_Recent Curiosities of Literature_ (Vol. ix., p. 31.).--Your correspondent
MR. CUTHBERT BEDE has done well in directing Mr. Thackeray's attention to
the error of substituting "candle" for "candlestick," at p. 47. of _The
Newcomes_; but it appears that the author discovered the error, and made a
clumsy effort to rectify it; for he elsewhere gives us to understand, that
she died of a wound in her temple, occasioned by coming into contact with
the stone stairs. See H. Newcome's letter.
The following curiosity of literature lately appeared in the London papers,
in a biographical notice of the late Viscount Beresford, which is inserted
in the _Naval and Military Gazette_ of January 14, 1854:
"Of honorary badges he had, first, A cross dependent from seven clasps:
this indicated his having been present in eleven battles during the
Peninsular War. His name was unaccountably omitted in the {137} return
of those present at Ciudad Rodrigo. When Her Majesty gracefully
extended the honorary distinctions to all the survivors of the great
war, Lord Beresford received the _Peninsular_ medal, with two clasps,
for _Egypt_ and Ciudad Rodrigo."
The expression should have been "the silver medal," not "Peninsular;" as,
among the names of battles engraved on the clasps attached to the silver
war-medals, granted in 1849, will be found the words "Martinique," "Fort
Détroit," "Chateauguay," "Chrystler's Farm," and "Egypt."