Spanish fiction -- Translations into English; Spanish poetry -- Translations into English
His proceedings passed unnoticed during fourteen happy years. At
last attention was drawn to them in _Notes and Queries_ (May 11,
1861, p. 365) by a correspondent who signed himself "A Stationer." "A
Stationer" remarked sarcastically on the erasure of all references to
the aldermanship from the monuments in Wraysbury Church, noted that
the dead Gills had been glorified into Gylls, deplored Gordon Gyll's
ingratitude towards the ancestors to whom he owed everything, censured
Gyll's conduct as "silly," and protested against such tampering as
improper. The editor of _Notes and Queries_ supported "A Stationer's"
view on the ground that monuments had hitherto been accepted as
testimony in suits at law, and that their evidential value would be
completely destroyed if Gyll's example were generally followed. Gyll
put on his finest county manner, and replied in an incoherent letter
(_Notes and Queries_, May 26, 1861, p. 414) which breathes the haughty
spirit of a great territorial chieftain. He denounced the insolence of
"A Stationer" in daring to criticize "a county family," branded the
intruder as a "tradesman," a "miserable citizen critic," and pitied the
poor soul's "confined education." But he failed to explain his conduct
satisfactorily, and laid himself open to the taunts of Dr. J. Alexander
(_Notes and Queries_, June 8, 1861, p. 452), who declared that Gyll had
"proved himself unable to write English, and ignorant of some of the
simplest rules of composition." Dr. Alexander added that,--if a licence
obtained in 1844 could justify changing the spelling of the name of a
man who died in 1798,--by parity of reasoning, "had the worthy alderman
accepted the proferred baronetcy, all his ancestors would, _ipso
facto_, become baronets. I believe China is the only country where
this practice obtains." In the same number of _Notes and Queries_, "A
Stationer" returned to the subject, and posed a number of very awkward
questions. "Are the Gylls really a county family? And when did they
become so? Has any member of the house ever filled the office of Knight
of the shire, or even that of sheriff for the county of Buckingham?"
And, after reproaching Gyll for his repudiation of his hard-working
grandfather, "A Stationer" ended by assuring the proud squire that "the
Stationers of London have a more grateful recollection of their quondam
brothers and benefactors--for benefactors they were to a very unequal
extent. From Alderman Wright, the Stationers received 2000_l._ 4 per
cents.: from Alderman Gill (who left a fortune of £300,000) 30_s._ a
year to be added to Cator's dinner. However, their portraits are still
to be seen in the counting-house of the Company, placed in one frame,
side by side. "_Par nobile fratrum!_" Gyll dashed off a reply which
the editor of _Notes and Queries_ (June 29, 1861, p. 520) declined to
insert: "as we desire to avoid as much as possible any intermixture
of personal matters into this important question." At this the blood
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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