Page:Notes and Queries - Series 10 - Volume 5.djvu/410

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NOTES AND QUERIES, [w-s.v. AI>KIL 23,


to the same authority, the steamer Royal William of 180 h.p. arrived in London from Quebec in 1833. A steamer, therefore, was no longer a strange eight in Canada in 1838.

L. L. K.

There was a vessel of this name built in 1830 at Newcastle, owners Hay & Co., Sun- derland, but she was a "snow" (variety of brig) of 172 tons, arid in 1838 was apparently trading between London and Leghorn or thereabouts. She was wrecked in 1842. MR. RALPH THOMAS refers to a steamer which arrived (where from?) at Montreal in 1838; but as he remarks that he "never before heard of a ship being so named," I send the above. I myself am continually coming across vessels (in print), scores and scores of them, of which I never heard before. But perhaps I miss your correspondent's point.

DOUGLAS OWEN.

HOLBORN (10 th S. ii. 308, 392, 457, 493 ; iii. 56, 234 ; v. 295). The evidence of Stow, Camden, and Munday, so confidently praised at the last reference, is all absolutely worth- less on such a point as this. Whoever trusts in what is said by Elizabethan writers about etymology must be very easily satisfied. The notion that the spelling Oldbourne, as occurring in 1611, is final, is simply ludicrous. The spelling Hojburne occurs twice in one page of the 'Liber Albus,' p. 233, in an Anglo-French document known to be older than 1419 at the latest; and much older quotations have already been given.

Seeing that the prefix Hoi- or its equivalent Hole , Holan-, occurs more than sixty times in Anglo-Saxon charters, it is by no means easy to deny its existence. Besides which, any county atlas will give two Holbecks, two Holbrooks, four Holcombes, Holcot and Hulcott, four Holwells, and so forth.

Why this matter cannot be allowed to rest I do not know. No one who has learnt Anglo-Saxon for a few months would boggle over it. But perhaps that is just the point. WALTER W. SKEAT.

GRANTHAM OF GOLTHO FAMILY (10 th S. v. 70, 231, 276). I am sorry SIR WILLIAM GRANTIIAM has announced that " there is not a word of truth " in my statements, except regarding the present locality of the Lincoln monuments, and that my "story about his arms is fictitious," because he compels me to return to the subject.

SIR WILLIAM declares, in an interview reported in The Daily Chronicle, that the tomb was "under a heap of rubbish near the spot where the church of St. Martin [Lincoln] used to stand," *' under a heap of


dung," and that "anybody could have taken it away"; also that " the story of the rector of Barcombe refusing to place it in his church is absurd." The truth is that part of St. Martin's in falling down injured the monument so much that it was afterwards preserved in the still existing tower ; and the tomb could not legally have been moved by "anybody" without permission of the churchwardens. Concerning the exclusion of the effigies from Barcombe Church, the rector can be written to and his reply published.

The damaged window, plainly exhibiting the ancient arms and motto, SIR WILLIAM tells us he "found in a barn," "in a hayloft, where it had been put and lost": but last summer, from the window itself, I copied the following :

"This window was removed from Goltho church, Lincoln, on its ceasing to be used for public worship, by the Hou blc Sir William Grantham, 1889."

I never denied that Granthams have long been in Sussex, or that they might be " allied to families of high standing " : I said they had been numerous in the county, but that " no Grantharn of Sussex had ever been shown to be connected with Lincolnshire."

SIR WILLIAM continues : " We have always possessed the coat of arms, and the motto 'Comme Dieu Grantit.'" If he knew that, why did he apply for the motto " Forwards," and obtain it by the patent of 4 May, 1880? Why did he suppress it when "somebody told him," nine years later, of the French one, and claim that instead ? (See Fox- Davies's 'Armorial Families,' 1905.) More- over, a red terra-cotta plaque affixed to his entrance lodge still exhibits the new arms and motto " Forwards."

More reckless still is the assertion that it was SIR WILLIAM'S brother who "some time afterwards" (that is, after the grant of 1880) first adopted the motto *' Forwards." (See Daily Chronicle.') That is impossible, because the patent specifying "Forwards" as SIR WILLIAM'S motto had, at his own request, been drawn in the form imparting the arms and motto " to all the other descendants of his father," including, of course, the brother. After this astounding lapse of memory, perhaps the "tradition " of the " migration " of Lincoln ancestors to Sussex "more than two centuries ago " may be mistrusted,

The remaining inaccuracies of SIR WIL- LIAM it is not worth while to notice, and I shall write no more, even if a fresh crop appears, because my object is obtained by placing on record that the Lincoln*