Notes and Queries, Number 31, June 1, 1850

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1850, by Various

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Title: Notes & Queries,No. 31., Saturday, June 1, 1850

Author: Various

Release Date: June 12, 2004 [EBook #12589]

Language: English

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Produced by Jon Ingram, Clint Hepner and PG Distributed Proofreaders.

Produced from page scans provided by the Internet Library of Early

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[** Transcriber's note. I used the Unicode combining diacritical to indicate a long o in Hæreseos. In the note on Parish Register's Tax, I could not make out one superscript; I have left it as an asterisk. I also could not make out part of the text in HOWKEY or HORKEY; I have left the unreadable text as a row of asterisks. **]

NOTES AND QUERIES:

A MEDIUM OF INTER-COMMUNICATION FOR LITERARY MEN, ARTISTS, ANTIQUARIES, GENEALOGISTS, ETC.

When found, make a note of.—CAPTAIN CUTTLE.

CONTENTS.

NOTES:—

Parish Registers—Statistics1

The Hudibrastic Verse, by S.W. Singer3

Custom of presenting Gloves, by Jas. Crosby4

Folk Lore:Exhumation of Body ominous to Family of the Deceased—Suffolk Folk Lore—Cure for Fits—Bible and Key4

Notes on Jeremy Taylor's Life of Christ, &c., by J.E.B. Mayor5

Unpublished Epigrams in the British Museum6

On Authors and Books, No. 7., by Bolton Corney6

QUERIES:—

Punishment of Death by Burning6

Cornelis Drebble6

Verses attributed to Charles Yorke7

Cultivation of Geometry in Lancashire8

Asinorum Sepultura by W.B. MacCabe8

Minor Queries:—Ransom of an English Nobleman—When does Easter end?—Carucate of Land—Members for Calais—Members for Durham—Leicester and the reputed Poisoners of his Time—Lord John Townshend's Poetical Works—Martello Towers—Mynyddyslwyn—Three Dukes—Bishops and their Precedence—Guineas—Parish Registers Tax—Charade9

REPLIES:—

Howkey or Horkey, by S.W. Singer10

Charles Martel11

Feast and Fast11

Replies to Minor Queries:— The Badger's Legs— Twm Sion Catti— Christian Captives— Cannibals— Symbols of the four Evangelists— Turkish Spy— Dr. Maginn's Miscellanies— Trianon— Pimlico— The Arms of Godin— Title of D.D.— Emancipation of the Jews— Sneck-up or Snick-up12

MISCELLANEOUS:—

Notes on Books, Catalogues, Sales, &c.14

Books and Odd Volumes wanted15

Notice to Correspondents15

Advertisements15

OUR SECOND VOLUME.

We cannot resist the opportunity which the commencement of our Second Volume affords us, of addressing a few words of acknowledgment to our friends, both contributors and readers. In the short space of seven months, we have been enabled by their support to win for NOTES AND QUERIES no unimportant position among the literary journals of this country. We came forward for the purpose of affording the literary brotherhood of this great nation an organ through which they might announce their difficulties and requirements, through which such difficulties might find solution, and such requirements be supplied. The little band of kind friends who first rallied round us has been reinforced by a host of earnest men, who, at once recognising the utility of our purpose, and seeing in our growing prosperity how much love of letters existed among us, have joined us heart and hand in the great object we proposed to ourselves in our Prospectus; namely, that of making NOTES AND QUERIES by mutual intercommunication, a most useful supplement to works already in existence—a treasury for enriching future editions of them—and an important contribution towards a more perfect history than we yet possess of our language, our literature, and those to whom we owe them.

Thanks, again and again, to the friends and correspondents, who, by their labours, are enabling us to accomplish this great end. To them be the honour of the work. We are content to say with the Arabian poet:

"With conscious pride we view the band

Of faithful friends that round us stand;

With pride exult, that we alone

Can join these scattered gems in one;

Rejoiced to be the silken line

On which these pearls united shine."

NOTES.

PARISH REGISTERS.—STATISTICS.

Among the good services rendered to the public by yourself and your correspondents, few, I think will be found more important than that of having drawn their attention to Mr. Wyatt Edgell's valuable suggestions on the transcription of Parochial Registers. The supposed impracticability of his plan has perhaps hitherto deterred those most competent to the work from giving it the consideration which it deserves. I believe the scheme to be perfectly practicable; and, as a first move in the work, I send you the result of my own dealings with the registers of my parish.

It is many years since I felt the desideratum which Mr. Edgell has brought before the public; and, by way of testing the practicability of transcribing, and printing the parochial registers of the entire kingdom in a form convenient for reference, I made an alphabetical transcript of my own, which is now complete. The modus operandi which I adopted was this:—1. I first transcribed, on