Chapter L: M. M. R

_English Diplomacy_ v. _Russian_.--A friend of Sir Henry Wotton's being designed for the employment of an ambassador, came to Eton, and requested from him some experimental rules for his prudent and safe carriage in his negociations; to whom he smilingly gave this for an infallible aphorism,--that, to be in safety himself, and serviceable to his country, he should always, and upon all occasions, speak the truth (it seems a state paradox). "For," says Sir Henry Wotton, "_you shall never be believed_; and by this means your truth will secure yourself, if you shall ever be called to any account; and 'twill also put your adversaries (who will still hunt counter) to a loss in all their disquisitions and undertakings." (_Reliquiae Wottonianae_.)

ALPHA.

* * * * *

Queries.

ANCIENT TENURE OF LANDS.

(Vol. ix., pp. 173. 309.)

The following paragraphs, containing both Notes and Queries, will doubtless interest your readers

At the last Kent assizes held at Maidstone (March, 1854) a case was tried by a special jury, of whom the writer was one, before Mr. Baron Parke; plaintiffs, "the Earl of Romney and others," trustees under an act of parliament to pay the debts of the borough of Queenborough, county Kent; defendants, "the Inclosure Commissioners of England and Wales." Tradition relates that Edward III. was so pleased with his construction of the Castle of Queenborough, that he complimented his consort by not only building a town, but creating a borough[4], which he named after her honour.[5] The case, in various shapes, has been before the law courts for some time, and was sent to these Kent assizes to ascertain whether Queenborough was either a manor or a reputed manor. In the course of the trial Baron Parke said, that, in despite of the statute _Quia Emptores_, he should rule that manors could be created when they contained the essentials.

My first Query is, therefore, Have any manors been created in England since the passing of that statute? In my _History of Deptford_ I have alluded to the manor of Hatcham as one of the last manors I supposed to have been created.

The Inclosure Commissioners, as the defendants, had been prayed by the Leeze-holders[6] of {449} Queenborough to inclose sundry lands called Queenborough Common; such inclosure was opposed by the trustees, who claimed under the act of parliament which constituted their existence to be in the position of the mayor[7], &c., and thus, if they were the lords of the manor, to have a veto upon the inclosure of the waste. The plaintiffs relied very much upon the following fact, which I here embalm as a _note_, and append thereon a _query_:--During the Mayoralty of Mr. Greet[8], a gentleman who died in 1829, a turbot was caught by a dredger on the Queenborough oyster-grounds: this unlucky fish was immediately pounced upon by the Queenborough officials, and seized for the mayor's behoof as his perquisite, _a la_ sturgeon.

Query, a like instance?

The Jury, after two days' long sitting, decided that Queenborough was neither a manor nor a reputed manor.

A. J. DUNKIN.

Dartford.

[Footnote 4: _Parliamentary History_, 1765.--On Wednesday, Dec. 6, 1654, an attempt was made to disfranchise Queenborough: the then member, Mr. Garland, suddenly and jocularly moved the Speaker that we give not any legacies before the Speaker was dead. This pleasant conceit so took with the House, as, for that time, Queenborough was reprieved, but was voted for the future to be dismembered, and to be added to the county.--Ap. Burton i. cxi. _Archaeological Mine_, i. 12. Queenborough was one of the victims included in Schedule A of the act of parliament known as "The Reform Bill."]

[Footnote 5: In our own day Cove has been called Queenstown in honour of Queen Victoria.]

[Footnote 6: _Leeze-holders_, a right of turning on the coming or Leeze (_Celtic_, Leswes) twenty-four sheep, which of late years, by a bye-law, has been arranged to substitute either two horses or three bullocks. A Leeze is supposed to contain about seven acres of land of herbage. The common consists of about 240 acres, including roads.]

[Footnote 7: See Hogarth's Visit, &c. to Queenborough. A hearty laugh will repay the trouble. The mayor was then a thatcher: the room remains as it did in Hogarth's day; and as Queenborough was then, so it is now, one long street without any trade.]

