412
NOTES AND QUERIES. [9* s. v. MAY 20, 1900.
scholars, and is wholly unconnected wit
mensuration of any kind. The statement tha
Metham "must" be connected with mete, t
measure, is pure assumption ; it may easib
he from another source. Thus the A.-S. met
ern is a room for taking common meals ir
and is a derivative of mete, meat. I continu
to protest against having such crude notion
thrust upon us. Any assertion seems goor
enough ; the assertion that the Late L. man
sura is all one with mensura is obviously
absurd, although it did once happen tha
a mediaeval scribe confused them.
WALTER W. SKEAT.
"SEVERAL." It has always seemed to me curious that this word should have such distinctly opposite meanings as to be applieo to a single and individual thing and also tc a number. Thus we have " several persons," meaning a good number, and persons who are bound "jointly and severally," where i\ means separately and individually. But J have heard the word used in a third sense. for which I can find no authority. The vicar of a large parish, after publishing the banns, generally a goodly list, invariably introduced the word in lieu of "respectively": "If any of you know any just cause or impediment why these persons should not severally be joined together," &c. I ventured to ask him about it, and his reply was that he thought it the usual expression, inferring that he him- self had become used to it from hearing it elsewhere. I should be glad to learn if any of your readers have known it to be similarly used. HOLCOMBE INGLEBY.
Heacham Hall, Norfolk.
A LINEAL DESCENDANT OP JOHN WICKLIFFE, D.D. The following note was written on a piece of paper and pinned upon the fly-leaf of
- Our Protestant Forefathers/ published in
1835. It may be added that the note was taken from a book which I had offered me in February last, and, thinking it worth a niche in ' N. & Q.,' I venture to send it :
" Died, January 29th, 1838, in the seventy-fifth year of her age, at Halton, near Leeds, Mrs. Catharine Wade. She was the last born of the name of Wick- liffe, and lineally descended from the great reformer. "
It would be interesting to know if there is any proof for the foregoing statement.
CHAS. H. CROUCH.
Nightingale Lane, Wanstead.
" CETU," A GHOST - WORD. In Hatton's ' New View of London ' (ii. 621-2) the Vintners' Company are described as bearing for their arms "Sable, a chevron cetu, three tuns argent, with a Bacchus for the crest," arid
this description has been copied at various
times without correction, the most recent
instance being in an article in the now defunct
West-End of 8 March, 1899, on 'Pulling down
an Ancient Palace,' descriptive of the house
No. 17, Fleet Street, where the arms of the com-
pany appear on the ceiling of the front room
on the first floor. I have searched in vain for
an explanation of a " chevron cetu," and have
arrived at the conclusion that "cetu" is not an
heraldic term, as it has been apparently taken
to be, but what Prof. Skeat calls a ghost- word,
being a misreading of the contraction bet'n for
between, the proper description of the Vint-
ners' arms being Sable, a chevron, between
three tuns argent, with a Bacchus for the
crest. JOHN HEBB.
Canonbury Mansions, N.
THE MACRAES AND THE SEAFORTH HIGH- LANDERS. In the list of 'Regimental Nick- names of the British Army ' (ante, p. 225) it is stated that " ' Macraes ' was a name given to the first battalion of the Seaforth Highlanders, because there were so many of that surname in it." I have always understood but I can point to no authority beyond family tradition that the regiment of Seaforth Highlanders was originally formed chiefly of MacRaes, with whom the MacAulays and the Mac- Kenzies were associated. When the clansmen were subjugated by the agency of Rob Roy MacGregor, I have been told they were offered the alternatives of forming a loyalist
egiment or of being hanged, and they be- came the nucleus of the Seaforth regiment. [f this information is wrong, I shall be glad
- o be corrected. Another reason that would
account for the name sticking to the Sea- brths as it does to this day is the notoriety of the "mutiny of the wild MacRaes," of ^hich a brief account is given in a note to
- he introduction to Scott's 'Two Drovers.'
J. F. McRAE.
Lee, S.E.
THE BIRTHPLACE OF BYRON. The owner, Mr. Tohn Lewis, of No. 24, Holies Street, Caven- dish Square, has certainly made handsome amends for the tardy fulfilment of his pro- mise to erect some fitting memorial at the pot where the illustrious poet first saw the ight. Formerly, as most of us know, a Society of Arts medallion marked this note- vorthy site. As a fact this indication of " the louse where Byron was born " was not strictly orrect ; for the original walls had been razed aany years before. It is to be regretted that he same inaccuracy has been perpetuated in he present instance, " Byron horn here 1788." However, one is tempted to forgive the slip
