses, which accompany the portrait first 
above mentioned : — 
“ Desine fortunam miseris inimicaque fata 
Objicere, et casus velle putare deos. 
Jactatur pius Aineas, jactatur Ulysses, 
Per mare, per terras, hic bonus, ille pius. 
Crede mihi non sunt meritis sua premia, casu 
Volvimur, haud malus est, cui mala proveniunt. 
Sis miser, et nulli miserabilis, omnia quisquis 
A diis pro merito cuique venire putas.” 
