Queries with Auswers.

SKELP.-This word is used both as a verb and

noun in the Border dialect of Scotland. To skelp is to beat, or rather to slap; and "he has got his skelps" is well known to the school-boy who has witnessed his comrade punished by stripes on his hand with the taws-otherwise, from the locality of the infliction, denominated his palmies. Whence, and what about this word (which an instructed etymologist ought to have at his fingers' ends); and has it any relation to the red Indian's scalp, in America? or has it any affinity to scult, scultsa similar epithet for the administration of " pawmies"? Palmam qui meruit ferat! BUSHEY HEATH.

[This is certainly a very puzzling word, chiefly from the numerous secondary significations in which it is used. Its radical meaning is that given by Jamieson in his Dictionary as No. 1: "To strike with the open hand. It properly denotes the chastisement inflicted on the breech." No one ever heard of a skelp on the lug, which negatives any connection with the scalp.

When he adds, as No. 2: "Sometimes it signifies to flog the buttocks by means of a lash," he falls into one of the few errors contained in his valuable book. His authorities in no way support any such idea.

The first is from the Popular Ballads, i. 395:—

'He's whirled aff the gude weather's skin,

And wrappit the dandily lady therein;

'I darena pay you for your gentle kin,
But weel may I skelp my weather's skin.""

Pay is well known Scotch for beating. This he cannot, for fear of her gentle kin, inflict upon the lady, but he rolls her in his sheep-skin, and then proceeds to the chastisement. If this had been done with a lash, the skin would have been a complete protection as effectual as the schoolboy's copy-book; but it would not be so against the skelp of a strong man's open hand.

The second is from Allan Ramsay:

uses of the word. It is generalised as a blow of any kind. Sir David Lindsay says of the battle of Pinkey: "and laid on skelp for skelp." It is used metaphorically in the case of any misfortune, in the same way as we at present talk of a severe blow.

A laddie will say he has been skelpit, whether the taws has been applied in the form of a regular palmie, or laid across any other part of his body-a process that often occurs if he does not hold out firm, but shirks the blow, which in consequence descends on the inflicting master's legs.

We are inclined to derive skelp, as Jamieson has done, from the Danish, or rather Icelandic, shelf, which he states is used in the same sense. He mentions scud and

scult as synonymous, but we have never met them in colloquial parlance, on the Scotch border or elsewhere.]

SYMBOLS. Monsieur C. Lamière has received a gold medal from the Commissioners of the late Paris Exhibition, for some designs. Amongst them is one representing the four heathen divinities over which Christianity has triumphed, namely, Jupiter for Europe, Buddha for Asia, Isis for Africa, and Huitzilopuchtli for America. Can you or your several learned readers give me the history of this god with the almost unpronounceable name, quite worthy of low Yankee phraseology? EBORACUM.

[Huitzilopotchli is the Mexican Mars, the patron deity of the Aztecs. The tradition respecting the origin of this sanguinary monster, or, at least, his appearance on this earth, is somewhat curious. His mother, a devout person, one day in her attendance on the temple, saw a ball of bright-coloured feathers floating in the air. She took it, and deposited it in her bosom. She soon after found herself pregnant, and the dread deity was born, coming into the world like Minerva, all armed, with a spear in the right hand, a shield in the left, and his head surmounted by a crest of green plumes. (See Clavigero, Stor. del Messico, ii. 19.) The colossal image of this terrible deity was loaded with costly ornaments. His temples were the most stately and august of the public edifices; and his altars reeked with the blood of human hecatombs in every city of the empire. His countenance was distorted into hideous lineaments of symbolical import. In his right hand he wielded a bow, and in his left a bunch of golden arrows, which a mystic legend had connected with the victories of his people. The huge folds of a serpent, consisting of pearls and precious stones, were coiled round his waist, and the same rich materials were profusely sprinkled over his person. On

That is, madly frightened.

No one, however, who has seen the "Gentle Shepherd " performed, ever saw these females lay on with cartwhips. The fun is, that they content themselves with their "ain braid loofs."

tumbled him, in the presence of the horror-struck Aztecs, down the steps of the teocalli. See more respecting this deity in Prescott's Conquest of Mexico, 3 vols. Lond. 1843, 8vo.]

STYLE OF THE EMPEROR OF AUSTRIA.

- The

Emperor of Austria is styled "His Imperial Royal Apostolic Majesty." Imperial as Emperor of Germany, Royal as King of Hungary-but why Apostolic? SEBASTIAN.

