Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 9.djvu/405

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s. ix. MAY n, 1902.) NOTES AND QUERIES.


397


Arundell of Wardour that Dr. Milner's museum, adjoining the Catholic Church at Winchester, contains many articles of great interest. RONALD DIXON.

46, Maryborough Avenue, Hull.

THE MITRE (9 th S. viii. 324, 493, 531 ; ix. 174, 334). The late Bishop Forbes, of Brechin, is commemorated by a recumbent effigy in St. Paul's Episcopal Church, Dundee. He wears cope and mitre ; but I do not think he ever wore these in life. Mitred abbots, certain canons in cathedral churches, and cardinals not bishops Newman is a case in point have the right to wear this head- dress ; but I do not think it is ever worn apart from chasuble or cope.

GEORGE ANGUS.

St. Andrews, N.B.

GANGANELLI'S BIBLE (9 th S. ix. 308). Just fifty years ago this volume formed the subject of a question in ' N. & Q.,' for which refer to 1 st S. v. 466 (not 463, as given in index to half-yearly volume and Index to First Series). According to the inquirer it was published in 1784, and a copy from the Duke of Sussex's library was sold to the British Museum for 30Z. See above refer- ence for any further information which may be required. EVERARD HOME COLEMAN.

71, Brecknock Road.

THE BIBLIOGRAPHY OF THE BICYCLE (9 th S.

viii. 304, 490, 530 ; ix. 36, 117, 171, 231). It

seems to be pretty generally agreed that for

the genesis of the bicycle we have to go back

to 1819. I have before me an extract from

the Literary Gazette for the above year,

headed ' The Pedestrian Carriage, or Walking

Accelerator,' in which the "dandy horse"

of that day is designated "a new invention "

"It was originally," it says,

"the invention of an ingenious German, M. Drais,

but has been introduced into this country and

improved by Mr. Johnson, coach maker, in Long

Acre, who has secured it by taking out letters

patent. The machine is of the most simple kind,

supported by two light wheels running on the same

line, the front wheel turning on a pivot, which, by

means of a short lever, gives the direction in

turning to one side or the other, the hind wheel

always running in one direction. The rider mounts

it and seats himself on a saddle conveniently fixed

on the back of the horse, if allowed to be called so,

and placed in the middle between the wheels ; the

feet are placed flat on the ground, so that, in the

first step to give the machine motion, the hefl

should be the first part of the foot to touch the

ground, and so on with the other foot alternately

as if walking, observing always to begin the move

ment very gently. In the front, before the rider, n

placed a cushion to rest the arms on, while the

hands hold the lever ; the cushion should be pro

perly called a balance, as it answers that purpose


or, in giving a short turn, if the machine inclines o the left, the right arm is pressed on the balance,

which brings the machine upright again, and BO

vice versa."

The paragraph goes on to state that it is easy to travel fifty or more miles a day on hese "German horses, "and that, as a riding- chool was about to be opened for them, it was expected that they would be brought nto extensive use.

ALEXANDER PATERSON. Barnsley.

ISLE OP DOGS (9 th S. ix. 165). A spot that lad for centuries been known as the richest riece of marsh land in England is hardly ikely to have derived its name from a situation which formed, though this is pure conjecture, "a trap for every dead dog or cat that came down the river." Such "a fine rich level for fattening cattle," as Strype calls it, must have been regarded en beau rather than with the contempt that such a theory implies, and an utter disregard for the picturesque in their place-nomenclature is not a sin that can be laid at the doors of our less Thames-factory-and -other-refuse afflicted forefathers. It is in the 'Circuit Walk,' at the end of Strype's 'Stow,' p. 102, that indebtedness is expressed to Dr. Josiah Woodward, minister of Poplar, for the belief that

the Isle of Dogs was so called, because, when our former Princes made Greenwich their Country Seat, and used it for Hunting, (they say) the Kennels for their Dogs were kept on this Marsh ; which, usually making a great Noise, the Seamen and others thereupon called the Place the Isle of Dogs : Though it is not an Isle, indeed, scarce a Peninsula, the Neck being about a Mile in Length." Why this tradition from so respectable a source should, in the absence of more trustworthy data, be contemned one cannot understand. It is apparently Lysons, in his ' Environs of London,' who first casts doubt upon it, "as it would have been," he says, " more con- venient to have had their dog-kennels on the other side of the water " (p. 467, note), and Wheatley ('London Past and Present') re- peats this in different words. But surely the fact of the barking of so many dogs in the vicinity of the " Manor of Pleasaunce, as the royal palace at Greenwich was called, was enough to cause their removal to a con- veniently adjacent place like Poplar Marsh, which is alluded to as early as the year 1611 as if it were a matter of common knowledge that it was a home for dogs, at any rate of some, if not royal, degree : " Moll Cutpurse. Sir, he hath been brought up in the Isle of Dogs, and can both fawn like a spaniel and bite like a mastiff as he finds occasion