This statement "comes in such a questionable shape," and from so "questionable" a quarter, that really one cannot be blamed for questioning it. Surely the ministers referred to must have been men deprived of their charges? Can any correspondent of "N. & Q." speak to this subject? I am certain that the Scottish clergy of that age would never have suffered any _Buckle the Beggars_ to rank with them as regular preachers, though "out of employment."
_Devil, Proper Name._--Will any of your correspondents kindly inform me whether there are any persons now existing of the name of Devil; or who bear the devil on their coat of arms? In 1847 I saw upon the panel of a carriage in London the _devil's head_ for a crest. To what family does this belong? "Robin the Devil" is mentioned in _Rokeby_, cant. vi. st. 32. The following is from the _Monthly Mirror_, August, 1799:
"Formerly there were many persons surnamed 'the Devil.' In an ancient book we read of one Rogerius Diabolus, Lord of Montresor." "An English monk, Willelmus, cognomento Diabolus. Again, Hughes le Diable, Lord of Lusignan. Robert, Duke of Normandy, son of William the Conqueror, was surnamed 'the Devil.' In Norway and Sweden there were two families of the name of 'Trolle,' in English, 'Devil;' and every branch of these families had an emblem of the devil for their coat of arms. In Utrecht there was a family called 'Teufel' (or Devil); and in Brittany there was a family of the name of 'Diable.'"
_Hendurucus du Booys; Helena Leonora de Sieveri._--Their portraits engraved by Cornelius Vischer from paintings by Vandyke. Who were they?
_Can a Clergyman marry himself?_--If a clergyman were to perform the marriage service in his own case, would it be valid? Has such an occurrence ever been known?
_Ground Ice._--Has any satisfactory explanation been given of the mode in which the peculiar substance termed _ground ice_ is formed in certain rivers. I am most familiar with it as seen in the Wiltshire Avon. It is seen in some rivers in Lincolnshire, where I am told it is called _ground-gru_. One who has noticed it in the Teviot says, that the inhabitants there call it "sludge."
The fact of ice being formed at the _bottom_ of streams, where we should expect a higher temperature, is so curious an anomaly, that it would be desirable to collect instances where and at what depths it is observed.