[The title of Apostolic Majesty was granted to St. Stephen, the first king of Hungary. He was the son of Geisa, Duke of Hungary, and was born in Gran in the year 979. In his early youth he bore the name of Vaik or Wait. When the Bohemian Bishop Adelbert arrived in Hungary to convert the pagans to Christianity, the young prince became his pupil, and after his betrothal to Gisela, sister of the Duke of Bavaria, he was baptised under the name of Stephen. On being firmly established in his kingdom after his victories over his subjects, who had rebelled against him for embracing the Christian faith, he sent an embassy to Rome to have his dukedom changed into a kingdom. Pope Sylvester II., willing to gratify so zealous a servant of the church, replied to his ambassadors, "I am called 'The Apostolic,' but your prince, who through Christ has gained a great people, is truly an Apostle." The pope not only granted the kingdom to Stephen and his heirs, but gave him permission to have the patriarchal cross borne before him, as a sign of his apostolic mission. With the cross Pope Sylvester sent him a crown of gold, symbolical of his royal jurisdiction, which is still preserved in the royal chapel in Buda.* Hence the title of "Apostolic Majesty" has descended to the Emperors of Austria as representatives, through the female line, of the kings of Hungary, when they became extinct in that of the male. For an interesting account of St. Stephen, consult Alban Butler's Lives of the Saints, Sept. 2nd.]

DOMESDAY.-Has a facsimile or reprint of the Domesday Book been lately (within the last year or two) published, in one volume ?

R. H. ROBINSON.

It

Domesday has lately been reproduced in facsimile by the photo-zincographic process by the officers of the Ordnance Survey, under the authority of the Government. forms two volumes like the original; the larger, or great Domesday Book, is a folio of 700 pages; the smaller is a largé 8vo volume of 900 pages, containing the counties of Norfolk, Suffolk, and Essex. These two contain the

census of the kingdom, made up from each county of England, excepting the four northern counties, Northumberland, Cumberland, Westmoreland, and Durham. These volumes, or the counties separately, may be had from Mr. Stanford, of Charing Cross, who is the appointed agent for the sale of the Ordnance Survey and similar works.]

It is almost unnecessary to add, that the arches of King Stephen's crown are of a much later period. Vide "N. & Q." 1st S. xi. 379.

Replies.

QUEEN BLEAREYE'S TOMB: PAISLEY ABBEY.

(4th S. i. 309.)

There is a very beautiful drawing of this tomb, and of the side chapel in which it stands, locally called "The Sounding Aisle," in the 2nd volume of Billings and Burn's Baronial and Ecclesiastical Antiquities of Scotland. The head of the sarcophagus, and of the canopy over the recumbent figure, are distinctly shown. ESPEDARE has accurately described the two shields on either side of the centre one. This last appears to exhibit, as he says, two keys in saltire; but there is besides, in the middle of the shield, what appears to be a sword in pale, handle at the base (or, possibly, a crosier reversed); and the supposed "crosier en pale," rising from the handle of each key, is more like part of the link of a chain attached to each. Mr. Billings considers the sculpture of the crucifixion to be of later date than the others. It is strange to find an antiquary asking an explanation of "J. N. R. I.”—“Jesus Nazarenus Rex ille Judæorum," as in the Vulgate (St. John, xix. 19).

Your correspondent asks: 1. To what families these three shields point? 2. Which is the principal one? and 3. If the charges on the centre are those of an ecclesiastic, and on the side shields of laics? As these materially affect the date of the tomb, one would have liked, before answering them, to have been assured that the tomb had remained intact, ab origine, in its present site. This, however, is known not to be the case, as the chapel was not erected till the close of the fifteenth century; while the tomb, which is said to be of the architecture of the fourteenth, was removed, with the supposed relics of the Princess, by an Earl of Abercorn about 1770 to its present site (Crawfurd's Renfrewshire, ed. 1782, p. 292), from one which has apparently been forgotten: possibly from the ruined choir, the ornaments of which coincide with those on the panels of the tomb. Mr. Billings says that "many parts of the sculpture have been repaired"; that it seems to and "the whole being covered with a thick coat have been in a very fragmentary state in 1820"; of stone-coloured paint, it would now (1849) be difficult to distinguish the parts which have been have originally belonged to it, or, at all events, supplied." Besides, these several shields may not not occupied the same relative position (as now) worthy incumbent of the Abbey Church. Taking when disinterred, as we are told, in 1788, by the them, however, as they stand, the centre one, in the post of honour, symbolises, I should fancy, an ecclesiastic. That on the dexter, next in rank, appears to be the bearing of Hamilton of Innerwick-the earliest cadet of the Hamilton family,