[Footnote 8: Of Mr. Greet's mayoralty many humorous tales are told: he was at times popular, but towards the close of his reign most decidedly the reverse. At his funeral the dredgers, &c. threw halfpence into his grave to pay his passage to the lower regions. He, one day, _ex officio_, sentenced a pilferer to a flogging at the cart's tail, and as executioners did not volunteer, he took off his coat, and himself applied the cat to the bare back of the culprit from one end of the street to the other. Mr. Greet was one of the best friends Queenborough ever had. After his death it plunged deeply into debt, had its paraphernalia and books seized and sold by the sheriff, and now all its property is in the hands of trustees to pay its debts, whilst its poor-rates are, a witness, a late mayor said, nine shillings in the pound. The debt was originally 12,700l.; but as no interest has been paid thereon, it is now 17,000l. The trustees have received about 4,000_l_., but this sum has been melted in subsequent litigation; for Queenborough men are mightily fond of supporting the law courts.]

* * * * *

OWEN ROWE THE REGICIDE.

Mark Noble, in his _Lives of the Regicides_, says that Owen Rowe was descended from Sir Thomas Rowe, Lord Mayor of London in 1568. In the Additional Manuscripts (British Museum), 6337. p. 52., is a coat in trick: Argent, on a chevron azure, three bezants between three trefoils per pale gules and vert, a martlet sable for difference; crest, a roe's head couped gules, attired or, rising from a wreath; and beneath is written, "Coll. Row, Coll. of hors and futt." These arms I imagine to have been the regicide's. If so, he was a fourth son. Query, whose? The Hackney Parish Register records, that on Nov. 6, 1655, Captain Henry Rowe was buried from Mr. Simon Corbet's, of Mare Street, Hackney. How was he related to Colonel Owen Rowe? I should feel particularly obliged to any correspondent who could furnish me with his descent from Sir Thos. Rowe.

According to Mr. Lysons (_Environs of London_, vol. iv. p. 540.), the daughter of Mr. Rowland Wilson, and widow of Dr. Crisp, married Colonel Rowe; adding in a note, that he _supposes_ this Colonel Rowe to have been Colonel Owen Rowe, the regicide. The same statement is found in Hasted's _History of Kent_ (edit. 1778), vol. i. p. 181. I should be glad of some more certain information on this point; also, what issue Owen Rowe left, if any, besides two daughters, whose marriages are recorded in the Hackney Register.

I am likewise anxious to learn whether there exist any lineal descendants of this family of Rowe, which had its origin in Kent; and thence branching off in the sixteenth century, settled and obtained large possessions in Shacklewell, Walthamstow, Low Layton, Higham Hill, and Muswell Hill. Through females, several of our nobility are descended from them.

TEE BEE.

* * * * *

WRITINGS OF THE MARTYR BRADFORD.

The second and concluding volume of Bradford's writings, which I am editing for the Parker Society, is about to be concluded.

Bradford's _Treatise against the Fear of Death, with Sweet Meditations on the Felicity of the Life to Come and the Kingdom of Christ_, was printed by Powell without a date, by Singleton without a date, and by Wolf 1583,--the last two editions being mentioned by Herbert, the first of Powell by Dibdin from Herbert's MS. additions. If any of your readers could inform me where a copy of any one of these editions is to be found, it would greatly oblige.

I have also never met, after some years' inquiry, with the edition of Bradford's _Letter on the Mass_, printed by Waldegrave, Edinburgh.

Some of the early editions of Bradford's writings are very rare. I possess his _Examinations_, Griffith, 1561; and _Meditations_, Hall, 1562; both of which are scarce: as also the only copy I have ever seen (though imperfect) of the first edition of his _Sermon on Repentance_, evidently printed in 1553.

His _Complaint of Verity_ is of extraordinary rarity. The only copy I am aware of is possessed {450} by the Rev. T. Corser, of Stand, Manchester; and was purchased (I believe) at Mr. Bright's sale for 17l.

I should be obliged to any one who would supply me with any information about early editions of Bradford's writings.

Every one is familiar with the story that Bradford, on seeing a criminal pass to execution, said, "There goes John Bradford but for the grace of God." Can any one inform me of any early printed authority for that story?

A. TOWNSEND.

Weston Lane, Bath.

