now with greater, now with slacker zeal. They show themselves compassionate towards brethren who have failed in life, and of a fatherly mind towards apprentices. As their corporate life develops they develop in due measure a taste for corporate magnificence; and these honest men yielded nothing to the other London guilds in their liberality, especially as testators, towards their own body.

or

One of the most interesting aspects of the Cutlers' history is that of their relations to certain subsidiary crafts-those of the Furbours, Hafters, Sheathers, Grinders, Bladesmiths, and one two others. To the novice in these matters it will not for a time be easy to realize what trade it was which constituted the cutler proper. His calling consisted first in the assembling of the productions of the bladesmith and sheather, and fitting the blade with its handle, and next in acting as

responsible to the public for the workmanship and quality of the finished article. The hafters, who provided the handles, were among the most important members of the Mistery.

Whether a determination to keep up the standard of work in a craft arises from mere good policy or from a lofty disinterested ideal, it can achieve its end only by means of training soundly the oncoming members, and the Cutlers display the usual sagacity of medieval men in this respect. We may perhaps observe in the medieval system of apprenticeship some influence from the general familiarity with the monastic system; and still more reasonable is it to suppose that the great community life in the monasteries affected what we may call the orientation of the corporate life of the Misteries. Questions of origin or evolution are beside the mark; our point is that it must have been, in the centuries we are dealing with, difficult for unlearned practical persons to dissociate the very conception of a community or corporation, for whatever purpose, from some implication of "religion." The Fraternity, which was the Mistery under its religious aspect, ensured that no member, however scantily provided with kith and kin, should go hence without funeral comfort, and without continued remembrance in masses and prayers, and we do not find the Cutlers in any way remiss as to this.

mysterious Lady Agnes "le Cotiller," who was assessed in Walbrook Ward at the then (early fourteenth century) considerable sum of 338. 4d. We may collect a few-it will be understood they are a few out of many-instances of picturesque or otherwise attractive details which we have noted.

The rules concerning each man's retail tradewere, as is well known, numerous and strict, and no freeman might be engaged in more than one. But he might deal in whatever wholesale merchandise he pleased, and we find that brewing as a second trade was much affected by the cutlers of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. The value of their own goods might be illustrated by several quotations-we take an example of 1361, one John Nasyng,. which is rather curious: brewer, ordered in his will that all the knives. attached to his girdle should be sold and the Here and there we get some hint of the relation proceeds given to the work of two City churches.. between London cutlers and those of other towns -as in the admission of Adam de Thakstede to the freedom of the City. Thaxted was an important centre for the cutlery trade, and Adam had so far prospered as to be able to move into London.. Still more interesting are the particulars of theshare taken by the Cutlers' Company in various civic demonstrations or responsibilities: in the reception of kings or queens, and maintaining watch and ward, or, as in 1402, furnishing delegates to attend an inquiry into the management of the City prisons, held in the Tower of London. In 1422 three hundred members of the divers Misteries, in white gowns and hoods, and bearing torches in their hands, attended the funeral procession of Henry V. The torches were the great expense in this, and the Cutlers' Company provided four. No doubt they appeared among their fellow-citizens as personable men, for their ordinances required that an apprentice should be not only "of free birth and condition," but likewise "formosus in statura habens membra. recta & decencia." In chap. iv., which deals with the inner life of the Company in the latter half of the fifteenth century, are to be found not only a good account of the Company's property in the Cutlery and of how it was acquired, but also a number of pleasant particulars relating to Cutlers' Hall and its appurtenances.

As an appendix to the text of the volume Mr. Welch prints in detail the principal pieces of evidence upon which his work is grounded, giving both the original Latin or French, and an English translation. This very greatly adds to the value of the book. Another admirable feature is the illustrations, especially Mr. Emery Walker's. fine engraving of the Hall and the reproductions of the seals. By the way, the Company is now the only City Company which has a French motto:: Pervenir (1), so it should be a bonne foy.

The history of the Company in the period dealt with in this volume may be said to fall into two divisions, that before and that after Dec. 4, 1416. On that date did the Cutlers receive their Charter of Incorporation from the hands of Henry V. It is unfortunate that the records at Cutlers' Hall do not furnish any information as to what led up to this grant. It had a considerable effect on the government of the Mistery, which, until this time had been administered by four Rulers, apparently equal in authority and elected annually. Henceforward, its officials have been a Master and two Wardens, to whom was added a Court of As-less into the form of a running narrative, and sistants. The Master and Wardens must themselves be of the livery of the Mistery-which now comes into prominence, and is distinct from the livery of the Fraternity-but the right of electing them belonged to all the freemen of the Company. This last is perhaps rather a loose expression, considering that there were women (single as well as widows) who held the freedom, and some of the most interesting entries in these records relate to women cutlers. There is even a

Mr. Welch has thrown his material more or renders it fairly easy for reference by means o, plentiful marginal indications. The writing is). perhaps, a little unequal; and the following (p. 123f may serve as an example of its occasional laxity: The task of preparing such a list, though easier now than in the days of this sixteenth-century scribe, is practically impossible." But apart from one or two minor lapses of this sort the work has been as well carried out as it was planned and accumulated.

66

Bicentenary Commemoration of the Royal Regiment of Artillery.

A BROCHURE of 8 pages gives a brief account of the origin of the Royal Regiment of Artillery, and of the presentation of a silver casket for use in Sheffield Cathedral in commemoration of this -on May 26 last-the 200th anniversary of the Royal Warrant by which its first two Companies were formed. There are portraits of Lieut. General Albert Borgard, the first colonel of the Regiment, and of Lieut.-Col. Shrapnel (a pleasing reproduction), as well as illustrations of the arms of the Regiment, and of the casket.

