Sept. 27. 1851.] 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



235 



That Scotland was able for so many centuries 

 to defend her liberties and independence against 

 the powerful kingdom of England, does her great 

 honour. There is no problem of more difficult 

 solution than this : AVhat might have happened, 

 if some other great event had happened otherwise 

 than it did ? When England had overcome the 

 kingilom of France, if Scotland had not afforded 

 the means of annoyance to England, the seat of 

 government might ,have been removed to France, 

 and the great English nation have been absoi-bed 

 in that country : but Providence ruled otherwise ; 

 England lost her dominion in France, and Scot- 

 land remained independent. 



SCOTUS OCTOGENARIUS. 



BOEOTJGH-ENGLTSH. 



(Vol. iv., p. 133.) 



W. Fhazek's Query, which are the towns or 

 districts in England in which Borough-English 

 prevails, or has prevailed, and whether there are 

 any instances on record of its being carried into 

 effect in modern times, would require more know- 

 ledge than any individual can be expected to pos- 

 sess of local customs throughout the country to 

 give a full answer to ; but if all your legal corre- 

 spondents would contribute their quotas of infor- 

 mation on the subject, a very fair list might be 

 made, which would not be uninteresting as illus- 

 trative of this peculiar custom. I do not know 

 any work in which the places where the custom 

 prevails are collected together. But I send you 

 a short list of such manors and places as I know 

 of and have been able to collect, in which the 

 custom of Borough-English is the rule of descent, 

 hoping that other correspondents will add to the 

 list which I have only made a commencement of: — 



Manors and Places where the Custom of Borough- 

 English prevails. 

 The Manor of Lambeth - - ? o 



„ Kenniiigton - - | ' ■'' 



„ Hoo (qy.) - - Kent. 



Reve V. IMaltster, Croke's Reports, Trin. 

 Term, 1 1 Chas. I. 



The Manor of Tottenham - - ?i,t-ji, 



•c. 1 . r Middlesex. 



,, Ji,dmonton - - ^ 



Tennea de la Leg, Kitchin, Co. 102. 



Turiiham Green - . - - Middlesex. 



Forester's Erjuitg Reports, 27G. 



, The Manor of Bray ... Berks. 



Co. Lilt. Sec. 211. 



I am informed that the custom also prevails in 

 some of the Duchy manors in Cornwall, but I 

 cannot at present give you the names. 



I may be able to add to this list in a future 

 communication, and I hope to see in your pages 



some considerable additions to this list from other 

 correspondents. 



As to the continuance of the custom to modern 

 times, nothing can alter it but an act of parlia- 

 ment; so that where the custom has prevailed, it 

 is still the law of descent : and I have had under 

 my notice a descent of copyhold property, in the 

 manors of Lambeth and Kennington, to the 

 youngest brother within the present century. 



G. R. C. 



There is a farm of about a hundred acres in the 

 parish of SuUescombe in Sussex, which is held by 

 this tenure ; but whether the adjoining land is so, 

 I am not aware. In case of the owner dying in- 

 testate, the land would go to the younger son ; but 

 I am not aware of an instance of this having 

 occurred, E. H. Y. 



PENDULUM DEMONSTRATION Or THE EARTH S 

 ROTATION. 



(Vol. iv., pp. 129. 177.) 



Your correspondent A. E. B. appears, by his 

 suggestion regarding Foucault's theory, to have 

 rendered confusion worse confounded, mystery 

 more mysterious. He says : 



" If the propounders of this theory had from the first 

 explained, that they do not claim for the plane of os- 

 cillation an exemption from the general rotation of the 

 earth, but only the difference of rotation due to ttie 

 excess of velocity with which one extremity of the, 

 line of oscillation may be affected more than the other, 

 it would have saved a world of fruitless conjecture and 

 misunderstanding." 



This supposition makes an effect, which it is dif- 

 ficult to believe in, into one utterly impossible to 

 conceive. It is hard enough to credit the theory, 

 that the plane of oscillation of a pendulum is par- 

 tially independent of the rotatory motion of the 

 earth, but still not impossible, considering that the 

 effect of the presumed cause is not inconsistent with 

 the results of a priori calculation. For instance, 

 during the swing of a two-seconds pendulum, the 

 angular motion of the earth will have been 1', or 

 thereabouts, which, supposing the oscillation to 

 be independent, would produce an appreciable 

 angle on an index circle placed concentric with 

 the pendulum, and at right angles to its plane of 

 oscillation. 



But as to A. E. B.'s theory, which supposes the 

 variation of the pendulum's plane to be " due to 

 the excess of velocity with which one extremity of 

 the line of oscillation may be affected more than 

 the other," it appears to me quite untenable for a 

 moment. Let him reduce it to paper, and find 

 what difference of velocity there is on the earth's 

 surface at the two ends of a line of ten feet, tlie 

 assumed length of the arc of a two-seconds peiulii- 

 lum, — a larger one, I presume, than that used by 



