474
NOTES AND QUERIES. [9 th s. n. DEC. 10, m
and historical documents was brought into
use by Beda, a position that has been main-
tained by the eminent chronologists cited by
me, and that has been adopted by no less an
authority than Prof. Liebermann. This is
thoroughly in unison with the words of Prof.
Riihl cited by ME. ANSCOMBE. I here repro-
duce them, taking the liberty of italicizing
the words that I wish to refer to more
especially :
" Mit der Ostertafel des Dionysius brachte S. Augustinus auch seine Aera nach Britanuieu, und bei den Angdsachsen ist sie zuerst praktisch ange- wandt worden."
This is sufficient for my purpose. Had Prof. Riihl been better acquainted with Old- English diplomatics, he would have refrained from quoting several spurious charters, and he would have supported my conclusions even more definitely than he does. The earliest un- doubted English charter dated by this era and theearliest instanceof its use for legalpurposes in Western Europe is a charter of ^Ethelbald of Mercia in 736 (' Cartularium Saxonicum,' i. 222). The first historical writer to use it was undoubtedly Beda, who commenced to use it occasionally in his ' Chronica Minora ' (see 9 th S. i. 232), written in 725, and regularly in his famous 'Historia Ecclesiastica,' com- menced in 731. W. H. STEVENSON.
ANGELS AND THEIR TRADITIONAL REPRE- SENTATION (9 th S. i. 407 ; ii. 16). According to all the traditions of religious art, angels should be represented as beardless youths. So truly were they considered to be of the male sex that mediaeval painting and sculp- ture invested them with the garments of the diaconate alb, dalmatic, and crossed stole. The deacon is pre-eminently a minister, as distinct from the priest ; and angels are " ministers of grace."
JOHN HOBSON MATTHEWS.
Town Hall, Cardiff.
A CHURCH TRADITION (9 th S. i. 428 ; ii. 58, 150, 173, 256, 296, 393). The French church builders had a taste for another kind of irre- gularity, peculiar, I believe, to their country the making two west towers, not alike, as the ears or horns of a beast, but of designedly unequal height. The two at Basle are of equal height, but very dissimilar forms, and this differs, I believe, from any French pair, unless we except those at Rouen and Chartres, which are of different ages, and meant to rival each other. Those at Chartres, differing four cen- turies in age, were each meant to excel any spire of their time, and may perhaps be called the oldest and youngest Gothic spires now extant. But the pairs I mean specially here
are those built each by one designer, differing
only in scale. The fashion survived even
Gothic times, for the great classic church of
St. Sulpice at Paris exhibits a trace of it.
The cathedral of Sees, in Normandy, has the
two steeples so nearly equal that King's study-
book makes them exactly equal. They are
by one designer, but each story of the northern
exceeds the corresponding southern by two or
three inches, and the whole difference mounts
up to perhaps two feet. Everywhere the
taller steeple, I think, is the northern.
E. L. GARBETT.
[The ' Guide- Joanne ' speaks of the two steeples of St. Se"es as being the same height, seventy feet.]
" TO ENJOY BAD HEALTH " (9 th S. ii. 248).
MR. RATCLIFFE'S remarks concerning this phrase are very pertinent, but not altogether new, as the oddness of the expression has been noted previously. Mr. Fitzedward Hall, in ' Modern English,' has a chapter on ' Our Grand- fathers' English,' and in some notes appended thereto I find cognizance taken of the phrase. In criticizing the style of Johnson he adduces many passages, in one of which the sage of Fleet Street, in the 'Life of Morin,' has
written, "He expired having enjoyed, by
the benefit of his regimen, a long and healthy life, and a gentle and easy death." Mr. Hall, in criticizing this passage, ventures the remark that " this extraordinary person not only enjoyed his death, but first died, and then expired." He points out a similar usage by Gibbon, who writes, " There was not one who enjoyed a life of peace or a natural death." The meaning of " enjoy " seems clearly to be equivalent to " experience," as MR. RATCLIFFE has already shown, and runs on all fours with the usage in the phrase which has been questioned. In this respect, therefore, "to enjoy death " and " to enjoy bad health," incongruous though they seem, are ex- plainable. Mr. Hall, as already stated, has noticed "the expression 'enjoy bad health,'" which " has often been ridiculed." He says :
" But even the French, with all their much- vaunted logical instinct, sometimes commit analogous blunders. See 'Le R^dresseur' (1866), by M. P. G. de Dumast, p. 98. Exception is there taken to " Les commercants chinois jouissent d'une assez mauvaise reputation,' and to ' Mon frere jouit d'une tr&s-mauvaise santd.' "
We may therefore take heart of grace that in some things we are no worse than our neighbours. Apparently they do not always do the correct thing, as Mr. Hall shows, " better in France." C. P. HALE.
MONASTIC ORDERS (9 th S. ii. 329, 374). The writer in the 'Encyclopaedia Britannica,'
