2nd S, No 21., May 24. °56.] 
NOTES AND QUERIES. 
419 
British interests, was pensioned by our govern- 
ment. By the subjoined extract from a lively 
work entitled A Transport Voyage to Mauritius, 
1851, he will see it asserted that Napoleon not 
only pensioned him, but tried, unsuccessfully of 
course, to apply his rare qualification nearer 
home: 
“On the right hand side of the town (Port Louis), 
viewed from the sea, is the mountain of Morne Fortunée, 
on which is the signal station. It was from this spot that 
the celebrated ship-seer, pensioned by Napoleon, made 
his observations. Much has been said and written about 
this extraordinary man, who had undoubtedly the gift of 
seeing vessels at sea long before they were visible to or- 
dinary eyes. That he was so gifted there can be no 
question. It has been proved by many circumstances, 
one only of which I will mention. He one day gave notice 
that he had for some time observed two brigs, keeping 
precisely the same situation as regarded each other, but 
moving under sail, and with such extraordinary equality 
of course, that it was supposed the head of the one must 
have lain close under the quarter of the other, the four 
masts retaining their exact distance from each other. 
The night set in without any other person being able to 
discover any object whatever on the horizon, and the as- 
tonishment of the inhabitants may be conceived when the 
next morning a four-masted American vessel came into 
harbour. There could have been no collusion here, for 
such a vessel had never before been heard of; she was the 
first ever built; and the man very naturally concluded 
that it must have been two brigs he had observed, though 
unable to account for the fact of their so long remaining 
in close company together. The authorities derived sub- 
stantial service from this far-seeing individual, as the 
position of the English cruisers was noted when they con- 
sidered themselves out of sight, and vessels from the har- 
bour were enabled to go to sea in security. The explan- 
ation given was, that he saw an appearance or reflection 
of the vessels in the sky, long before they came upon the 
horizon. When removed to Brest by Napoleon, he at 
once confessed that his powers had left him with the 
change of climate, and he was consequently sent back to 
the Isle of France.” 
I would add, that it must have required a pe- 
euliar eye to discover, as well as a peculiar re- 
fractory atmosphere to produce, the phenomena 
described ; for{ know right well that the invalided 
military functionaries who have had charge of this 
same signal post, in these latter days, have never 
astounded the town below with any such extraor- 
dinary announcements, or established a character 
for prescience ; unless, by-the-bye, when frater- 
nising with their old companions in the barracks 
upon pay day, they have seen double on returning 
to their post, or through consequent fatigue they 
have become oblivious of their Flag Vocabulary. 
Cullet (24 S. i. 377.) —The Essex oyster- 
dredgers call any hard rubbish, oyster shells, 
broken bricks, &c., used to make an artificial, 
bottom for their oyster beds, cultch. Are not cullet 
and cultch something culled or selected from a 
larger quantity? To cull a flock of sheep is to 
take out the culls or the worst, or faulty ones. 
A. Horr Wuire. 
Blood which will not wash out (2"9 S. 1. 374.) — 
Sir Walter Scott, in his Tales of a Grandfather, 
speaking of the murder of Rizzio, and describing 
the scene of this cruel tragedy, mentions that the 
floor near the head of the stair still bears visible 
marks of the blood of the unhappy victim. 
NSE. 
English Pronunciation of Latin (24S. i. 383.) 
—IfR.S. will compare my note with the note, 
p- 151., to which it refers, he will see that I never 
asserted that “the English pronunciation of 
Latin” began at the commencement of the present 
century, but the “ usage which was complained of” 
by E.H.D.D. The English pronunciation of 
Latin existed in the time of Milton, and was very 
much disapproved of by him; but the peculiar 
usage, of which E. H. D. D. complains, did, I be- 
lieve, begin no earlier than I have stated. 
E. C. H. 
Fairfax Correspondence (22 8. i. 337.) —In 
the answer to the Query respecting these letters, 
it should have been stated that the larger portion 
of them came from Mr. Hughes into the hands of 
Mr. Bentley the publisher, by whom they were 
sold by auction at Sotheby and Wilkinson’s in 
June, 1852. A considerable number of the letters 
were purchased for the British Museum, and are 
now bound up, in chronological order, in the 
Add. MS. 18,979. It may be added, that before 
Mr. Bentley bought the mass of this correspond- 
ence, many letters were scattered abroad, and 
passed into the collections of Upcott and others. 
The publication by Bell in 1848 was continued 
by R. Bell in 1849, two vols. 8vo. be 
The Words “ Reason,” §c. (2°98. i. 375.) — 
The author of the work here referred to was the 
Rev. W. Robertson, born in the year 1703 in 
Dublin, where his father, a Scotch linen manu- 
facturer, had settled, and educated at the Uni- 
versity of Glasgow, whence he afterwards obtained 
the diploma of D.D. He was collated to various 
benefices in the church, in Ireland, through the 
friendship of Dr. Hoadly, Bishop of Ferns, and 
was just about to be instituted to a valuable living 
in Killala by a new patron, when an important 
change in his religious opinions led him to refuse 
all further preferment, and shortly afterwards to 
separate from the church, in which he had distin- 
guished himself as a learned, able, and zealous 
minister. This was in the year 1764, and in 
1766 he published, by way of apology, the Aé- 
tempt to explain the words Reason, Substance, Sc. 
In the year 1765 he was nominated by the Com- 
pany of Merchant Taylors, of London, to the 
Mastership of the Free Grammar School at Wol- 
verhampton, in Staffordshire, which he held till 
his death in 1783, having survived his wife and 
his numerggs family of twenty-one children. 
