10 s. xii. OCT. 2, 1909.] NOTES AND QUERIES.
267
latest residence, and I would hope that this,
perhaps with other particulars, may be
recorded in ' N. & Q.'
" The old order changeth, yielding place to new." ' The Green Bushes ' as melodrama, and ' How to Settle Accounts with your Laundress ' as farce, may not satisfy twen- tieth-century criticism, but, associated with Miss Woolgar, the delight they gave still lives in memory. W. L. BUTTON.
[The Daily Telegraph of 10 September contained a. tolerably full account of Miss Woolgar.]
.
WE must request correspondents desiring in- formation on family matters of only private interest to affix their names and addresses to their queries, in order that answers may be sent to them direct.
WILLIAM GUSH, PAINTER. In Graves' s 4 Dictionary of Contributors to the Royal Academy of Arts ' there are references to no fewer than 53 works of William Gush. The first was exhibited in 1833, and the last in 1874. The Wesley an Methodist Magazine, 1832-60, contains scores of engraved repro- ductions of Gush's portraits of Wesleyan ministers. He painted a number of portraits in Canada in 1858. Four are in Sackville, New Brunswick, one being the portrait of Charles Frederick Allison, the founder of the Mount Allison Institutions of that place.
Can any one supply further biographical details ? 'Rather curiously, his name does not seem to appear in any dictionary of painters. R. C. ARCHIBALD.
11, Rue Scribe, Paris.
" VIRETOT " IN SCOTT. I wonder if any of your readers can enlighten me on the pre- cise etymology and meaning of the word " viretot." It occurs in the eighteenth chapter of Sir Walter Scott's ' Fortunes of Nigel ' : " Here you come on the viretot, through the whole streets of London, to talk some nonsense to a lady," &c.
I have searched for " viretot " in a whole gallery of dictionaries, both English and French, including dialect dictionaries and glossaries ; but so far can find no trace of it except in an edition of ' Nigel ' published by Messrs. Macmillan in 1904. In a bald note by the anonymous editor " on the viretot " is here stated to mean " in haste."
Possibly ; but how ? Why ?
STANLEY V. MAKOWER.
Grosvenor House, Chiswick Lane, W.
[" Upon the viretote " occurs also in Chaucer, and is explained by Prof. Skeat in a note at vol. v, p. 110 of his six-volume edition of Chaucer. See also 9 S. vii. 83. 257; viii. 48, 130.]
" THE COURT OF THE ACTORS or CHESTER."
At or about midsummer 1477, 1479, and
1480 an appointment was made of certain
men to be " Senescallos nostros ad unam
Curiam Histrionum Cestrie in civitate pre-
dicta hac vice tantum tenendam," or in
terms practically the same. In the first
two years Richard, Abbot of St. Werburg,
is chief steward, supported by the mayor
of the year, and by Master William Thomas
in 1477 and Peter Button, sen., in 1479.
The last-named* was again appointed in
1480, with John Massy, sen.,| Thomas
Pole, sen., armiger, and John Sotheworth,
armiger.J
These facts are recorded in the Thirty- First Report of the Deputy Keeper of the Public Records (1870), pp. 223, 256 ; and I am somewhat surprised to find no refer- ence to this very special type of court in the Index to the Fourth Series (then current) of ' N. & Q.' Is anything further known of its proceedings ? or of analogous courts elsewhere ?
Was a company of travelling actors subject then to the variant decisions of the autho- rities in the cities and towns it visited ?
Q. V.
MORGANS OF TREDEGAR. I am anxious to obtain further information with regard to the ancestry of William Morgan, who was born in November, 1754, at Grays Thurrock, and is described as the son of John and Ann Morgan. He was closely related to the Morgans of Tredegar, but further par- ticulars as to the relationship are required. He bore as his arms Or, a griffin segreant sable ; as a crest, a griffin's head erased. He served for a time as an officer in the Navy, and subsequently lived in Lisbon. He was at one time connected in some way with Messrs. Crawford & Trotter, a firm of Admiralty contractors.
William Morgan married Mary Catherine von Bockmann in 1783, and had four sons and three daughters. His eldest son John and his sons William and George have descendants. His eldest daughter, Anne Eugenia, married Sir Henry Chamberlain, Bt., and was the mother of Field-Marshal Sir Neville Bowles Chamberlain and others ;
- Described as "of Hatton" in the latter enrol-
ment.
f Possibly the " John Mascy " who was appointed clerk of the exchequer of the county of Chester, during pleasure, on 5 Nov., 1474.
% One John Sotheworth was mayor and escheator of the city of Chester in 1468, 1475, 1476, and 1478 (ubi supra, 222, 241).
