118
NOTES AND QUERIES.
[12 S. I. FEB. 5, 1916.
to MRS. STOPES for information. I then, by
your courtesy, published a query, asking if
any of your readers could supply me with
the evidence required (' N. & Q.,' Nov. 6,
1915). I had hoped that MBS. STOPES, as a
frequent contributor to your columns, might
reply to this ; but although she wrote to you
a note concerning ' Plays at Hampstead,
1709,' which appeared the next week
(' N. & Q.,' Nov. 13, 1915), my question was
not answered, either by her or by any other
of your readers.
I then wrote to MRS. STOPES, who is, I am sorry to say, personally unknown to me, asking if she would be so good as to tell me the authority on which she had published this statement on a matter of no little public interest. She replied, by letter dated Nov. 15 last, informing me that she was unable to give me the authority on which she had relied. The letter was not marked " private," and I can conceive of no reason why even the strictest precisian in matters of etiquette should suggest that, having published a statement on the authority of MRS. STOPES, I was not at liberty to inform my readers, and any others whom it might concern, that I could, on further inquiry, find no authority for it, and that the lady, who had first published it, was unable to supply me w r ith any. MRS. STOPES suggests 1hat I ought to have added that, although engaged in writing a book, and also not infrequently writing to the press, she was, unfortunately, prevented by the state of her health from looking up the authority in question. Had I known that she would have wished me to publish these details, which I much regret to learn, I would gladly have done so. I sincerely hope that her health may soon be so completely restored that she may be able to publish, not only her new work, but also the long-sought evidence which some of us so much desire to see. Meantime, I am quite unable to admit that she has any ground for reproaching me with publishing " private information."
G. G. GREENWOOD.
House of Commons.
J. B. BRAITHWAITE (US. xii. 463, 508; 12 S. i. 51). Joseph Bevan Braithwaite, i arrister-at-law, of the Middle Temple, practised as a conveyancer at 3 New Square, Lincoln's Inn. His published works are enumerated in Joseph Smith's ' Descriptive Catalogue of Friends' Books,' vol. i. (1867), p. 314 ; Supp. (1893), p. 67. He died at his house, 312 Camden Road, London, Nov. 15, 1905, aged 87 years, and was interred in
the Friends' Burial-ground at Winchmore
Hill, Middlesex. A memoir of him appears
in ' The Annual Monitor,' 1907, p. 3. See
' J. Bevan Braithwaite, a Friend of the
Nineteenth Century,' by his Children, 1909^
with a portrait as frontispiece.
An excellent photograph of him is included in the collection of portraits at the Friends^ Institute, 138 Bishopsgate, London.
DANIEL HIPWELL.
LIFE OF JOHNSON IN THE 1825 OXFORD* EDITION OF HIS WORKS (12 S. i. 70). The- essay on Johnson's ' Life and Genius ' was written by Arthur Murphy. See Courtney's ' Bibliography of Johnson,' p. 166 f" Oxford Hist, and Lit. Studies," vol. iv.), and ' Diet. Nat, Biog.,' xxxix. 334-7. G. F. R, B.
The author of ' The Life and Genius of Samuel Johnson,' attached to the above edition of Johnson's ' Works,' edited by Francis Pearson Walesby, was Arthur Murphy (1727-1805). It was published to accompany the 1792 edition of Johnson's ' Works,' and, according to Nichols in his ' Literary Anecdotes,' ix. 159, " for this slight essay the booksellers paid Mr. Murphy 300." It was also published separately in the same year (1792). A life of Murphy may be found in the * D.N.B.'
E. E. BARKER.
The John Bylands Library.
This * Life of Johnson ' is a reprint of Murphy's essay on his ' Life and Genius.' The edition was superintended by Francis Pearson Walesby, 1798-1858. See 2 S. xi, 269, 335, and W. P. Courtney, ' Johnson Bibliography,' Oxford, 1915, pp. 166-7. MALCOLM LETTS.
TIGERS' WHISKERS (11 S. xii. 481 ; 12 S. i, 37). The late Col. Campbell of Skipness states that the natives of India have a superstitious belief that, unless the whiskers of a tiger be singed off directly after he is killed, his ghost will haunt those who have caused his death. In ' The Old Forest Ranger ' he depicts Ishmail, the chief huntsman, singeing off the whiskers of a tiger- that had just been killed, while he addresses the animal as follows :
' ' How do you like that, you sulky- looking old bantchoat ? You little thought, half an hour ago,, that you would have me for a barber ; but I've got you by the beard now, and the devil a bristle shall I leave on your ugly snout. No, no, I had trouble enough with you when alive, and have no fancy to be haunted by your ghost now that you are dead.' " ' The Old Forest Banger,' p. 51~
T. F. D.
