It is a very old "Joe," but worth repeating, that "one of our young men was told off" " by a daily paper to "do" in hot haste an article upon Chinese metaphysics, and, knowing less than nothing upon the subject, was shut up in the editor's 's room, with ample store of books of reference on the shelves about him, and bidden to look up in an encyclopædia C, for China, and M, for metaphysics, and then to "combine the information."

On some such principle surely must an article upon Horsemonger Lane Gaol, appearing lately in a daily contemporary, have been written. The writer begins with deploring that an agitation in favour of converting the site of the doomed prison into a recreation ground has failed in its object. So far so good. But he commences to blunder when he assumes, in fine language, to describe the execution of Colonel Despard and his "companions in treason" in 1803. Our instructor is evidently under the impression that the unhappy colonel enjoyed (?) the melancholy privilege of a peer of the realm, and, by way of distinction from his wretched fellow convicts, suffered death by decapitation.* The solemn accessories of the blackdraped scaffold, the hollowed-out block, the saw

"A faint flicker of romance, it is true, shoots up from its [.e. the prison's] record as we come across the name of Colonel Marcus Despard among its inmates, for, after all, there is a kind of dignity attachable to the crime of high treason and to a career that ends in death, not from the hangman's rope, but the headsman's are. Yet Marcus Despard, except that he was a traitor, and was beheaded in 1808 [sic], has little or no interest for us in these days. He and his half-dozen accomplices," &c. -Extract from article; the italics are my own.

dust, the masked headsman, the hearse in waiting, seem to have been present to the writer's vivid imagination, whereas, in prosaic fact, the culprit was tucked up," with his six miserable companions, by an ordinary Jack Ketch, who did not condescend to disguise his honest "mug" by any visor of crape or otherwise, and disdained to conceal his national knee-shorts and "white cotton stockings" beneath any medieval disguise of a bourreau. It is true that Despard and his fellow plotters were decapitated, but it was after death, and not before it, which makes all the difference, and the operation was performed, as has been usual in all such sad cases for the last hundred years, not by the public executioner, but by a surgical professor, specially retained by the Government for the purpose. I have before me as I write a contemporary engraving, taken from an actual drawing made on the spot, of the unfortunate Colonel as he stands tied up to the fatal beam, pinioned, and addressing the spectators; and the particulars of the execution I have frequently heard from the lips of an actual eyewitness. The seven men executed had been dead for half an hour before their heads were severed from their bodies. My criticism may appear trivial; it may even seem to be hypercritical to point out that in the same article Leigh Hunt's well-known squib-sufficiently celebrated, one would have thought, to have escaped misquotation-appears as calling the Prince Regent "a fat Adonis of forty," whereas the merest elementary knowledge of modern history would have saved a writer of ordinary intelligence from making such a blunder of ten years, George IV. having been born in 1762 and Leigh Hunt's prosecution having been carried on to a conviction in 1810. I remember perusing an article the other day-I think it was upon the subject of baths and washhouses-in which I counted forty-four proper names, ranging from Enoch and Moses, through Aristotle, Plato, Nostradamus, John, Duke of Marlborough, and Horatio, Viscount Nelson, down to Ned Wright, the converted burglar. I have only time, and probably you have hardly space, to denounce the silly affectation of these word-spinners in alluding to " one William Shakespeare," a certain Arthur Wellesley, who afterwards became not altogether unknown to fame as the Duke of Wellington or the Iron Duke." It may, or may not, be your métier to flagellate such needless inversions and perversions, but I entertain a very strong opinion that it is your duty to place upon record misstatements of fact in the materials that are to-day making history. Journals like yours must, if necessary-and it would appear sometimes to be necessary-boldly correct those who assume to pose as our teachers, or else Quis custodiet ipsos custodes? S. P. Temple.