[In the British Museum are the following works by John Bradford, bound
in one volume, press-mark 3932, c.:--_The Hvrte of Hering Masse_; also
Two Notable Sermons, the one of _Repentance_, and the other of the
_Lord's Supper_, Lond. 1581. On the fly-leaf is written, "A copy of
Bradford's _Hurte of Hearyng Masse_, printed for H. Kirham, 1596,
B. L., was in Mr. Jolley's sale, Feb. 1843. This edition by William
Copland for William Martyne without date is scarcer, and I believe
earlier.--R. H. BARHAM."]

* * * * *

Minor Queries.

_Courtney Family._--I throw an apple of discord to your heraldic, genealogical, and antiquarian, readers. Was there originally more than one family of Courtnay, Courtney, Courtenay, Courteney, Courtnaye, Courtenaye, &c. Which is right, and when did the family commence in England, and how branch off? If your readers can give no information, who can?

S. A.

Oxford.

"_The Shipwrecked Lovers._"--Can you give me any account of the following tragedy, where the scene of it is laid, &c.? It is printed along with some poems, and appears never to have been acted. The name of the piece is _The Shipwrecked Lovers_, a tragedy in five acts, by James Templeton, Dublin, 12mo., 1801. I regret that I am unable to give any account of the author, but perhaps some of your Irish readers may be able to do this.

SIGMA.

_Sir John Bingham._--In Burke's _Peerage and Baronetage_, article "Lucan," it is stated that this gentlemen was high in rank in King James's army at the battle of Aughrim, and turned the fortune of the day in favour of William by deserting, with his whole command, at the crisis of the battle. A late number of the _Dublin University Magazine_ repeats this story on the authority of Mr. Burke, and it would therefore be satisfactory to know where the latter found a statement affecting so much the honour of the family in question, one of the first in my native county. The dates of Sir John's birth and marriage are not given, but the ages of several of his children are known, and from them it follows that, supposing the father of the first Lord Lucan not to have married till the mature age of fifty-five or sixty, he was barely of age at the time of the battle, therefore not likely to have been high in command. My countrymen are too much inclined, like the French, to attribute their disasters to treachery, or to any cause but the equal numbers and courage, and superior discipline, of their adversaries: but they have never done so to less purpose than when they ascribe the loss of that battle to a man who was in all probability not born in 1691, and must in any case have been a mere boy at the time. No peerage that I have met with gives the date of his birth, which would at once settle the question. It seems most unlikely, if such were actually the case, that the family, on attaining the peerage, should have revived the title of the gallant Sarsfield (whose representatives they were), and thus challenged public attention, always on the alert on such points in Ireland, to their alleged dishonour and betrayal of the cause for which he fought and fell.

J. S. WARDEN.

_Proclamation for making Mustard._--Did Queen Elizabeth issue a proclamation for "the right of making mustard?" And if so, what was the language of such proclamation?

AN ADMIRER.

_Judges practicing at the Bar._--A curious disquisition has run through "N. & Q." on the relinquishment of their sees by bishops, but I do not see that any of them are shown to have officiated as parish priests after quitting the episcopate.

Not that this is the point I wish now to put before you and your readers, but I want information on a somewhat kindred subject.

In Craik's _Romance of the Peerage_ there occurs:

"Percy's leading counsel upon this occasion was Mr. Sergeant
(afterwards Sir Francis) Pemberton, who subsequently rose to be first a
puisne judge, and then Chief Justice of the King's Bench, was thence
transferred to the Chief Justiceship of the Common Pleas, and after all
ended his days a practitioner at the bar."--Vol. iv. p. 291. note.

Pemberton, it appears, was dismissed from the Common Pleas in 1683; he was counsel for the seven bishops in 1688, as was also another displaced judge, Sir Creswell Leving, or Levinge, who was superseded in 1686.

Are these the only two instances of judges, _qui olim fuere_, practising at the bar? If not, are they the latest? And farther, if not the latest, does not etiquette forbid such practice now?

W. T. M.

Hong Kong.

_Celebrated Wagers._--I should be glad if any correspondent will point out any remarkable {451} instances of the above. The ordinary channels for obtaining such information I am of course acquainted with.