The flamboyant type may possibly be of Eastern origin. The krisses of the Malays, at the present day have serpentine blades. W. J. BERNHARD SMITH. Temple. _Cockade_ (Vol. iii., pp. 7. 196.).--The _cockade_ was simply the knot of the riband that served to _cock_ the broad flapped hat worn by military men in the seventeenth century, and which in fine weather, or going into action, &c., they used to _cock_, by means of hooks, laces, and ribands. We see still in the {293} cocked-hats of coachmen and beadles, the traces of these old ligaments. Hence the phrase to _cock one's hat_. Let me add one or two remarks on other points of dress arising out of old military habits. In old times coats were of the shape we now call frocks, and _lined_ throughout, generally with a different colour from the outside. When a person in one of these coats was going about any active work, and particularly into fight, he doubled back his sleeves, and folded back the collar, which, being of a different colour, came to be what we now call the _facings_ of military uniforms. The French, truer to their origin, still call them the "_revers_." So also on such occasions the broad skirts of the frock coat used to be hooked back not to impede the movements of the lower limbs, and thence the swallow tails of military uniforms. So also the high jack-boots, that covered the knees, used, in walking, to be turned down, and the inside being of a lighter colour, gave the idea of what are called _top-boots_. C. * * * * * Miscellaneous. NOTES ON BOOKS, SALES, CATALOGUES, ETC. In the belief that the time has arrived when the history of our national architecture must be reconsidered, with a view to a revision of the classes or periods into which it has hitherto been divided, Mr. Sharpe has just put forth a handsomely illustrated volume, under the title of _The Seven Periods of English Architecture defined and illustrated_. Mr. Sharpe's proposal is, that these seven periods should be thus formed:--three belonging to the division _Romanesque_, under the titles of Saxon, Norman, and Transitional Periods; and the remaining four to the _Gothic_, viz. the Lancet, Geometrical, Curvilinear, and Rectangular Periods. We must, of course, refer our readers who desire to know the principles upon which Mr. Sharpe proposes this great change to the work itself, which is plain and to the purpose.