Chapter C: D. Landry

Greenock.

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_Darcy, of Platten, co. Meath._--It is on record that, in the year 1486, the citizens of Dublin, encouraged by the Earl of Kildare and the Archbishop, received Lambert Simnel, and actually crowned him King of England and Ireland in Christ's Church; and that to make the solemnity more imposing, they not only borrowed a crown for the occasion from the head of the image of the Virgin that stood in the church dedicated to her service at Dame's Gate, but carried the young impostor on the shoulders of "a monstrous man, one Darcy, of Platten, in the county of Meath."

Did this "monstrous man" leave any descendants? And if so, is there any representative, and where, at the present day? Platten has long since passed into other hands.

ABHBA.

_Dorset._--In Byrom's MS. Journal, about to be printed for the Chetham Society, I find the following entry:

"May 18, 1725. I found the effect of last night drinking that foolish
Dorset, which was pleasant enough, but did not at all agree with me,
for it made me very stupid all day."

Query, What is Dorset?

R. P.

_"Vanitatem observare."_--Can any of your readers explain the following extract from the Council of Ancyra, A.D. 314? I quote from a Latin translation:

"Mulieribus quoque Christianis non liceat in suis lanificiis vanitatem
observare: sed Deum invocent adjutorem, qui eis sapientiam texendi
donavit."

What is meant by "vanitatem observare?"

R. H. G.

_King's Prerogative._--A writer in the _Edinburgh Review_, vol. lxxiv. p. 77., asserts, on the authority of Blackstone (but he does not refer to the volume and page of the _Commentaries_, and I have in vain sought for the passages), that it is to _this day_ a branch of the king's prerogative, at the death of _every bishop_, to have his kennel of hounds, or a compensation in lieu of it. Does the writer mean, and is it the fact, that if a bishop die without having a kennel of hounds, his executors are to pay the king a compensation in lieu thereof? And if it is, what is the amount of that compensation? Is it merely nominal? I can understand the king claiming a bishop's kennel of hounds or compensation in feudal times, when bishops were hunters (vide Raine's _Auckland Castle_, a work of great merit, and abounding with much curious information); but to say, to _this day_ it is a branch of the king's prerogative, is an insult alike to our bishops and to religious practices in the nineteenth century. Of hunting bishops in feudal times, I beg to refer your readers, in addition to Mr. Raine's work, to an article in the fifty-eighth volume of the _Quarterly Review_, p. 433., for an extract from a letter of Peter of Blois to Walter, Bishop of Rochester, who at the age of eighty was a great hunter. Peter was shocked at his lordship's indulgence in so unclerical a sport. It is obvious neither Peter nor the Pope could have heard of the hunting Bishops of Durham.

FRA. MEWBURN.

_Quotations in Cowper._--Can any of your correspondents indicate the sources of the following quotations, which occur in Cowper's Letters (Hayley's _Life and Letters of Cowper_, 4 vols., 1812)? In vol. iii. p. 278. the following verses, referring to the Atonement, are cited:

[Greek: Tou de kath' haima rheen kai soi kai emoi kai adelphois]
[Greek: Hêmeterois, autou sôzomenois thanatôi.]

In vol. iv. p. 240. it is stated that Twining applied to Pope's translation of Homer the Latin verse--

"Perfida, sed quamvis perfida, cara tamen."

L.

_Cawley the Regicide._--Mr. Waylen, in his _History of Marlborough_, just published, shows that Cawley of Chichester, the regicide, has in Burke's _Commoners_ been confounded with Cawley of Burderop, in Wiltshire; and he adds, "the fact that a son of the real regicide (the Rev. John Cawley) became a rector of the neighbouring parish of Didcot," &c. has helped to confound the families. May I ask what is the authority for stating that the Rev. J. Cawley was a son of the regicide?

C. T. R.

* * * * *

Minor Queries with Answers.

_Dr. John Pocklington._--Can any of your correspondents oblige me with information respecting the family, or the armorial bearings of Dr. John Pocklington? He wrote _Altare Christianum_ and _Sunday no Sabbath_. The parliament deprived him of his dignities A.D. 1640; and he died Nov. 14, 1642. Dr. Pocklington descended from Ralph Pocklington, who, with his brother Roger, followed Margaret of Anjou after the battle of Wakefield, A.D. 1460. He is said to have settled in the west, where he lived to have three sons. The family is mentioned in connexion with the county of York, as early as A.D. 1253.