Part 5

Any free nitric acid in the nitrate of silver can be detected by the smell. The crystals can be freed from {182} it, should they contain any, by fusing them in a porcelain crucible over a spirit-lamp. The ordinary fused lunar caustic of the surgeon is unfit for general use as a photographic agent.

J. LEACHMAN.

_Professor Hunt's Photographic Studies._--My attention has just been directed to a "Practical Photographic Query" in your Journal, Vol. ix., p. 41., which appears to require a reply from me. It is quite evident that your correspondent, notwithstanding the personal respect which he professes to entertain, cannot have any intimate knowledge of either my works or my studies. Allow me to make my position clear to him and other of your readers. My first photographic experiment dates from January 28, 1839, and since that period the investigation of the _chemical phenomena of the solar rays_ has been the constant employment of all the leisure which a busy life has afforded me. The production of photographic pictures has never been the ultimate object at which I have aimed, although my researches have caused me to obtain thousands. My object has been, and is, to endeavour to obtain some light into the mysteries of the radiant force with which the photographic artist works, being quite content to leave the production of beautiful images to other manipulators.

As I write on the subject, it appears, of course, necessary that I should be familiar with all the details of manipulation in each process which I may describe. Whenever I have mentioned, in either of my works, a process with which I have not been entirely familiar, I have given the name of the authority upon whom I have depended. But there will not be found in either my _Photography_, or my _Researches on Light_ (of which a greatly enlarged edition will soon be submitted to the public), any one process upon which I have not made such experiments as appeared to me necessary to my understanding the _rationale_ of the chemical changes involved, and of the physical phenomena which arise.

Now, since it is not necessary to select a picturesque object to instruct me in these points, the same buildings, trees, and plaster casts have been copied times beyond number; and when the problem under examination has been solved, these pictures have been destroyed.

There are twenty exhibitors of pictures in the Photographic Gallery who would certainly leave my productions far behind, as it concerns their pictorial character; but I am confident there is not one who has made the philosophy of Photography so entirely his study as I have done.

I have been engaged for the last two years in studying the chemical action of the prismatic spectrum. I inclose you my report on this subject to the British Association for 1852 (that for 1853 is now in the hands of the printer), from which you will perceive that I am employing myself to greater advantage to photography, as science under art, than I should be did I enter the lists with those who catch the beauties of external nature on their sensitive tablets, and secure for themselves and others pictures drawn by the solar pencil, in which no one can more deeply delight than your humble servant.

ROBERT HUNT.

_Waxed-paper Pictures._--Will your correspondents or yourself do me the favour to say, how such beautiful pictures have been produced and exhibited by Mr. Fenton and others by the waxed-paper medium, if that process be so bad and defective? When I have followed it, and exercised consistent patience, I have ever produced pleasing and faithful results. That when parties do not themselves prepare, it becomes expensive, I am willing to admit; but I am inclined to attribute many failures to the uncertain heat of hot irons, which _must_ vary; and I make this fact known to you as the result of my own observation on many sheets: added to which, defective manipulation, or impure chemicals, must not be allowed to do away with its having much merit.

HARLEY LANE.

_The Double Iodide Solution._--In a note appended to DR. MANSELL'S communication on the calotype (Vol. ix., p. 134.), you state that having lately prepared the double iodide solution according to the formula given by DR. DIAMOND, in which it required 650 grains of iodide of potassium to dissolve a 60-grain precipitate, you were inclined to believe, until you made the experiment yourself, that DR. MANSELL must have made a wrong calculation as to the quantity of iodide of potassium (680 grains) which he stated was sufficient to dissolve a 100-grain precipitate, as the difference appeared so small for a solution more than one-third stronger.

The small difference referred to with respect to the quantity of iodide of potassium required, is owing to the amount of water used being in both cases the same. A slight difference in the strength of a solution of iodide of potassium makes a great difference with respect to the quantity of iodide of silver it is capable of dissolving. Thus, if you remove a small proportion of the water from a solution of the double iodide of silver by evaporation, the slight increase of strength which the solution will thereby acquire, will enable it to take up a much larger proportion of iodide of silver than it already contains; and if, on the other hand, you dilute it with a small proportion of water, its diminished strength (unless the solution contains a great excess of iodide of potassium) will cause the precipitation of a large proportion of the iodide of silver. And hence the great variation in the amount of iodide of potassium which is found requisite to form a solution of the double iodide of silver, under the same apparent conditions with regard to the proportions of the other ingredients employed, may be accounted for by the impossibility of _measuring_ off with sufficient accuracy the proper proportion of water.