THE PUBLICATION OF CHURCH REGISTERS.About three years ago some interesting correspondence appeared in "N. & Q." under the above title, a result being the formation of the Register Section of the Harleian Society, under whose auspices the publication of the London registers has commenced. About 200 members subscribe to this section, enabling one register to be transcribed, printed, and published annually, which is but a very small beginning for a work of such importance and magnitude, and unless further help is given the publication must necessarily be confined to the registers of a few parishes of historical interest, while the general publication of the registers of the whole kingdom (the final object in view) is quite a forlorn hope. Some more comprehensive scheme is clearly desirable, but what form it should take is difficult to decide. During the discussion of the subject in these columns it was suggested that the transcription of the registers should be made by the Government. This would be all very well if the Government took the same view, but, seeing the large majority of uninterested persons who would exercise their vote, the success of this proposal is not very probable. A rider on this proposition was that the transcripts of the registers should be concentrated in their respective counties in preference to London, and in this suggestion I think we have a clue to a convenient and economical scheme. In making genealogical inquiries respecting any family or person, it is generally necessary to visit the county to which the family belonged, and it would be convenient if in the principal town of that county the originals or transcripts of all the parish registers could be searched. A central society would be unable to create sufficient local interest for the prosecution of this work, but if each of the county archæological societies were to have a register section, similar to that of the Harleian Society, with an annual subscription of, say, one guinea until the transcriptions were completed, I consider that the work would progress rapidly and satisfactorily, as the contributions in each case would come from those directly interested.

I suggest that the work of transcription be first completed with proper indices, and the MSS. deposited in the Free Library of the town, or other safe and suitable custody. For genealogical purposes this would be sufficient, as a volume once referred to is of no further use for that particular search, and it would avoid the heavy cost which printing entails; but should the funds be sufficient, the more important registers might of course be published. It is of paramount importance, to my mind, that the transcripts should be complete, verb. et lit., and continued down to July 1, 1837, when the General Register Office in London was established; the opportunity should also be taken to supplement the registers with the monumental inscriptions, which are of very great assistance to

the genealogist, in consequence of the association of the various members of a family in the inscriptions. There is an objection to terminating the transcripts at the year 1754, as the Harleian Society is doing, because, although one may trace a family back two or three centuries, it may still be desired to find the date or place of baptism, marriage, or burial of an intermediate member of the family in comparatively recent times.

If a register section, having in view the objects I have sketched out, should be formed in Norfolk or Suffolk, I should be glad to become a member and to introduce others.

A MEMBER OF THE HARLEIAN SOCIETY. [See "N. & Q.," 5th S. vi. 484; vii. 9, 89, 131, 239, 290, 429, 459; viii. 53, 152; x. 470, 498, 516; xi. 38, 326, 377. "The Past and Future of Parish Registers" is the heading of an excellent article in the April number of the Church Quarterly Review. We desire to call attention to this paper, because the subject of it is of considerab'e and increasing importance, because it has often of late been mooted in "N. & Q.," and because the paper presents it fully and clearly, and ends with suggestions which, whether accepted or not, have at any rate the merit of being definite and simple. The writer sketches the history of parish registers from 1538 onwards-doing full justice, at starting, to the one undoubtedly good action of Thomas Cromwell's life-and illustrates it by examples which appear to be the result of no small research. He then suggests that the parishes of London and a twelve miles circuit around it might deposit their registers at the Rolls, receiving copies instead; that for the rest of the country, each parish should (and here we fully agree with him) retain its own register, but that competent transcribers, acting (say) under the Society of Antiquaries, should copy each register, and should mark for publication any local entries of importance. We may remark that the "diligent and systematic examination of church records" which this writer justly recommends, would be made more easy to the curious inquirer by a nominal index to each register, which index the village schoolmaster or other such person might be trusted and induced to make, by the aid of a small local subscription.]