who is said to have added the fesse cheque to his paternal cinquefoils in consequence of marrying the heiress of a Stewart of Cruxton. Now, wherever this Cruxton may have been situated, it is, I feel pretty certain, not the Crocstoun or Crookstoun of the Darnley Stewarts, for this reason:The first of this latter family acquired these estates in the thirteenth century by marriage with the heiress of a Croc, descended from one of the Shropshire followers of the first High Steward, and they remained with the Stewarts of Darnley, and their successors the Earls and Dukes of Lennox, till the last duke sold them in the seventeenth century to the family of Montrose; from whom the Cruikstoun estate came, by purchase in the eighteenth, to the Maxwells of Pollock.

May the fesse cheque not have been taken by Sir Alexander Hamilton, second of Innerwick, who appears as the husband in 1389 of Elizabeth Stewart, younger sister of Margaret Stewart, Countess of Angus, and whose wife was next heir to the Angus estate, failing George first (Douglas) Earl of Angus, the countess's bastard son, and the heirs of his body, in honour of that alliance and possible heirship? (See "N. & Q.," 3rd S. ix. 515.) At any rate these Hamiltons, though close allies of the Stewarts of Darnley, never acquired the latter's estate of Cruikstoun by marriage; so the fesse cheque must be accounted for on some other hypothesis.

The remaining shield, on the sinister side, seems to be that of the Stewarts of Blackhall, whose ancestor was a natural son of Robert III., and bore the fesse cheque, surmounted by the lion rampant. If this shield is now in situ, this fixes the date of the tomb at a period not earlier than the reign of Robert III. The first Stewart of Blackhall is generally called "John," and said to have received the lands from his royal parent in 1396. There is, however, in the Great Seal Register (No. 51, p. 213), a grant by this king, of date Feb. 8, 1393, to "Sir Murdoc Stewart, Knight" (afterwards the unfortunate Albany), during the lifetime of David Stewart, Earl of Carrick (the still more unhappy Rothesay), the king's eldest son, of one hundred marks annually from the customs of Aberdeen; which, in the event of the young prince's death, is to devolve on the king's [natural] son, "Sir Robert Stewart, Knight." And immediately following is a similar charter by the king, of the same date, to his "dearest brother Robert, Earl of Fife and Menteith" (the Regent Albany), of two hundred marks annually from the customs of Linlithgow and Cupar; which, on the Earl of Carrick's death, is to be enjoyed by the above Sir Robert. These singular grants seem bribes by the king to his brother and nephew, to bespeak their protection for his unhappy son and heir. As is matter of history, the Albanys were accused of his murder at Falkland Palace

eight years afterwards. This king (unlike his father Robert II., who had many bastards,) is not known to have had more than one. Robert III., as is known, discarded his baptismal name of "John" for the "felix et faustum nomen " borne by his heroic great-grandfather, and possibly his natural son followed his example. These remarks are offered as a humble contribution towards the interesting question of the date of this celebrated tomb, which, assuming the armorial shields to have always formed part of it, must be seventy or eighty years after the death of Marjory Bruce. These, however, seem in no way to allude to her history, and may therefore be the addition of a later age to the recumbent female figure. ANGLO-SCOTUS.

QUAKERS.

(4th S. i. 222.)

I can hardly suppose that the number mentioned in the quotation given under the signature NOELL RADECLIFFE, as those imprisoned at one time, large as it is-fifteen thousand-is much or at all exaggerated. In the unhappy days of Charles II., when all nonconformists were liable to suffer, persecution fell by far the most heavily on the Quakers; for they alone were marked out so as to be at once distinguished. Also it must. be remembered that in that day, before they had any discipline established amongst them, their numbers were vastly greater than they ever have been since.

:

But it would be a great mistake to suppose that the persecution of the Quakers commenced under restored Episcopacy for then what had been begun by the Independents was simply continued and carried out, in great part, by means of new laws. Under Cromwell, the number of Quakers imprisoned in England is said to have been four thousand-of these, not a few suffered this penalty for nonpayment of tithes for whatever Independents may now profess as to endowments and establishments, when they could they took to the uttermost the benefit of both.