Whenever _exact_ quantities of liquids are required, recourse should always be had to the balance, for no great accuracy can be depended upon by measurement with our ordinary glass measures, even supposing them to be correctly graduated, which is not always the case.

J. LEACHMAN.

_Dr. Mansell's Process._--DR. MANSELL'S lucid and very practical paper on the calotype process in "N. & Q." must, I am sure, be of the greatest service to photographers in general; and as one of the many I am irresistibly tempted to offer my sincere and hearty {183} thanks to him for the truly valuable hints it contains. If DR. MANSELL will give the rationale of the necessity of not allowing a longer time than absolutely required for the soaking out the now injurious iodide of potassium, set free by the deposit of the iodide of silver; and also, an explanation of the cause of that part of the iodized papers which takes the longest time in drying being weaker than that part which had been more hastily dried, the learned Doctor will still be adding to our present account of obligation to him.

HENRY HELE.

* * * * *

Replies to Minor Queries.

_Buonaparte's Abdication_ (Vol. ix., p. 54.).--In an article on this subject, after referring to Wilkinson's shop on Ludgate Hill, your correspondent states that "Wilkinson's shop does not now exist." In justice to ourselves, we trust you will insert this letter, as such a remark may be prejudicial to us. Having sold our premises on Ludgate Hill to the Milton Club, we have removed our establishment to No. 8. Old Bond Street, Piccadilly.

As regards the table spoken of, your informant must be labouring under some strange error. We do not remember ever having, or pretending to have, the original table on which the Emperor Napoleon signed his abdication. Many years ago, a customer of ours lent us a table with some such plate as you describe, which he had had made abroad from the original, for us to copy from; and after this we made and sold several, but only as copies. We cannot charge our memory with the correctness of the inscription you publish; and, moreover, we believe the words "a fac-simile," or something to that effect, were engraved as a heading to those made by us.

CHAS. WILKINSON & SONS.

8. Old Bond Street.

[We willingly give insertion to this disclaimer from so respectable a firm as MESSRS. WILKINSON & SONS; from which it appears that our correspondent A CANTAB has not made "when found, a _correct_ note" of the fac-simile. Another correspondent has favoured us with the following additional notices of the original table: "On Dec. 8, 1838, I saw the table on which Napoleon signed his abdication at the Chateau of Fontainebleau, on which there are two scratches or incisures said to have been made by him with a penknife. These injuries upon the surface of the table were so remarkable as to attract my attention, and I inquired about them of the attendant. He said Napoleon, when excited or irritated, was in the habit of handling and using anything which lay beside him, perhaps to allay mental agitation; and that he was considered to have so used a penknife, and disfigured the table."]

_Burton Family_ (Vol. ix., p. 19.).--I know not whether E. H. A. is interested about the Burtons of Shropshire. If he is, he will find an interesting account of them in _A Commentary on Antoninus his Itinerary, &c. of the Roman Empire, so far as it concerneth Britain_, &c.: London, 1658, p. 136.

CLERICUS (D.).

_Drainage by Machinery_ (Vol. viii., p. 493.).--E. G. R. will perhaps find what he wants on this subject in Walker's

"Essay on Draining Land by the Steam Engine; showing the number of Acres that may be drained by each of Six different-sized Engines, with Prime Cost and Annual Outgoings: London, 1813, 8vo., price 1s. 6d."

He will find a complete history of the drainage of the English fens in Sir William Dugdale's

"History of Embanking and Draining of divers Fens and Marshes, both in Foreign Parts and in this Kingdom, and of the Improvement thereby: adorned with sundry Maps, &c. London, 1662, fol. A New Edition, with three Indices to the principal Matters, Names, and Places, by Charles Nelson Cole, Esq.: London, 1772, fol."

Mr. Samuel Wells published, in 1830, in 2 vols. 8vo., a complete history of the Bedford Level, accompanied by a map; and I may add that the late Mr. Grainger, C.E., read a series of papers on the draining of the Haarlem Lake to the Society of Arts in Edinburgh, which, I believe, were never published, but which may, perhaps, be accessible to E. G. R.

HENRY STEPHENS.

