Notes and Queries, Number 66, February 1, 1851, page 29 by Various Authors
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examination of the pupil by the teacher of grammar. Thus, Fuller, in his Worthies, art. Norfolk, says that--
"The University appointed Dr. Cranmer, afterwards Archbishop of Canterbury, to be the poser-general of all candidates in divinity."
Roquefort, Gloss. de la Langue Romaine, has "apponer, appliquer, poser, plaier." See Richardson in appose and pose.
L.
Culprits torn by Horses (Vol. ii., p. 480.).--In reply to MR. JACKSON'S question respecting culprits torn by horses, I beg to inform him that Robert François Damiens was the last criminal thus executed in France. He suffered on the 28th March, 1757, for an attempt on the life of Louis XV. The awful penalty of the law was carried out in complete conformity with the savage precedents of former centuries. Not one of the preparatory barbarities of question, ordinary and extraordinary, or of the accompanying atrocities of red-hot pincers, melted lead, and boiling oil, was omitted. The agony of the wretched man lasted for an hour and a half, and was witnessed, as Mercier informs us, by all the best company in Paris.
The men amused their leisure with cards, while waiting, as he says, for the boiling oil; and the women were the last to turn their eyes from the hideous spectacle. Your correspondent may be glad to be informed that the same punishment was inflicted on Poltrot de Méré for the murder of the Duke of Guise, in 1563; on Salcède, in 1582, for conspiring against the Duke of Alençon; on Brilland, in 1588, for poisoning the Prince de Condé; on Bourgoing, Prior of the Jacobins, as an accessory to the crime of Jaques Clément, in 1590; and on Ravaillac, for the murder of Henry IV. in 1610. These, with the case of Jean Chastel, are all of which I am aware. If any of your readers can add to the list, I shall feel obliged.
As I am upon the subject of judicial horrors, I would ask, whether any of your correspondents can s