In New England, however, the Independents put the Quakers to death for no reason except their nonconformity from the doctrines and practices of those who had there sought liberty of conscience-a work of persecution in which some of the pilgrim-fathers of forty years before were themselves engaged. The restoration of Charles II, had the effect of hindering the Independent emigrants from continuing to put other nonconformists to death. If liberty of conscience is now held by the Independents, it was not the case then. When they had power to persecute, they pleased themselves by using it. This they did in their public acts, though the private opinions of individuals were certainly far better.

The reference to the New England persecutions by Orme, in his Memoirs of Dr. Owen (chap. xi.), is very curious. He speaks of the "very oppressive measures," without saying that the Quakers had been put to death; and he notices the whole matter after the English government had interfered for years. He says:

"So contrary to the word of God was their behaviour considered, that on hearing of it, a letter was written by the Independent ministers in London, at the head of whom was Dr. Owen, remonstrating with their brethren, and entreating them to desist from such proceedings (p. 257). 1669, Dr. Mather acknowledges was not attended at the time with all the effects it ought to have produced " (p. 258).

This letter, dated the 25th of March,

The whole account is curious: for it would seem as if the English Independents had not heard of their American brethren persecuting Quakers to the death, until the English government had for some eight years put a stop to their proceedings; and it was when persecuted themselves that they advised their Transatlantic brethren not to persecute.

Mr. Orme tries hard to shift from Independency the guilt of persecution : —

"Consistent Independency is not accountable for anything but what is done by the Churches and their officebearers separately assembled."

But what if Independents have done (or if they do) inconsistent things? The things past remain done, and all the philosophical considerations in the world will not undo them; and if done by Independents, on them rests the responsibility, whether of the blood of Mary Dyer at Boston, or of Charles I.

A writer in "N. & Q." (4th S. i. 254) mentions

how

"the Quakers in the United States have been divided for about forty years into two perfectly distinct bodies-the Orthodox and the Hicksites, the latter being Socinians." How falsely the Hicksites claim to be Quakers at all, is shown by the Trinitarian Confession of Faith in the Act of William and Mary, a copy of which appeared in "N. & Q." some time since. LÆLIUS.

the books were most carefully arranged, and in excellent condition, as far as I was able to judge. I also visited the MSS. department, and was pleased to see what care was taken of those inestimable treasures, amongst which are, (1.) A curious Life of Cardinal Wolsey; (2.) Letters of Gondomar, Spanish Minister to our James I.; (3.) A fine illuminated Missal, date 1315, and another with enamel clasps and exquisite illuminations, which it is believed belonged to the great Isabella I. of Castile; (4.) There are also two copies of the Iliad of the tenth and twelfth centuries, and two vols. of Ancient Councils, in Gothic characters, and illuminated. One is supposed to have been written about the year 976, and is called Codigo Vigilano, from the name of the Monk Vigilia, who copied it; (5.) The Arabic MSS. are numerous, but few Spanish scholars now study this language, as Señor Don Pascual Gayangos assured me; many of the MSS. were unfortunately destroyed in the fire which occurred in 1671. Still the number of MSS. yet remaining amounts, I was told, to 4000.

1859; hence the anecdote about the monk "allowing the Austrian to choose at random a souvenir of the books and manuscripts," &c., is without the slightest foundation in truth. The contains about three hundred students, lay and monastery is now converted into a seminary, which ecclesiastical. The learned rector and professors the students to be ardent and diligent in their seem to be animated with an excellent spirit, and respective studies. Hebrew is taught by a German professor. Padre Claret, the Queen's Confessor, who is quite a literary prelate, is the president of the college. He has published, in a work entitled Miscelánea Interesante (Barcelona, 1865), an official account of the course of studies, the constitutions, privileges, &c. of the college, Lorenzo del Escorial. Spaniards always spell this which is styled in full-El Monasterio de San last word, not as English writers do-Escurial

I believe no monks inhabited the Escorial in

but Escorial.

St. John's, Norwich.

J. DALTON.

LIBRARY OF THE ESCORIAL.
(4th S. i. 340.)

The account respecting the state of the library of the Escorial, said to be related by a certain Austrian ambassador at Athens, cannot be correct, especially as it rests only on the authority of a nameless newspaper, dated May 1859.

I was in Spain in 1859, and again in 1866. During my last visit I spent three most agreeable days at the Escorial, and inspected the library with great interest. Many of the volumes had certainly their cut edges towards the visitor; but

LOW SIDE WINDOWS.

(4th S. i. 364, &c.)

The origin of these windows is, as your correspondent MR. PIGGOT remarks, a vexata quæstio. It was a favourite puzzle for the wits of the Oxford Architectural and Cambridge Camden Societies some thirty years back. A good account of them will be found in Mr. Parker's Glossary of Architecture, i. 294, and in the Archæological Journal, iv. 314.