_Nattochiis and Calchanti_ (Vol. ix., pp. 36. 84.).--The former of these words being sometimes spelt _natthocouks_ in the same deed, shows the ignorance or carelessness of the scribe, the reading being clearly corrupt; I would suggest _cottagiis_, cottages, and by "g^anis" I should understand not _granis_, as F.S.A. supposes, but _gardinis_, gardens. The line will then run thus:

"Cum omnibus gardinis et cottagiis adjacentibus."

It will be seen that this differs from the solution proposed by MR. THRUPP (p. 84.).

With respect to the latter word, _calchanti_, I regret that I cannot offer a satisfactory solution. Possibly the word intended may have been _calcanthi_, copperas, vitriol, or the water of copper or brass; but I find in the _Index Alter_ of Ainsworth, the word--

"CALECANTUM. A kind of earth like salt, of a binding nature. _Puto pro Chalcanthum, Vitriol, L._"

Will this tally with the circumstances of the case? I presume that the words _liquor_, _mineral_, &c., following _calchanti_ in the grant, are contractions for the genitive plural of those words; the subject of the grant being the tithes of all those substances.

H. P.

Lincoln's Inn.

{184}

_"One while I think," &c._ (Vol. ix., p. 76.).--These lines will be found in _The Synagogue_, p. 41., by Christopher Hervie.

M. ZACHARY.

_"Spires 'whose silent finger points to heaven'"_ (Vol. ix., pp. 9. 85.).--F. R. M., M.A., seems not to have observed that Wordsworth marks this line as a quotation; and in the note upon it (_Excursion_, 373.) gives the poetical passage in _The Friend_, whence he took it, thus acknowledging Coleridge to be the author. The passage is not to be found in the modern edition of _The Friend_, by the reference in Wordsworth's note to "_The Friend_, No. 14. p. 223." I presume that _The Friend_ was originally published in numbers, and that it is to that publication Wordsworth refers. This is not simply the case, as F. R. M., M.A., suggests, of two authors using the same idea, but of one also honestly acknowledging his debt to the other. The idea is of much older date than the prose of Coleridge, or the verse of Wordsworth. Milton, in his Epitaph on Shakspeare, has:

"Under a star y-pointing pyramid."

Prior has the following line:

"These pointed spires that wound the ambient sky." Prior's _Poems_: Power, vol. iii. p. 94., Edin. 1779.

In Shakspeare we find:

"Yon towers, whose wanton tops do buss the clouds." _Troilus and Cressida_, Act IV. Sc. 5.

The idea is traceable in Virgil's description of "Fame" or "Rumour" in the 4th Æneid:

"... caput inter nubila condit."

J. W. FARRER.

_Dr. Eleazar Duncon_ (Vol. ix., p. 56.).--D. D. will find some mention of Dr. Duncon in a correspondence between Sir Edward Hyde and Bishop Cosin, printed among the _Clarendon State Papers_ (ed. Oxford, vol. iii., append. pp. ci. cii. ciii.), from which it appears that, in 1655, Dr. Duncon was at _Saumur_; where also Dr. Monk Duncan, a Scotch physician, was a professor (Conf. note _a_, p. 375. of Cosin's _Works_, vol. iv., as published in the Anglo-Catholic Library). I regret that I cannot furnish D. D. with the when and where of Dr. Duncon's death.

J. SANSON.

_"Marriage is such a rabble rout"_ (Vol. iii., p. 263.).--

"Marriage is such a rabble rout, That those that are out would fain get in, And those that are in would fain get out."

I do not think it is against the rules of "N. & Q." for any Querist to put a _rider_ on any of his own Queries. In a volume entitled _The Poetical Rhapsody_, by Francis Davidson, edited, with memoirs and notes, by Nicholas H. Nicolas, London, Pickering, 1826, under the head of "A Contention betwixt a Wife, a Widow, and a Maid," p. 21., occur the following lines:

"_Widow._ Marriage is a continual feast.

_Maid._ Wedlock, indeed, hath oft compared been To public feasts, where meet a public rout, Where they that are without would fain go in, And they that are within would fain go out," &c.

This piece is signed "Sir John Davis."

S. WMSON.

_Cambridge Mathematical Questions_ (Vol. ix., p. 35.).--IOTA is informed that the questions set at the examination for honours, are annually published in the _Cambridge University Calendar_. He should consult the back volumes of that work, which he will probably find in any large provincial library.