"MARKED WITH TAU."-Bishop Andrewes, in a sermon on the text "Remember Lot's wife" (Luke xvii. 32), preached before Queen Elizabeth, March 6, 1594, says, towards the conclusion,"But this reward (saith Ezekiel) is for those, whose foreheads are marked with Tau, which (as Omega in Greek) is the last letter in the Hebrew alphabet, and the mark of consummatum est, among them." The reference is to Ezekiel ix. 4. The LXX in their version make no allusion to any special mark, but translate quite generally dòs Tò onueîov. The Vulgate, on the other hand, has " et signa thau super frontes virorum gementium."

Tertullian, in his treatise against Marcion (bk. iii. 22), says, "Hæc est litera Græcorum Tau, nostra autem T, species crucis."

salem, et notabis signum super frontes," &c. And again, in his treatise Ad Demetrianum he adduces the same text in support of his position that only those can escape the wrath to come "qui renati et signo Christi signati fuerint."

Tertullian, to extract the symbolical meaning he desires from the text, transmutes the Hebrew letter into the Greek Tau, "nostra T"; but, according to Poole's Synopsis Criticorum, in loc., there have been those who have asserted that the Hebrew letter itself had originally the likeness of a cross. This view, according to Poole, is supported by St. Jerome, Pradus, Sanctius, Cornelius a Lapide, and others. Is there any sufficient evidence to justify this assertion? St. Cyprian makes the prophet refer directly to no special mark, but argues from analogy that the "signum" of which he speaks must have been that of the cross.

Pallion Vicarage.

JOHNSON BAILY.

"READ AND RUN : "RUN AND READ."-Has anybody ever noticed the very curious way in which the last words of Habakkuk ii. 2 are comAs the monly, if not universally, misquoted? Authorized Version rightly gives it, the passage is as follows: "Write the vision and make it plain upon tables, that he may run that readeth it." People commonly talk, however, of a thing being made so plain that he who runs may read " it, reversing the proposition; and I believe there is a series of books for railway travellers, no doubt printed in a bold and clear type, that is called "The Run and Read Library." Some may say there is not much difference between the two notions; but clearly there is a good deal. The idea in the original passage is that the vision is to be written so plainly that he who takes it up to read may, as we say, run through it,"--as the Latin Vulgate has it, "Ut percurrat qui legerit eum," and the English Catholic translation, "that he that readeth it may run over it"; while I am sure the popular idea is that the writing or printing in some advertiscments, in letters of a foot high, is to be so large and plain, perhaps as we see it that he who is running, at the top of his speed it may be, will, without stopping, be able to read it with ease a very different sense from the other, although of course the departure from the real meaning of the original passage is more a matter of curiosity than of importance.

E. R.

AN EXTRACT FROM THE REGISTER OF BAPTISMS oF WOOD DALLING, NORFOLK.-I take the opportunity of sending you, if you think it worth preserving in "N. & Q.," a stinging extract from the register of baptisms in the parish of Wood Dalling in this county :

tizatorum, manu meâ expungenda fieri: [sic] in sempiternum: Johan. Hildeyard, Vicarius ibidem, Ecclesiæ Anglicana Filius genuinus Regiæ Majestati vere sub

ditus."

I may observe that this worthy ancestor of mine, who took such offence at what was done, "when," as he in another place states, "Robert Cronshaye was Intruder," was a man of note of his day, for I have a portrait of him in my possession, with a description at the back in the characters of the time: "John Hildeyard, LL.D., one of His Majesty's Justices of the Peace, and Commissary of Norfolke, Prebend of Norwich, Rector of Cawston, and Vicar of Wood Dalling in the Diocese of Norwich. Etatis 46, 1683. J. Linton, Londini."

It might have been added "Rector of Swanington" as well, for his name appears frequently as such in the register books of this parish.

Swanington Rectory, Norwich.

FRED. HILDYARD.

