kindness. The Duke replied, 'Do you think I have been so long a pupil
of Dr. Burnet's without learning to be a hypocrite?'"

J. Y.

_Old Custom preserved in Warwickshire._--There is a large stone a few miles
from Dunchurch, in Warwickshire, called "The Knightlow Cross." Several of
Lord John Scott's tenants hold from him on the condition of laying their
rent before daybreak on Martinmas Day on this stone: if they fail to do so,
they forfeit to him as many pounds as they owe pence, or as many white
bulls with red tips to their ears and a red tip to their tail as they owe
pence, whichever he chooses to demand. This custom is still kept up, and
there is always hard riding to reach the stone before the sun rises on
Martinmas Day?

L. M. M. R.

_English Diplomacy_ v. _Russian_.--A friend of Sir Henry Wotton's being
designed for the employment of an ambassador, came to Eton, and requested
from him some experimental rules for his prudent and safe carriage in his
negociations; to whom he smilingly gave this for an infallible
aphorism,--that, to be in safety himself, and serviceable to his country,
he should always, and upon all occasions, speak the truth (it seems a state
paradox). "For," says Sir Henry Wotton, "_you shall never be believed_; and
by this means your truth will secure yourself, if you shall ever be called
to any account; and 'twill also put your adversaries (who will still hunt
counter) to a loss in all their disquisitions and undertakings."
(_Reliquiae Wottonianae_.)

ALPHA.

* * * * *

Queries.

ANCIENT TENURE OF LANDS.

(Vol. ix., pp. 173. 309.)

The following paragraphs, containing both Notes and Queries, will doubtless
interest your readers

At the last Kent assizes held at Maidstone (March, 1854) a case was tried
by a special jury, of whom the writer was one, before Mr. Baron Parke;
plaintiffs, "the Earl of Romney and others," trustees under an act of
parliament to pay the debts of the borough of Queenborough, county Kent;
defendants, "the Inclosure Commissioners of England and Wales." Tradition
relates that Edward III. was so pleased with his construction of the Castle
of Queenborough, that he complimented his consort by not only building a
town, but creating a borough[4], which he named after her honour.[5] The
case, in various shapes, has been before the law courts for some time, and
was sent to these Kent assizes to ascertain whether Queenborough was eit