2"^ S. VI. 133.. July 17. '58.] NOTES AND QUERIES. 



57 



it is the correct bearing of the writer. Letters, 

 like deeds, are not unfrequently sealed with some 

 signet which may have come into the accidental 

 possession of the writer, and the seal might possi- 

 bly have belonged to the first husband of the 

 bishop's wife.* The Life of Bramhall mentions his 

 beinor born in Yorkshire, and descended of a good 

 and ancient family, but does not partijcularly spe- 

 cify in what county that family was located. 



The following bearings of the Bramhalls, taken 

 from an Heraldic MS. in Queen's College, Oxon., 

 may perhaps interest the querist : — 



" Bromehall. A. a chev. bet. three crosses patte Sa. 

 Bremeall. Az. a lion ramp, le de furshe or. 

 Bromhall. Sa. a lion ramp. or. 



Bromehall. A. a chev. int. 3 crosslets formy fitche sa. 

 Bromhall. Er. on a chief az. a demy lion ramp. or. 

 Bromeall. Az. a lion ramp, with 2 tails or." 



Cii. Hopper. 



Paintings of Christ bearing the Cross (2°'* S. v. 

 378. 424. 505.) — There is a small painting of this 

 subject in the Louvre by Paul Veronese, and thus 

 noticed in the Catalogue, Paris, 1852 : — 



" Jesus-Christ ^ur le Chemin du Calvaire : — 



" Le Christ succombe sous le poids de la croix que 



denx bourreaux soutiennent. Plus loin, la Vierge eva- 



nouie dans les bras de Marie Madeleine. Dans le fond, la 



vilie de Jerusalem." 



" Collection de Louis XVI. Ce precieux tableau n'est 



qu'ebauch^ dans certaines parties." 



A faithful copy of this picture forms an altar- 

 piece in the parish church of St. Mary, Bocking, 

 Essex. W. H. F. 



A Geological Inquiry (2"'* S. vi. 31.) — In reply 

 to your correspondent W. K. in your last number, 

 I beg to refer him to a most elaborate and valuable 

 ethnological work published in America, and 

 entitled Types of Mankind or Ethnological Re- 

 searches based upon the Ancient Monuments, Paint- 

 ings, Sculptures, and Crania of Races, and upon 

 their Natural, Geographical, Philological, and Bi- 

 blical History, illustrated by selections from the 

 inedited Papers of T. G. Morton, M.D., by J. C. 

 Nott and Geo. R. Gliddon. London, Triibner 

 and Co. In this work the subject of — "Have 

 fossil human bones been found ?" is most fully dis- 

 cussed, and clearly demonstrated that such have 

 been found. The passage quoted by W. K. is thus 

 alluded to — 



"From these data it appears that the human race,ex- 

 isted in the Delta of the Mississippi more than .57,000 

 years ago ; and the ten subterranean forest."!, with the one 

 now growing, establish tliat an exuberant flora existed 

 in Louisiana more than 100,000 years earlier; so that 

 150,000 years ago the Mississippi laved the magnificent 



* By the Rfformatinn of the Ecdedastical Laws drawn 

 np"in King Kdw. VI. 's reign, it was appointed that the 

 seal of a ilead man should be defaced. This is now in 

 force in case of a bi.thop's death, when his episcopal seal 

 is broken in the presence of the archbishop of the province 

 (vide a curious treatise on seals by Lewis). 



cypress forests with its turbid waters." (Dowle's Tableav.r 

 of New Orleans.) 



For farther information on this most interest- 

 ing inquiry, I would refer your correspondent to 

 Mantel!, Petrifactions and their Teachings, 1817, 

 pp. 464. 483. ; ib. Wonders of Geology, Lond., 

 12mo., 6th edit., 1848, pp. 86-90. 258-9. : ih. Me- 

 dals of Creation, Lond., 12mo., 1844, pp. 861-3.; 

 Martin, Nat. Hist, of Mammiferous Animals, Man, 

 and Monkeys, Lond. 8vo., 1841, pp. 332-6. 354-7. 



From the above-mentioned works, anil espe- 

 cially the American one, he will obtain all that has 

 been collected up to the present time bearing on 

 this intensely interesting inquiry. 



J. W. G. GuTcii. 



Weston-Super-Mare. 



On the subject of the discovery of human re- 

 mains by geological research, W. K. will find a 

 scientific article in the Revue des Deux Mondes, 

 March 1, 1858, by E. Littre, entitled Histoire Pri- 

 mitive. T, J. BUCKTON. 



Lichfield. 



" Whipultre" (2"^ S. vi. 38.) — Whether F. C. 

 H. is right or not in supposing that the holly 

 is the "whipultre" because "whip-handles" or 

 " whip-poles " are made from it when young, I 

 do not know ; but there is an agricultural imple- 

 ment or article, whose name ought to be accounted 

 for : it is called a " whippletree " (see Royal Agri- 

 cultural Society's Catalogue, Chelmsford show, 

 1856, p. 310.). It is thus used — when a pair of 

 horses are harnessed to a plough, abreast, the 

 traces of each horse are hooked to the ends of two 

 cross-bars, about three feet long, being linked at 

 their middle to the ends of another strong bar, the 

 centre of which is attached to the plough. These 

 cross-bars are called " wliippletrees " or " Hem- 

 pletrees." I do not know that they have any 

 connexion with the holly-tree or its wood. In Nor- 

 folk and Suffolk the holly-tree is called "Christ- 

 mas " from its berries being used at Christmas ijnie 

 to dress up church-windows, &c. In the snnie 

 counties a fence formed of holly, planted close, 

 and clipped, is called a " Hulver-hedge." (O.) 3. 



I am happy to confirm the opinion of F. C. II. 

 respecting " whipultre " from Chaucer ; for I re- 

 member when at Grafton in Canada, nine years 

 ago, being shown a piece of wood, which is there 

 called " whippletree," and it corresponded with our 

 holly. The village was settled by N. E. Loyalists, 

 whose descendants retain many old English words 

 now obsolete in the metropolis. J. Mackintosit. 



The Amber Trade of Antiquity (2"* S. vi.l.) — 

 Sir G. C. Lewis, in his learned note on this sub- 

 ject, says, "there is no mention of amber in the 

 Old Testament" (ante, p. 3.). This seems to be 

 an oversight, for the word occurs twice at least. 

 See Ezekiel i. 4. and viii. 2., where certain appear- 



