following inscription:

"Thomas Hobbes, aet. 81. 1669.
J^{os}. Wick Wrilps, Londiensis, Pictor Caroli 2^{di}. R.
pinx^t."

Is this painter the same as John Wycke, who died in 1702, but who is not, I
think, known as a portrait painter?

Can any of your readers inform me whether a portrait of Hobbes is now in
the galleries at Florence, and, if so, by whom it was painted? It is
possible that mine is a duplicate of the picture which was painted for the
Grand Duke.

W. C. TREVELYAN.

Wallington.

* * * * *

Minor Queries with Answers.

_Brasenose, Oxford_.--I am anxious to learn the origin and meaning of the
word _Brasenose_. I have somewhere heard or read (though I cannot recall
where) that it was a Saxon word, _brasen haus_ or "brewing-house;" and that
the college was called by this name, because it was built on the site of
the brewing-house of King Alfred. All that Ingram says on the subject is
this:

"This curious appellation, which, whatever was the origin of it, has
been perpetuated by the symbol of a brazen nose here and at Stamford,
occurs with the modern orthography, but in one undivided word, so early
as 1278, in an Inquisition, now printed in the _Hundred Rolls_, though
quoted by Wood from the manuscript record."--See his _Memorials of
Oxford_.

CUTHBERT BEDE, B.A.

[Our correspondent will find the notice of King Alfred's brew-house in
the review of Ingram's _Memorials_ in the _British Critic_, vol. xxiv.
p. 139. The writer says, "There is a spot in the centre of the city
where Alfred is said to have lived, and which may be called the native
place or river-head of three separate societies still existing,
University, Oriel, and Brasenose. Brasenose claims his palace, Oriel
his church, and University his school or academy. Of these Brasenose
College is still called, in its formal style, 'the King's Hall,' which
is the name by which Alfred himself, in his laws, calls his palace; and
it has its present singular name from a corruption of _brasinium_, or
_brasin-huse_, as having been originally located in that part of the
royal mansion which was devoted to the then important accommodation of
a brew-house." Churton, in his _Life of Bishop Smyth_, p. 277., thus
accounts for the origin of the word:--"Brasen Nose Hall, as the Oxford
antiquary has shown, may be traced as far back as the