It will be satisfactory to hear at the same time in what work they are to be found. A nobleman of high rank is said to have them engraved on a silver table of the period. ÆGROTUS. Minor Queries Answered. _Call a Spade, a Spade._--What is the origin of the common saying _to call a spade, a spade_? Is it an old proverb or a quotation? In a letter of Melancthon's to Archbishop Cranmer respecting the formularies of the Anglican Church, dated May 1st, 1548, the following sentence occurs, which seems to be another form of it:-- "In Ecclesiâ rectius, _scapham, scapham dicere_; nec objicere posteris ambigua dicta." Is _scapham, scapham dicere_, I would also ask, a classical quotation, or a modern Latin version of the other expression? W. FRASER. [Mr. Halliwell, in his _Dictionary_, says, "The phrase _To call a spade a spade_ is applied to giving a person his real character or qualities. Still in use." "I am plaine, I must needs call _a spade a spade_, a pope a pope."--_Mar-Prelate's Epitome_, p. 2.] _Prince Rupert's Drops._--At the risk of being thought somewhat ignorant, I beg for enlightenment with regard to the following passage extracted from a late number of _Household Words_:-- "Now the first production of an author, if only three lines long, is usually esteemed as a sort of Prince Rupert's Drop, which is destroyed entirely if a person make on it but a single scratch." If you, or some of your correspondents, would not think this too trivial a matter to notice, and would inform me what the allusion to "Prince Rupert's Drop" refers to, I should be very much obliged. YRAM. [For the history of Prince Rupert's Drops our correspondent is referred to our 100th Number, p. 234. These philosophical toys, which exhibit in the most perfect manner the effects of expansion and contraction in melted glass, are made by letting drops of melted glass fall into cold water. Each drop assumes an oval form with a tail or neck resembling a retort; and possesses this singular property, that if a small portion of the tail is broken off the whole bursts into powder with an explosion, and a considerable shock is communicated to the hand that grasps it.] _"Worse than a Crime."_--Who first remarked, with reference to the murder of the Duc D'Enghien by Napoleon, "It was worse than a crime, it was a blunder?" T. ALLASON. Furnival's Inn, Oct. 3. 1851. [This saying has always been attributed to Talleyrand; and it is so clearly the remark of a clever politician, but lax moralist, that we have little doubt it has been very justly appropriated to that distinguished sayer of good things.]