h S. III. MAY 20,
NOTES AND QUERIES.
397
SOLUTA " (9 th S. iii. 268). The meaning of
ita in the quotation from the Admon.
At b Book (1691) at Somerset House " Catha-
rii se Scattergood solutse sorori naturali et
lej. itimse Willielmi Scattergood "is u free."
Th is shows that the lady is unmarried, and
th< refore " free " to act without the consent
of mother person. JAMES PEACOCK.
anderland.
This word means spinster. D'Arnis ('Lexi- con Manuale') gives " Solutus, Cselebs, qui uxorem non duxit ; ce'libataire."
THURSTAN C. PETER.
The meaning of this word in old parish registers has already been discussed in he pages of ' 1ST. & Q.' John S. Burn, the mthor of the ' History of Parish Registers in England'; the Rev. Dr. Lee, the author of A Glossary of Liturgical and Ecclesiastical Terms,' and others have expressed their jpinion that soluta designates a single Lvoman, one that is not fettered with any '.spousal or pre-contract. Burn says the oore correct designation is sola, as in the krming register: "Edward Green of Ditton, olus ; and Annie A very, sola." See 3 rd S. iii. 61, 5], 198, 236; 4 th S. vii. 314.
EVERARD HOME COLEMAN. Many replies to the same effect are acknowledged.] 4 OXFORD ARGO ' (9 th S. ii. 309, 475 ; iii. 312). -What authority the compiler of the list of ctitious names of authors may have had for !he statement that Richard Burdon, of Oriel l-ollege, wrote the 'Oxford Argo' does not ppear. Mr. Burdon, under his after-name of ! ichard Burdon Sanderson, is one of my series If 'Men of Mark 'twixt Tyne and Tweed.' |/hen writing a sketch of his life for my jiird volume, and compiling a list of the samphlets, booklets, &c., that issued from his olific pen, I had family papers of great
- erest and value at my disposal ; but in
ne of them, nor in any communica- ri from the family, was there a hint specting the 'Oxford Argo.' Mr. Burdon ined the Newdigate Prize in 1811, his sub- 3t being ' The Parthenon ' ; took a first in issics in 1812 ; obtained a fellowship and i office of Secretary of Presentations from 3 uncle, Lord Eldon, in 1813 ; and the lowing year received the prize for the iglish essay 'A Comparative Estimate of 3 English Literature of the Seventeenth and ghteerith Centuries.' In 1815 he married daughter of Sir James Sanderson, Bart., ex-Lord Mayor of London, and took her me. His descendants are still among us. ie of them, his second son, is known the >rld over as Dr. Burdon Sanderson, Regius
Professor of Medicine at Oxford. But did
he write the 'Oxford Argo'? The fact that
CANON BAILY'S copy bears the imprint of a
Newcastle typographer indirectly supports
the theory that he was the author. It so, it
is pretty clear that he wished the fact to
remain concealed. RICHD. WELFORD.
Newcastle-upon-Tyne.
D'AULNOY AND THE MICROPHONE (9 th S. iii.
264). To go back further than the charming and graceful writer of fairy tales, I have read somewhere that Heimdal, the sentinel whose Gjallar trumpet was to announce Ragnarok ('Gotterdammerung'), could hear "the grass growing in the meadows and the wool on the sheep's backs." I quote from memory.
FRANCIS P. MARCHANT. Brixton Hill.
One is inevitably reminded of Wordsworth's well-known lines in 'The Idiot Boy' :
The grass, you almost hear it growing, You hear it now if e'er you can.
C. LAWRENCE FORD, B.A. Bath.
Compare George Eliot's beautiful verses. Being away from home I quote from memory, but they occur as a heading to a chapter in
- Middlemarch ' or ' Daniel Derorida ' :
Fairy folk, a-listening,
Hear the seed sprout in the spring ;
And, for music to their dance,
Hear the hedgerows break from trance ;
Sap, that trembles into buds,
Sending little rhythmic floods
Of fairy sound to fairy ears :
Thus all beauty that appears
Has birth as sound to finer sense
And lighter-clad intelligence.
Elsewhere she speaks of " the roar that lies on the other side of silence." C. C. B.
Most of Madame d'Aulnoy's stories are taken from folk-tales, either directly, or in- directly through Straparola. In an old Welsh, or Armorican, legend I have met with a person who had his hearing so acute that he could hear a dewdrop fall from a blade of grass at the other end of the world. Heimdall, the porter of the Scandinavian gods, could hear the grass grow in the meadows and the wool on the backs of the sheep. E. YARDLEY.
SIR THOMAS VERNON (9 th S. ii. 387). I send the following, and regret it is so meagre. Sir Thomas Vernon, Turkey merchant, was knighted 8 March, 1684/5 ; M.P. for the City of London ; married Anne, daughter of Henry Weston, of Ockham, co. Surrey, and Kathe- rine, daughter of William Ford, of Harting,