JOTTINGS FROM THE DECEMBER

CATALOGUES (Concluded.)

consider

a

A COLLECTOR who might have for the asking his
choice of the 225 items described in Messrs.
Myers's latest Catalogue (No. 214) would be
reasonable in hesitating a day or two among its
attractions. He would have to
number of delightful bindings, several of them by
Samuel Mearne, and would probably linger most
Eikon Basilike,' in black
over that binder's '
morocco, with a portrait of Charles I. in the
middle of the front cover-a work executed
especially for Charles II., which since that day
has been the treasured possession of a Congre-
gational minister, and again of the father of
Queen Victoria, and is now offered to the public
for the sum of 751. Then there is, bibliographi-
cally speaking, the main prize of all described
here: Dame Juliana Berners's The Booke of
Haukyng, Huntyng and Fysshyng,' in the edition
of W. Copland of Lothbery (1565-7). This seems
to be literally unique, and is in a fine state of
preservation, and for it is asked the sum of 4501.
This is tempting, of course, but we would our-
selves rather possess a fine Flemish illuminated
Hora' of the fifteenth-century School of Bruges,
with 25 miniatures, and many other fascinating
details, which costs 125l.; and alongside of that
for desirability we would put an illuminated
Persian MS. of the eighteenth century-Nizami's
'Sikanda '-full of delights, and encased in a
lacquer binding beautifully adorned likewise with
Persian work, of which the price is 62l. 108.
Messrs. Myers have three particularly good
of
letter
autographs:
Queen Elizabeth's
Leicester giving directions to a keeper of Windsor
Forest for a buck to be sent as a present to Mr.
William Davison (1579), 211.; a letter of Dorset
to that same Richard Staffarton, keeper, about
felling trees within his charge (1595), 107. 108.;
and one, signed "Henry de lorraine," from the
famous Duc de Guise, murdered at Blois in 1588,
301.

a

We note that the same work, in the original Latin only-Anglorum Prælia appears in the Catalogue No. 204 of Mr. James Miles of Leeds, printed Londini, apud Radulphum Nuberie.... Mr. Miles has also 1582," and offered for 21. 108. Thiers's Histoire de la Révolution Française' and 'Histoire du Consulat et de l'Empire,' 32 vols. in all, half-bound in scarlet morocco a large-type library edition which belonged to Lord Holden (1874-80), 71. 78. ; a first edition of Walter Pater's Marius, the Epicurean,' in the original cloth (1885), 21. 108.; Lovelace and Davies's translation of Voiture, the first edition, in an old calf binding, which is possibly the original one, and having

beneath Voiture's portrait eight lines by Lovelace not found in his Lucasta' (1657), 31. 3s.; and the Tour through North Wales,' published first in 1817, with the coloured plates after Turner, Prout, and others, 61. 68.

A great feature of Mr. Charles J. Sawyer's new Catalogue (No. 43) is the number of its extraillustrated works. For 901. he is offering a copy of Bryan's Dictionary of Painters,' extended, by means of 2,062 plates, some of them rare and valuable, from the 2 vols. of 1816 to 21 vols. Then there is Lady Theresa Lewis's Extracts of Miss Berry's Journal' and correspondence, extended to 6 vols. by the insertion of over 300 engravings, 15l. 10s.; Madame D'Arblay's 'Diary' and letters, similarly illustrated, 7 vols., 127.; and one or two more. One of the best items in the Catalogue' to which the name John Ruskin's Original Study Book' has been attached, is a collection in two elephant folio volumes, made by John Ruskin, of some 650 old engravings of English and Welsh cathedrals and abbeys, used by him as material in his early study of architecture, and in several instances annotated by him. This is certainly not expensive at 301. first edition of Borrow's Zincali (1841), 107. 10s. ; the Oxford edition of Defoe's Works (1840-41), 121. 128.; a copy of the Grolier Bible, one of the edition" de grande Luxe," limited to 86 copies, and printed entirely on Japanese vellum, 181. 108. -these may serve as specimens of an enjoyable collection of rare or remarkable books.

A

WE have much pleasure in announcing that our new volume will begin with the first instalment of a valuable and most interesting contribution, which we owe to the generous kindness of Sir Richard Carnac Temple. This is the original private correspondence, now at the India Office, of a factor and merchant of Bengal, towards the end of the The letters have never seventeenth century. before been published, and would appear to be unique of their kind. Sir Richard Temple has not only transcribed them, but has added numerous biographical, topographical and other notes in order to make complete the lovely picture they give of the Anglo-Indian life of the period.

The Athenæum now appearing monthly, arrangements have been made whereby advertisements of posts vacant and wanted, which it is desired to publish weekly, may appear in the intervening weeks in N. & Q.'

TWELFTH SERIES.-VOL. II.

SUBJECT INDEX

[For classified articles see ANONYMOUS WORKS, BIBLIOGRAPHY, BOOKS RECENTLY PUBLISHED,
EPIGRAMS, EPITAPHS, FOLK-LORE, GAMES, HERALDRY, MOTTOES, OBITUARY, PICTURES, PLACE-
NAMES, PROVERBS AND PHRASES, QUOTATIONS, SHAKESPEARIANA, SONGS AND BALLADS, SURNAMES,
and TAVERN SIGNS.]

Bibles: "Biblia de buxo," the meaning of, 210, Boleyn (Queen Anne), her chaplain Thirlwall,

Bombay Grab, tavern sign, origin of, 349, 457
Bonaparte ("Betsy "), Poe, Margaret Gordon,
and "Old Mortality," 367, 498

Almanacs, local, printed c. 1640, 241, 280, Bonaparte (Napoleon): his Biography by