152
NOTES AND QUERIES. [9 th s. in. FEB. 25, m
accredited by Burke to Hertfordshire. The
further probability is that Sir John, the
justice, assumed a coat when he emerged
from obscurity, and that his son, the more
eminent Chancellor, had to explain matters
to the officials of Heralds' College, who then
granted a fresh coat ; and that Sir Thomas
retained them both (see ' N. & Q.,' 4 th S. iv.
61). This, I think, is a natural instinct in
any one so circumstanced, A, HALL,
13, Paternoster Row, E.G.
HANDS WITHOUT HAIR (9 th S. i. 328 ; ii. 35). I am obliged to your correspondents for their letters ; but they have not answered my question. I asked myself if the expression might refer to the case of Jacob and Esau, but concluded negatively, because there it was the deceiver who had the " hands without hair," and fled with a conscience that was good only, as all consciences are, in accusing truly. In any case, the first book of Moses is not the literary source of the words in ques- tion, even if those who first used them had Jacob, inappropriately, in their minds. The words do not occur in Genesis xxvii.
PALAMEDES.
MAXWELL'S 'HERODIAN' (9 th S. iii. 86). MR. AXON will find that part of his com- munication has been anticipated in 'N. & Q ' 8 th S. v. 284. W. C. B.
"AN ICE" (9 th S. iii. 26). Disraeli's 'Young Duke' supplies an instance, of the date 1831 : > " The pasties, and the venison, and the game, the pines, and the peaches, and the grapes, the cakes, and the confectionary [(tic], and the ices, which proved that the still-room at Hauteville was not an empty name, were all most popular." Chap. xiii. p. 104, ed. 1853.
Hastings.
EDWARD H. MARSHALL, M.A.
"T'ESQUiNTE PAS" (9 th S. iii. 69). The
meaning seems to be " Don't knock yourself
up." M. Gasc, in his very useful 'Diet, of
the Fr. and Engl. Languages,' gives esquinter
as a " popular " alternative of ereinter. Both
mean properly to rupture or sprain the loins,
esquinter being formed from esquine, the loins
of a horse, as ereinter from reins, the loins
without such restriction of meaning. The
word is also in the dictionnaires d'argot, e.g.,
Loredan Larchey : " Esquintement, ' fatigue
extreme ; esquinter, harasser, epuiser."
F. ADAMS.
M. Gasc, in his excellent dictionaries, ed. 1889 and 1897, gives this word as a "popular" form of s 1 ereinter, to tire oneself out, to knock oneself up ; lit., to break or sprain one's back. Spiers (1869) and Roubaud do not give the
word. It is, however, in Wessely's 'Pocket
Dictionary ' in an active sense, " to knock up."
It is also in M. Gasc's ' Pocket Dictionary,'
1889, in the same sense.
JONATHAN BOUCHIER.
[Other replies to the same effect are acknow- ledged,]
CRYPTOGRAPHY (9 th S. ii. 52S). Chambers Journal for 1 Sept., 1855, and 15 March, 1856; Macmillaris Magazine for February, 1871; and Rees's ' Cyclopsedia,' contain instructive and interesting articles on this subject. ' N. & Q,,' 2 nd S. v. 397, furnishes a long list of English works; and 5 th S. viii. 169, 312, the titles of many foreign books relating thereto. I may also refer your correspond- ent to 4 th S. vii., viii.; 5 th S. i.; 6 th S. ix., for additional information.
EVERARD HOME COLEMAN. 71, Brecknock Road.
There is a long article on 'Ciphers and Cipher - writing ' in Macmillaris Magazine, February, 1871, pp. 328-38. This contains a reference to "the fifties," because it ^ begins, " When the late Lord Clarendon was in Paris in 1856," after which there is an anecdote of an intercepted, but deciphered despatch from the Foreign Office, written in cryptography. ED. MARSHALL, F.S.A.
ROBERT SCOTT GODFREY (9 th S. iii. 28). He is unknown to the ' D.N.B.,' but there is the barest mention of him without dates in Redgrave's ' Dictionary.'
EDWARD H. MARSHALL, M.A.
Hastings.
THE GENEALOGY OF LORD CURZON (9 th S. ii. 467, 531). T. W. says that William Penn, the founder of Pennsylvania, was the fifth in descent from " a younger son of the family [of Penn] living at Penn." If T. W. has documentary evidence for this statement, he will greatly oblige me, and all other persons interested in the history of the Penns, by giving it, or, at least, by definitely referring to it. P. S. P. CONNER.
Philadelphia.
BENEDICT ARNOLD (9 th S. iii. 69). The Gentleman's Magazine for July, 1801, records the death of Brigadier-General Arnold at his house in Gloucester Place, on 14 June, 1801 ; also that his remains were interfed on the 21st at Brompton. Seven mourning coaches and four state carriages formed the cavalcade. During the latter part of last year I was in correspondence with a lady in Massachusetts and another (a relative) in England, on the subject of Arnold's place of burial. I am not