These questions, with solutions at length, are also annually published by the Moderators and Examiners in one quarto volume. All the Senate House examination papers are annually published by the editor of the _Cambridge Chronicle_, in a supplement to one of the January numbers of that periodical.

C. MANSFIELD INGLEBY.

P.S.--As I write from memory, I may have been guilty of some slight inaccuracy in details.

I think the _Cambridge University Calendar_ will contain all the mathematical questions proposed in the Senate House for the period mentioned. Those from 1801 to 1820 inclusively were also published by Black and Armstrong (Lond. 1836), to accompany the revised edition of Wright's solutions. The problems from 1820 to 1829 inclusive are reprinted in vol. v. of Leybourne's _Mathematical Repository_, new series, and in vol. vi. those for 1830 and 1831 are given. In 1849 the Rev. A. H. Frost arranged and published the questions proposed in 1838 to 1849. Perhaps this may be found satisfactory.

T. T. WILKINSON.

_Reversible Masculine Names_ (Vol. viii., pp. 244. 655.).--If you allow _Bob_, you cannot object to _Lol_, the short for _Laurence_. Lord Glenelg and the Hebrew abba will not perhaps be held cases in point, but _Nun_, _Asa_, and _Gog_, and probably many other Scripture names, may be instanced; and _Odo_ and _Otto_ from profane history, as well as the Peruvian Capac.

P. P.

_The Man in the Moon_ (Vol. vi., pp. 61. 182. 232. 424.).--

"As for the forme of those spots, some of the vulgar thinke they represent a man, and the poets guesse 'tis _the boy Endymion_, whose company shee loves so well, that shee carries him with her; others will have it onely to be the face of a man as the moone is usually pictured; but Albertus thinkes rather that it represents {185} _a lyon_, with his taile towards the east and his head to the west; and some others (Eusebius, Nieremb. _Hist. Nat._, lib. VIII. c. xv.) have thought it to be very much like a _fox_, and certainly 'tis as much like a lyon as that in the zodiake, or as Ursa Major is like a beare.... It may be probable enough that those spots and brighter parts may show the distinction betwixt the sea and land in that other world."--Bishop Wilkin's _Discovery of a New World_, 3rd. edit., Lond. 1640, p. 100.

"Does the _Man in the Moon_ look big, And wear a huger periwig; Show in his gait, or face, more tricks Than our own native lunatics?" _Hudibras_, pt. II. c. iii. 767.

To judge from his physiognomy, one would say the Man in the Moon was a _Chinese_, or native of the Celestial Empire.

EIRIONNACH.

_Arms of Richard, King of the Romans_ (Vol. viii., p. 653.).--With respectful submission to MR. NORRIS DECK, and notwithstanding his ingenious conjecture that the charges on the border are pois, and the seal which he mentions in his last communication, I think the evidence that the border belongs to Cornwall, and not to Poictou, is perfectly conclusive.

1. The fifteen bezants in a sable field have been time out of mind regarded as the arms of Cornwall, and traditionally (but of course without authority) ascribed to Cadoc, or Caradoc, a Cornish prince of the fifth century. They occur in juxtaposition with the garbes of Chester, upon some of the great seals of England, and I think also upon the tomb of Queen Elizabeth; and they are, to the present day, printed or engraved on the mining leases of the duchy.

2. Bezants on sable are extremely frequent in the arms of Cornish families; but crowned lions rampant gules do not occur in a single instance of which I am aware, except in the arms of families named Cornwall, who are known or presumed to be descended from this Richard, and bear his arms with sundry differences. Bezants on sable are borne (_e.g._) by Bond, Carlyon, Chamberlayne, Cole, Cornwall (by some without the lion), Killegrew, Saint-Aubyn, Treby, Tregyan (with a crowned eagle sable, holding a sword), Treiago, and Walesborough, all of Cornwall; and it is to be remarked that bezants are not a common bearing in other parts of England, especially not on sable.

3. When Roger Valtorte married Joan, daughter of Reginald de Dunstanville (who was natural son of Henry I., and Earl of Cornwall nearly a century before Richard, King of the Romans, but never Earl of Poictou), he added to his paternal arms a border sable bezantée.

This is but a small portion of the evidence which might be adduced; but it is, I think, quite enough to justify the statements of Sylvanus Morgan, Sandford, Mr. Lower, and others, that the bezants pertain not to Poictou, but to Cornwall.

