ws.ii.joLY23.i9w.] NOTES AND QUERIES.
71
margin Somerset is given as the place. It i
possible that these two, Gilbert Basset an<
John Biset, are the same as those of the sani
names (above) who died 1241.
In another deed (vol. i. B. 1796) a certain Roger, son of Ralph Byset, of Kynnardfery Lines, makes a grant of a croft to Richarc Burr', of Ouston, and Agnes his wife, unde date 1397.
In Woodward's 'Heraldry* the arms o Bisset are given (p. 133) as "Argent, a bend sinister gules," and on p. 191 other arms are also assigned to this family, viz., " Azure, a bezant" (cf. the latter with the arms given to Jno. Biset by Matthew Paris).
Many of the Bisets named above seem t< have been connected with Scotland. Is ii not possible that they belong to the ancieni family of Bisset, of Lissendrum, Drumblade, near Huntly, Aberdeenshire ? For their descendants, lineage, &c., vide Burke'i 4 Landed Gentry.'
It is mentioned in the ' Rhymed History o Scotland' that the Bissets migrated from England to Scotland.
CHRISTOPHER WATSON. 264, Worple Road, Wimbledon.
She was a descendant of Manasser Biset, well-known figure in the middle of the twelfth century, who founded the house of leprous women at Maiden Bradley, in Wiltshire. Fundatrix is here used in its common sense of "patroness." R.
CLASSIC AND TRANSLATOR (10 th S. i. 508).
The author is Antiphanes, whose surviving
fragments canbeseeninMeineke's 'Fragrnenta
Comicorum Grsecorum' (5 vols. 1839-57),
vol. iii. pp. 3 sqq., and also in Kock's * Comi-
.corum Atticorum .Fragrnenta ' (3 vols. 1880-
1888). This fragment is numbered Incert. 12
in Meineke and 235 in Kock. I do not know
the translator. May I subjoin my own
version, published in 1895 ?
A man can hide all things, excepting twain That he is drunk, and that he is in love.
Then looks and words do testify so plain, Himself his own denial doth disprove.
JOHN B. WAINEWRIGHT. The verse quoted is a translation from the Greek of Antiphanes (Middle Comedy, flor. c. 360 B.C.) :
rdAAa ris SVVOLIT av TrXrjv 8voiv t
olvov re irivwv et epwrd r e/ZTreo-tui'.
a/L<j)()Tfpa jj.r]vvL yap diru TWI/ /JAe/i/^aTWi/
KUI roll/ Aoywi/ ravd\ (oVrc TOVS u.pvovfj.vov<;
A terra TOVTOUS [ravra] Kara^avcts Trotet.
Quoted in the Epitome of book ii. of
Athenteus, cap. 6, fin., or Teubner, 38. The
original is also in the Didot 'Poet. Com.
Grsec.,' p. 407. The translation given by
RESERVE OF OFFICERS is that in Bonn's
'Athenaeus/ vol. i. p. 62, and is presumably
by C. D. Yonge. H. K. ST. J. S.
BEER SOLD WITHOUT A LICENCE (10 th S. ii. 9). It forms a part of my early recollections of my native town (Wotton - under- Edge, Gloucestershire) that on the fair days (25,26 Sept.) any householder had a right, which was freely exercised, to sell beer with- out a licence. Such houses were distinguished by a shrub or bush placed conspicuously over the entrance door, and were hence called " Bush-houses." The origin of this right I have no knowledge of, but it probably lapsed at the reform of the corporation under Sir C. Dilke's Act in 1886. The custom seems to be alluded to in the old adage " Good wine needs no bush." JAMES T. PRESLEY.
Cheltenham Library.
As a fair is a franchise which is obtained by a grant of the Crown, did not this royal privilege or franchise confer the right during such fair times to sell beer as well as other commodities without the necessity for any further licence ? Perhaps the General Licensing Act, 9 George IV., c. 61, affected this right. The Licensing Act of 1872 was amended in 1874, when it was enacted that
any person selling or exposing for sale any intoxicating liquor in any booth, tent, or place within the limits of holding any lawful and accus- tomed fair or any races, without an occasional licence authorizing such sale, shall, notwithstanding anything contained in any Act of Parliament to the contrary, be deemed to be a person selling or ex- 3osing for sale by retail intoxicating liquor at a jlace where he is not authorized by his licence to sell the same, and be punished accordingly." See ^hitty's 'Statutes,' 1894, vol. v., 'Intoxicating
liquors,' Excise Licensing Act, 1825, 11 ; 1828, 36; and 1874, 18.
J. HOLDEN MACMlCHAEL.
LAMONT HARP (10 th S. i. 329). The fol- owing is my note communicated to Scottish Notes and Queries, Second Series, vi. 11. Two ancient instruments known as Queen Mary's and the Lamont harp, which have for many ^ears been exhibited in the National Scot- ish Museum of Antiquities, were sold by .uction in Edinburgh in March. The Queen's iarp was bought for 850 guineas on behalf f the Museum of Antiquities, and the Lamont arp was purchased on behalf of a gentleman 'hose name did not transpire, but who it is nderstood will permit the harp to be placed n the museum on loan. MR. HUGHES may
