Page:Notes and Queries - Series 10 - Volume 2.djvu/393

This page needs to be proofread.

ii. OCT. >, 1904.] NOTES AND QUERIES.


321


LONDON, SATURDAY, OCTOBER K, 100L


CONTENTS.-No. 43.

NOTES : William III.'s Chargers at the Boyne, 321 Omar Khayyam Epitaphiana, 322 Watts and Cowper Blysse of Daventry Witchcraft Bibliography, 323 "Valkyrie" Tennyson's House, Twickenham Timothy Pont Colfe's Almshouses, Lewisham,324 J. C. Scaliger's Books Toad as Medicine- Bideford Freeman Roll, 325.

QUERIES : ' Reliquiae Wottoniamc 'False Quantities in "Parliament " Trousered," 326 Poem by H. F. Lyte German Volkslied Barbara Grant George Washington's Arms "Mugwump" "Vine" Inn, Highgate Road " English " ' Pearmain " : " Pearweeds " ' William Tell ' Markham's Spelling-Book, 327 John Jenkinson Manchet The ' Decameron ' Gwillim's ' Display of Heraldrie 'Theatre-Building Kissing Gates Armorial Bearings Squire Dick Smith, 328.

REPLIES : The Mussuk Purcell's Music for 'The Tem- pest,' 329 'Experiences of a Gaol Chaplain' Preserva- tion of Parish Documents, 330 Northumberland and Durham Pedigrees Godfrey Higgins Bacon and the Drama Eel Folk-lore, 331 Thomas Beach, the Portrait Painter Shakespeare Autograph Roger Casement

  • ' Dago " Descendants of Waldef, 332 Westminster

School Boarding-houses Withatn Cisiojanus Carter nndFleetwood, 333 Moral Standards of Europe Gamage,

4 Rules of Christian Life Fettiplace Family' Prayer

for Indifference ' Heacham Parish Officers, 335 Font Consecration Holy Maid of Kent, 336.

NOTES ON BOOKS :-' New English Dictionary '-Heine- mann's Shakespeare ' Great Masters ' Booksellers' Catalogues.

Notices to Correspondents.


WILLIAM IIL's CHARGERS AT THE BATTLE OF THE BOYNE.

VISCOUNT WOLSELEY, in the first chapter of his interesting autobiography, states that there is a tradition in his family to the effect that when William III.'s horse got bogged, crossing the Boyne, Col. (afterwards Briga- dier) Win. Wolseley, of the Inniskilling Horse, who was riding close to the king, exchanged steeds with his Majesty. Lord Wolseley goes on to say that if King William rode a white charger at the Boyne, as repre- sented in the historic picture of the battle, then the tradition falls to the ground, as Col. Wolseley's horse was a black one on the eventful day in question.

There is nearly always some foundation for tradition, but lapse of years generally brings about perversion of facts. It is on record that William with his left wing of cavalry got into a morass on -the brink of the Boyne, and many of the officers, including the -king, got bogged and had to dismount. The troopers helped to get the chargers out of


the deep mire, and Private McKinlay, of the Inniskilling Dragoons, is said to nave ex- tricated his Majesty's horse. It is more than probable that when William's charger got oogged one of the Inniskilling officers, near the king's person, offered to exchange horses with his royal master ; but there is nothing to prove that the " swap " took place. Making due allowance for the exaggeration of family tradition, it may be fairly surmised that when King William met with this unexpected check to his passage of the Boyne, he in- curred a debt of obligation to an Inniskilling officer, and that this gentleman was pre- sumably Capt. Tobias Mulloy. In Burke's

  • Commoners ' (edit. 1838, vol. iv. p. 149) is to

be found the following circumstantial story in connexion with the battle of the Boyne :

"It is stated that Capt. Mulloy,* perceiving William's horse shot [sic], rode up and gave his own charger to the king, and that for this seasonable service his Majesty requested he would call at his tent after the action, and choose whatever horse he pleased from the royal stud. Mulloy selected one called Kaiser, the king's favourite, which William cheerfully gave him, with the housings and pistols. This horse, which lived to be forty years of age, never was allowed to be ridden by any but the old captain, and when he began to get stiff, was let run for life."

William was nineteen hours in the saddle on the eventful 1 July, 1690, so that he may possibly have changed his charger more than once. This monarch, like Frederick the Great, is generally depicted riding a white horse ; but it does not follow that Kneller, whom William made choice of

To fix him graceful on the bounding steed, portrayed the royal charger in its true colour. Artists, like poets, have their licence. Napo- leon is always represented on a white charger called Marengo ; and we are told he rode this horse at Marengo, Austerlitz, Jena, Wagram, in the Russian campaign, and finally at Waterloo. The late Hon. F. Lawley, in an article published in 1896, states tnat " he was unable to believe that Napoleon rode at Waterloo in 1815 the horse that had carried him at Marengo in 1800, and still less that the horse went through the Russian campaign of 1812." CHARLES DALTON.


  • Capt. Toby Mulloy served with the Innis-

killing forces in 1689, and was one of the officers who received three months' pay in England, 27 Feb., 1690, with orders to return to Ireland ('English Army Lists and Commission Registers,' 1661-1714, vol. lii. p. 168). Mulloy served at the Boyne, and subsequently accepted a lieutenancy in the corps now known as the 8th Hussars, and became captain- lieutenant in 1695. In 1712 he was appointed to 8ir Daniel O'Carroll's Regiment of Dragoons in Por- tugal. He died in 1734.