On the 20th Feb., 1655, whilst travelling in France, Lord Carrington was barbarously murdered by one of his servants for the sake of his money and jewels, and buried at Pontoise. (Bankes’ Dormant and Extinct Peerage, vol. iii. p. 155.) The title became extinct circiter 1705.

BRAYBOOKE.

Lord Monson presents his compliments to the Editor of “NOTES AND QUERIES,” and has the pleasure of answering a Query contained in this day’s Number, p. 440.; and takes the liberty of adding another.

The English nobleman murdered at Pontoise was Charles Smith, Viscount Carrington of Barrefen, Ireland, and Baron Carrington of Wotton Warem, co.  Warwick; the date in the pedigrees of the murder is usually given 1666, probably March 1665-6.

The last Lord Carrington died 17 May, 1706:  the estates of Wotton came to Lewis Smith, who married Eliz., daughter of William Viscount Monson, and relict of Sir Philip Hungate.  His son Francis Smith Carrington died in 1749, and left one daughter and heir.  What relation was Lewis Smith to the Smiths Lord Carrington?  No pedigree gives the connection.

Dover, May 4. 1850.

["J.M.W.” has kindly answered this Query; so also has “W.M.T.,” who adds, “Lord Carrington, previously Sir Charles Smith, brother to Sir John Smith, who fell on the King’s side at Alresford in 1644, being Commissary-General of the Horse.  By the way, Bankes says it was his son John who fell at Alresford, but it is more likely to have been, as Clarendon states, his brother, unless he lost there both a brother and a son.”] {491}

Esquires and Gentlemen.—­I would ask your correspondent (No. 27. p. 437.), whether he has ascertained the grounds of distinction made in the seventeenth and in the early part of the eighteenth century, between esquires and gentlemen, when both were landed proprietors?  We find lists of names of governors of hospitals, trustees, &c., where this distinction is made, and which, apparently, can only be accounted for on this ground, that the estates of the gentleman were smaller in extent than those of the esquire; and, consequently, that the former was so far a person of less consideration.  Had the bearing of coat armour, or a connection with knighthood, any thing to do with the matter?

J.H.  MARKLAND. 
Bath, May.

Early Inscriptions.—­The excellent remarks by “T.S.D.” on “Arabic Numerals, &c.” (No. 18. p. 279.) have put me in mind of two cases which in some degree confirm the necessity for his caution respecting pronouncing definitively on the authenticity of old inscriptions, and especially those on “Balks and Beams” in old manorial dwellings.  The house in which I spent the greater portion of my youth was a mansion of the olden time, whose pointed gables told a tale of years; and whose internal walls and principal floors, both below and above stairs, were formed of “raddle and daub.”