170
NOTES AND QUERIES. [io s. vn. MARCH 2, 1907.
signify ? Did it mean that he was a replica
of James in features and colouring, or that
there was merely the strong family likeness
between them which may exist, and not
infrequently does exist, between an ugly
and a handsome man ?
A querist writing in the Intermediate, 20 Octobre, 1906, says :
"Le veritable Charles I er . J'ai lu recemmeiit, dans xme revue, que Van-Dye k avait tou jours plus ou moins embelli ses modeles. Je m'en doutais un peu et ai toujours pense" que les images de leurs oontemporains, surtout de leurs contemporaines, que nous ont laissees certains maitres, pourraient bien e"tre de belles infideles. Mais 1'auteur ajoute que le pinceau de Van-Dyck a tranforme 1 en un elegant gentilhomme jusqu'a ce ' gnome ' de Charles I cr , terme qui me surprend, applique, au petit-fils de Marie-Stuart, tandis qu'il conviendrait ))arfaitement au pauvre Charles II. d'Espagne.
" Pour le roi anglais, jai accepte jusqu'a present le type consacr6 par mairits originaux de Van- Dyck, un corps droit et souple de gentilhomme chasseur surmont6 d'une tete au long visage, dont 1'expression est melaricolique et haute, sans qu'on y dem61e cette faussete qui causa en grande partie les malheurs du second des quatre Stuarts.
"Quel etait done au physique le veritable Charles I er ? H. C. M."
No doubt an artist who intends to be patronized by the world of fashion in any age accentuates to some degree the better traits in a face, and softens the effect of those which are unsatisfactory. Nevertheless, he has to keep his work like the sitter, or the sitter's vanity will take up arms. He wants a portrait of his own admirable self, not an entirely fancy picture.
Readers of La Fontaine's fables will recollect that when Jupiter called all the animals together, that each might say whether anything needed altering in its appearance, he asked the ape, "Are you satisfied ? " and received the answer, " Why not ? " The ape pitied the bear, the bear the elephant, the elephant the whale, the ant the mite. Every one of them was critical enough of others, but pleased with itself.
Had Charles I. been a " gnome," what satisfaction could it have been to acquire a series of portraits which represent an entirely different type ? C. E.
NAPOLEON'S CARRIAGE. I wish to ascer- tain what British regiment it was that captured Napoleon's travelling carriage after he had left it in his flight from Waterloo
J. N.
MUSICAL GENIUS : is IT HEREDITARY ?
I have noticed a peculiarity in musica genius in that it does not seem to show itself in the family of a great musical com-
poser nearly so much as literary genius does
n the family of a great writer. I think
rhat this may be accounted for by the
act that composers do not marry, or by
he fact that when married they have but
mall families. Can any of your readers
- ite an instance to the contrary ?
ENIGMA.
LATIN PRONUNCIATION IN
ENGLAND.
(10 S. vii. 108.)
THERE is no " foreign " pronunciation of
atin. There is a French pronunciation, a German pronunciation, a Spanish, and an Italian ; and they are all very materially lifferent. I doubt whether the Pope would at least without difficulty) understand the Gospel as read either in Paris or in Madrid.
But all these pronunciations agree roughly with respect to certain, though by no means all, vowel-sounds. They also all agree in not pronouncing c like k before e and i.
In Roman churches in England the Italian pronunciation is naturally adopted.
Is not MR. STRONG overlooking the pro- Dability that English pronunciation of English changed between 1500 and 1600, and with it English pronunciation of Latin, but only with it ? I should assume that More and
olet pronounced the English word " nature" much as the French word " nature " is now pronounced ; but that Coryat approximated to our modern English pronunciation.
Natura " would follow " nature," and consequently by 1600 there would be a much greater divergency between English Latin and any kind of foreign Latin than there was in 1500.
Is there not something in Mulcaster bear- ing on this, and tending to show that English Latin resisted for a little time the influence of the vernacular ?
May I take this occasion of expressing my cordial detestation of the proposed change ? It is thoroughly unhistorical, ignoring in particular English history ; and it treats Latin as a dead language. More- over, it will work havoc with words adopted from the Latin. Already I have heard " minnus " ( ) : I expect " plooce " ( + ) soon. R. JOHNSON WALKER.
Little Holland House, Kensington, W.
I have often tried to get people to under- stand that Latin, in England, was doubtless