THE NAME "ANTILLES."-Armstrong (Gaelic Dictionary) says: "A great antiquary [no name given] observes that there is a striking resemblance between many words in the Celtic and Darien languages which might give rise to very useful disquisition. Antilles [description given] signifies, says he, "water lands," from an, and tealla, land.' There is certainly much acuteness, and seemingly much truth, in this observation; for it will be found that in many languages the word which signifies island means also water-land." And he then suggests the derivation of insula from undasolum. But the name Antilles would seem to be a Portuguese compound, equivalent to ante insulas. Vieyra writes the name in Portuguese Antilhas; and Pinkerton (vol. xi. p. 398), under "The Island Antilia, called also Septe Ritade," in a note quotes the following from the Portuguese Dictionary of Bluteau, under the head "Antilhas": "Héonome de humas pequeñas ilhas do archipelago da America Meridional assi chamado, como quem dissera ilhas oppostas, ou frontieras as grandes ilhas da America"; which Pinkerton renders, "This is the name of certain small islands of the archipelago of Southern America, so denominated to signify their being opposite to, or limitaneous of, the great islands of America." R. S. CHARNOCK.

Junior Garrick.

THE HOUSE OF COMMONS ANALYZED.-The Times has lately published an analysis of the professions, &c., of the members comprising the newly elected House of Commons. A similar analysis of the successive Parliaments, say, to keep within moderate limits, from June, 1859, to March, 1880, would be both interesting and important, as showing the set of the political tide by the greater or less predominance of various social elements in our representative system at different periods: witness the fact that there are 150 members connected with commerce in the new House. I have been

of the

led to desire such analyses through observing that in 1860 there were upwards of 150 gentlemen of the long robe in the House, against fifty-two now, and that in 1879 at least sixty-one officers and army navy had seats, against thirty-two now. Here my meagre contribution ends. I hope that some one or more of the better qualified correspondents of "N. & Q." will supplement the deficiencies and instruct the ignorance of H. B. P.

FORGED ANTIQUES AT WILTON HOUSE.-Here is a note of an alleged incident in the history of one of the most famous private collections of works of art in England. Perhaps some correspondent can say if there is any truth in the tale, which, of course, refers to Wilton House and Thomas, eighth Earl of Pembroke, who died in 1733. In the Oxford Magazine, 1772, p. 16, is the following part of a letter :—

"Those persons who pretend to understand the works of antiquity are the greatest dupes upon earth, one instance of which I shall endeavour to produce. The late Earl of Pembroke was extravagantly fond of, and thought death there were found, at the bottom of one of his himself a great connoisseur in, antiques, but after his ponds, a great number of statues which he purchased as antiques, and which he afterwards found were fabricated by moderns, buried in the earth, and afterwards dug up as if by accident. I know a person who is now employed hands, that he can prove were dug out of the ruins of in this way, and furnishes statues, made with his own Herculaneum, and have been buried there some hundred years."

0.

"SMELLING THE HAT "" ON ENTERING CHURCH. The usage of "smelling the hat," supposed to be of modern Protestant origin, may be shown to be ancient. The term is derived from a little boy in Punch asking his father why gentlemen "smelled their hats" on going into church.

this continual pain, that it was all I could do, when "And after a good while I grew so infirm, through Assumption Day came, to venture to go and sit down to hear a sermon. And as I put my hat before my eyes, I fell into a swoon from very weakness," &c.-From MS. of Rulman Merswin, one of the "Friends of God," or troductory Notice" to John Tauler's Life and Sermons, mystics of the fourteenth century, extracted from "Inedited by Susanna Winkworth, p. 148.

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"And when the Master [John Tauler] came and saw that there was such a multitude, he went up into a pulpit in a high place, that they might hear him all the better. Then he held his hood before his eyes, and said, 'O merciful Eternal God,""&c.-From "The History and Life of Dr. John Tauler" (the eminent preacher of the fourteenth century, also one of the German mystics called "Friends of God"), a MS. translated in the above-mentioned book of Susanna Winkworth, 1857, p. 49. J. T. F.

Bp. Hatfield's Hall, Durham.

DEEDS RELATING TO CO. CORK.-Among deeds sold this year by James Coleman, Tottenham, are No. 359, from Sovereign of Kinsale, 1622, to