It is scarcely necessary, after such an exhaustive account of them as will be found in the latter

work, to say much more about them. But a few circumstances concerning them may still be noted.

1. They are low in comparison with the floor of the chancel, not always in comparison with the ground outside. At Prior Crawden's Chapel, Ely, is one about ten feet from the ground. In La Sainte Chapelle, Paris, is another at a still greater height. Another remains at Winchester College.

2. They seem to have been always furnished with shutters, and not glazed.

3. They are found mostly at the west end of the chancel on the south side, but often on the north side; sometimes on both sides; sometimes (as at Kimpton, Hants) in a transept or chantry.

4. They sometimes (as at Elsfield, Oxon, and Allington, Wilts,) have a stone seat and desk formed in the sill inside, as if it were the station of an attendant who was taking some part in the service of the altar.

5. They are rare in Norman work; but from the beginning of the thirteenth century until the end of the fifteenth they are comparatively

common.

MR. PIGGOT will see the theories about these windows duly noticed and disposed of in the article in the Archæological Journal noticed above. But there is one theory which is not noticed there. It is one which was mentioned to me many years ago by (I think) a member of the Oxford Architectural Society, who gave his authority at the time for the statement he then made. I have now forgotten the name of my informant, and the authority cited by him. If this happens to meet his eye, would he kindly communicate with me? What he then stated was that an injunction was issued by certain medieval bishops, ordering that at the elevation of the consecrated elements in any church a bell should be rung in uno latere of the church, for the benefit of such parishioners as through sickness, &c. were unable to be present, but who, being warned by the sound of the bell, might adore (though from a distance) the Adorable Presence. Hence the low side window. In later times the sanctus bell took its place, and I have never noticed both in the same building.

This theory seems to meet, the various peculiarities of these windows cited above. In case of their being in both sides of the chancel, I find that the village lies, or used to lie, on both sides of the church; and as the population was to the north or south of the building, so the window was inserted in the north or south wall. At Kimpton the great house is to the south of the church, and the low side window belonging to its chantry is in the south wall, under the main south window, for the benefit of the sick members of the squire's household.

I must call the special attention of MR. PIGGOT and any others interested in this question to the

low side window at Othery, Somerset. As it is not quite correctly described in the article of the Archeological Journal, I will describe it shortly. Othery is a cross church with central tower of Perpendicular date. Most of the village is on the north side, and accordingly there is a low side window in the north wall of the chancel. Some buildings are on the south side, and there is a south window for them. Both these windows are of two lights; one of these lights being divided by a plain transom, and the lower half furnished with a shutter, but all the rest of the window glazed. The shutters were remaining in situ when I saw the church some twenty years ago, but I believe that they are now removed and the openings glazed.

After the tower was built it began to give way at its south-east angle, and, to hinder further mischief, a diagonal buttress was added to that angle. This buttress interfered somewhat with the southern window, though not quite to the extent stated in the Archeological Journal, for a person could stand or kneel outside, though not easily. Anyhow it was thought necessary to cut a square hole through the buttress in a direct line with the opening of the window. This might well be done for the easier transmission of the sound of the sanctus bell; but it is clear that all this arrangement is fatal to the theories mentioned by MR. PIGGOT, besides many others. W. G.

WILLIAM MARRAT.

(4th S. i. 365.)

I had the honour of being personally acquainted with the late William Marrat. His favourite studies were mechanics, natural philosophy, and antiquities. He was also well acquainted with Greek, Latin, and several modern languages. During his long life he contributed to the mathematical, philosophical, and poetical departments of the Lady's and the Gentleman's Diaries, the Scientific Receptacle, the Student, the Leeds Correspondent, the Mathematical Repository, &c., &c. He also edited, either wholly or in part, the Enquirer, published at Boston in three 8vo volumes; the Monthly Scientific Journal, published at New York, America, in seven parts; and a History of the Antiquities of Lincolnshire, his native county, which was intended to be completed in three or four volumes, according to the materials at his disposal. Besides these, he wrote a Treatise on Mechanics in Theory and Practice, London, 1810, which he dedicated to Dr. Hutton; and also the Elements of Mechanical Philosophy, London, 1825, which he dedicated to his friend Dr. Trail of Liverpool. He died suddenly, at Liverpool, on March 26, 1852, in the seventy-ninth year of his age, and was buried in the Necropolis near that