H. G.

_Brothers with the same Christian Name_ (Vol. viii., pp. 338. 478.).--If your various correspondents, who adduce instances of two brothers in families having the same Christian names (both brothers being alive), will consult Lodge's _Peerage_ for 1853, they will find the names of the sons of the Marquis of Ormonde thus stated:

"James Edward Wm. Theobald, Earl of Ossory, born Oct. 5, 1844.

"Lord James Hubert Henry Thomas, born Aug. 20, 1847.

"Lord James Arthur Wellington Foley, born Sept. 23, 1849.

"Lord James Theobald Bagot John, born Aug. 6, 1852."

The Christian name of the late Marquis was James; and whichever of his grandsons shall succeed the present possessor of the title, will bear the same Christian name as the late peer.

JUVERNA.

_Arch-priest in the Diocese of Exeter_ (Vol. ix., p. 105.).--Haccombe is doubtless the parish in the diocese of Exeter, where MR. W. FRASER will find the arch-priest about whom he is inquiring. Haccombe is a small parish, having two houses in it, the manor-house of the Carew family and the parsonage. It is said that, by a grant from the crown, in consequence of services done by an ancestor of the Carews, this parish received certain privileges and exemptions, one of which was that the priest of Haccombe should be exempt from all ordinary spiritual jurisdiction. Hence the title of arch-priest, and that of chorepiscopus, which the priests of Haccombe have claimed, and perhaps sometimes received. The incumbent of Bibury, in Gloucestershire, used to claim similar titles, and like exemption from spiritual jurisdiction.

J. SANSOM.

Since sending my Query on this subject, I have obtained the following information. The Rectory of Haccombe, which is a peculiar one, in the diocese of Exeter, gives to its incumbent for the time being the dignity of arch-priest of the diocese. The arch-priest wears lawn sleeves, and on all occasions takes precedence after the bishop. The late rector, the Rev. T. C. Carew, I am told, constantly officiated in lawn sleeves attached to an A. M. gown, and took the precedence due to his spiritual rank as arch-priest of the diocese. The present arch-priest and Rector of Haccombe is the Rev. Fitzwilliam J. Taylor. Does such an office, or rather dignity, exist in any other case in the Anglican Church?

WM. FRASER, B.C.L.

Tor-Mohun.

{186}

_"Horam coram dago"_ (Vol. ix., p. 58.).--Your correspondent [Sigma]. is probably thinking of Burns' lines "Written in a wrapper, inclosing a letter to Captain Grose," &c.:

"Ken ye aught o' Captain Grose? Igo et ago, If he's among his friends or foes, _Iram, coram, dago_."

It is not very likely, however, that this should be the first appearance of this "burden," any more than of "Fal de ral," which Burns gives to other pieces both before and after this. It may have a meaning (as I believe one has been found for "Lilliburlero," &c.), but I should think it more likely to be sheer _gibberish_.

By the way, how comes _burden_ to be used in the sense of "chorus or refrain?" I believe we have the authority of Shakspeare for so doing.

"Foot it featly here and there And let the rest the burden bear?"

Is it the _bourdon_, or big drone? Certainly the chorus could not "bear a burden," in the sense of _hard work_, even before the time of Hullah.

J. P. ORDE.

In Chambers' _Scottish Songs_, Edinburgh, 1829, p. 273. is a piece beginning--

"And was you e'er in Crail toun? _Igo and ago_; And saw ye there clerk Fishington? Sing _irom, igon, ago_."

And in _Blackwood_ for Jan. 1831 ("Noctes Ambrosianæ, No. 53.") is "A Christmas Carol in honour of Maga, sung by the Contributors," which begins thus--

"When Kit North is dead, What will Maga do, Sir? She must go to bed, And like him die too, Sir! Fal de ral de ral, _Iram coram dago_; Fal de ral de ral, Here's success to Maga!"

I suspect that the "chorus or refrain" of the first of these ditties suggested that of the second; and that _this_ is the song which was running in your contributor's head.

J. C. R.

[We are also indebted to S. WMSON, F. CROSSLEY, E. H., R. S. S., and J. SS. for similar replies. See Burns' _Works_, edit. 1800, vol. iv. p. 399., and edit. Glasgow, 1843, vol. i. p. 113.]