Qnd §, No 16., Aprit 19. 56.4 
NOTES AND QUERIES. 
311 
If this plan had been carried into execution, 
Germany would have probably been deprived of 
an author belonging (as he himself said) to the 
sphere of a world-literature. D. J. Lotsxry. 
15. Gower Street. 
Early Revolvers. — 
“« After dinner was brought to Sir W. Compton a gun 
to discharge seven times: the best of all devices that 
ever I saw, and very serviceable, and not a bauble, for it 
is much approved of, and many therefore made.”—-Pepys’ 
Diary, July 3. 1662. 
“There are several people trying a new-fashion gun, 
brought my Lord Peterborough this morning, to shoot 
off often, one after another, without trouble or danger.”— 
Ibid., March 4, 1664. 
Mackenzie Watcortt, M.A. 
The Oath of Abjuration.—As this subject is 
now under discussion, I send you a note taken 
from a pamphlet, entituled Maynooth, its Sayings 
and Doings, by the Rev. R. J. M‘Ghee, and pub- 
lished recently by Shaw. He says: 
“ Let those who talk of the extinction of the Stuarts 
attend to the following facts: —In that remarkable book, 
Hibernia Dominicana, a history of Ireland of the Order 
of Dominican monks, which, in the title page, is said to 
be printed at Cologne in the year 1762, but which was 
printed by Edward Finn at Kilkenny, written by Thomas 
de Burgh, Roman Catholic bishop of Ossory, there are 
(pp. 513, 514.) the letters of appointment of this same 
Thomas de Burgh to that bishopric by Clement XIII. 
In this work, in the seventh chapter, which has in most 
copies been suppressed, but which is in the copy in my 
possession (p. 148.), the author states the succession o? 
the House of Hanover, and mentions the accession of 
George III., which was two years before the book was 
printed. He states that the heirs of Sophia of Hanover 
were placed on the British throne, as being nearest of 
kin to the family of the Stuarts who were Protestant. 
‘ But,’ says this writer, ‘there are fifty and more Catholic 
princes of either sex who enjoy the right of nearer blood 
to the Stuarts, which that most accurate genealogical tree 
of celebrated lineage which I hold in my hands distinctly 
exhibits.’ He gives in proof the affinities in the lines of 
Sardinia, France, Spain, &c.” 
Cuares ReEep. 
Paternoster Row. 
Passage in Heywood. —The recent editor of 
Lamb's English Dramatic Poets, for Bohn’s Clas- 
sical Library, does not notice that the idea in the 
passage from Heywood (p. 104.) is borrowed from 
Atheneus, 1. § 5. p. 37 b., where we find that a 
house at Agrigentum was called the Trireme 
from a circumstance similar to that in Heywood. 
P. J. F. Ganritron. 
Take care of old Books. — We may owe some- 
thing to the following canon of the Third Council 
of Constantinople in 719 : 
“That nobody whatever be allowed to injure the book 
of the Old and New Testament, or those of our holy 
preachers and doctors; nor to cut them up; nor to give 
them to dealers in books, or perfumers or any other person 
to be erased, except they have been rendered useless by 
moths, or water, or in some other way. He who shall do 
any such thing, shall be excommunicated for one year.” 
B. H. C. 
Legislation for Ladies’ Dresses in the Olden 
Time.—By the following extracts, taken from 
Brook's History of Medford, it would appear that 
the good people of Massachusetts, more than two 
centuries ago, were compelled to make some 
severe laws, for the purpose of preventing the 
ladies of their families from dressing in an extra- 
vagant manner. From these singular public ex- 
posures, it is very evident that the fathers of the 
colony did not have any respectful deference paid 
to their wishes at home when fashion was con- 
cerned ; and hence their legislation on this subject, 
which is thus recorded in the legal acts of the 
time. 
Under date of September 3, 1634, the General 
Court said : 
“ That no person, either man or woman, shall hereafter 
make or buy any apparel, either woollen, silk, or linen, 
with any lace on it, silver, gold, silk, or thread, under the 
penalty of forfeiture of said clothes. Also all gold or silver 
girdles, hat bands, belts, ruffs, beaver hats, are prohibited, 
Also immoderate great sleeves, slashed apparel, immode- 
rate great rayles, longwing,” &c. 
The lawgivers of the colony, having thus effec- 
tually prevented the extravagance of their wives 
in articles of dress, next turned their attention to 
the fashion which should positively regulate the 
length and width of the sleeves of their garments. 
On September 9, 1639, the General Court de- 
creed, that — 
“ Hereafter, no garment shall be made with short sleeves, 
whereby the nakedness of the arm shall be discovered in 
the wearing thereof; and hereafter, no person whatever 
shall make any garment for women, or any of their sex, 
with sleeves more than half an ell wide in the widest 
part thereof, and so proportionally for bigger or smaller 
persons.” 
As the Puritan mothers of New England had 
not been long in this country when the first de- 
cree respecting their dress was made public, might 
I ask what is the meaning of the words great 
‘“rayles” and ““longwing,” as applied to their gar- 
ments ? ARF 
Malta. 
[A rayle, or rail, is a garment of fine linen formerly 
worn by women round the neck. “Rayle for a woman’s 
necke, crevechief, en quarttre doubles” (Palsgrave). “ Any 
thing worne about the throat or necke, as a neck-kercher, 
a partlet, a raile” (Florio, p. 216.). The night-rail seems 
to have been of a different kind, and to have partially 
covered the head (Halliwell’s Dictionary). See also Bp. 
Corbet’s Poems, “ To the Ladyes of the New Dresse, that 
weare their Gorgets and Rayles downe to their Wastes ;” 
“The Ladies’ Answer;” and “Corbet’s Reply.” Long- 
wing is an unregistered word. } 
James Moffitt, M.D.—Died — 
“On the 6th inst., at Devonport, after a long illness, 
James Moffitt, Esq., M.D., first class surgeon. He served 
