Various

“ FOLK LORE. Popular Superstitions in Lancashire.
—That a man must never "go a courting" on a Friday. If an unlucky fellow is caught with his lady-love on that day, he is followed home by a band of musicians playing on pokers, tongs, pan-lids, &c., unless he can rid himself of his tormentors by giving them money to drink with.
That hooping-cough will never be taken by any child which has ridden upon a bear. While bear baiting was in fashion, great part of the owner's profits arose from the money given by parents whose children had had a ride. ”

“ Lardner has just issued a small closely printed volume with the object of supplying that "information relating to physical and mechanical science, which is required by the medical and law student, the engineer and artisan, by those who are preparing for the universities, and, in short, by those who, having already entered upon the active pursuits of business, are still desirous to sustain and improve their knowledge of the general truths of physics, and of those laws by which the order and stability of the material world are maintained." ”

“ A ruin, a group of flowers or figures, will employ a good artist about two months, when only two inches square; and a specimen of such a description costs from 5l. to 20l., according to the execution: a landscape, six inches by four, would require eighteen months, and would cost from 40l. to 50l. For a picture of Pæstum, eight feet long by twenty inches broad, on which four men were occupied for three years, 1000l. sterling was asked. The mosaic work of Florence differs entirely from Roman mosaic, being composed of stones inserted in comparatively large masses. ”

“ That hooping-cough may be cured by tying a hairy caterpillar in a small bag round the child's neck, and as the caterpillar dies the cough goes.
That Good Friday is the best day of all the year to begin weaning children, which ought if possible to be put off till that day; and a strong hope is sometimes entertained that a very cross child will "be better" after it has been christened. ”

“ This trust Dionysius faithfully fulfilled, bringing up and loving his nephew as he would have done his own son; and when, three years after the death of Cledonius, he quitted his native country and proceeded to Rome, the youthful Pancras accompanied him. Upon reaching the imperial city, the uncle and nephew took up their residence in the same suburb where the Pope Marcellinus had fled for concealment from the persecution which had been raised against the Christians by the Emperors Diocletian and Maximianus. ”

“ With the reverence for the dead which is so pleasing a characteristic of modern refinement, it is probable that acts of user of this description would now have little weight, inasmuch as no man of right feeling would be disposed to interrupt parties assembled on so mournful and solemn an occasion. I recollect, however, having read a trial in modern times for a riot, arising out of a forcible attempt to carry a corpse over a field against the will of the landowner ”

“ It may be better perhaps, to state the humble method I adopt in attempting to rescue from oblivion those memorials of the dead, than to suggest any. I avail myself of occasions, whenever I visit the country, to take notes of monumental inscriptions in churches and other places of sepulture; generally of all within the walls of the sacred edifice, and those of the principal tombs in the surrounding graveyard. Time very often will not allow me to take verbatim copies of inscriptions; so I merely transcribe faithfully every date, genealogical note, and prominent event recorded upon monuments ”

“ CORPSE PASSING MAKES A RIGHT WAY.
(Vol. iii., p. 477.)
The fact of the passage of a funeral procession over land, from being an act of user of a very public character, must always have had some influence on the trial of the question whether the owner of the land had dedicated the same to the public; and it is not improbable that in early times very great weight was attached to evidence of this kind: so that the passage of a corpse across land came to be considered in the popular mind as conclusive and incontrovertible evidence of a public right of way over that land. ”

“ A Christian man removeth his household, and, having there an image of Christ, equal unto him in length, and breadth, and all proportion, by forgetfulness leaveth it there in a secret place behind him. ”

“ The belief in ghosts, or bogards, as they are termed, is universal.
In my neighbourhood I hardly know a dell where a running stream crosses a road by a small bridge or stone plat, where there is not frectnin (frightening) to be expected. Wells, ponds, gates, &c., have often this bad repute. I have heard of a calf with eyes like a saucer, a woman without a head, a white greyhound, a column of white foam like a large sugar-loaf in the midst of a pond, a group of little cats, &c., &c., as the shape of the bogard, and sometimes a lady who jumped behind hapless passengers on horseback. ”

“ Under the Empire the art was greatly improved, and not merely by the introduction of marbles of various colours, but by the invention of artificial stones, termed by the Italians Smalti, which can be made of every variety of tint. This art was never entirely lost. On the introduction of pictures into Christian temples, they were first made of mosaic: remaining specimens of them are rude, but profoundly interesting in an historical point of view. When art was restored in Italy, mosaic also was improved ”

“ The illustrations are generally of a popular character, and therefore the better calculated to impress upon the mind of the student the principles they are intended to explain.
The new volume of Mr. Bohn's Standard Library consists of the third of Mr. Torrey's translation of Dr. Neander's General History of the Christian Religion and Church. The period included in the present division of this important contribution to ecclesiastical history extends from the end of the Diocletian persecution to the time of Gregory the Great, or from the year 312 to 590. ”

“ The popular belief, that a person cannot die with his head resting on a pillow containing pigeons' feathers, is well known; but the following will probably be as new to many of your readers as it was to myself. On applying the other day to a highly respectable farmer's wife to know if she had any pigeons ready to eat, as a sick person had expressed a longing for one, she said, "Ah! poor fellow! is he so far gone? A pigeon is generally almost the last thing they want; I have supplied many a one for the like purpose."
J. EASTWOOD.
Minor Notes. Lord Nelson's Dress and Sword at Trafalgar. ”

“ CIRCULATION OF OUR PROSPECTUSES BY CORRESPONDENTS. The suggestion of T. E. H., that by way of hastening the period when we shall be justified in permanently enlarging our Paper to 24 pages, we should forward copies of our Prospectus to correspondents who would kindly enclose them to such friends as they think likely, from their love of literature, to become subscribers to "NOTES AND QUERIES ," has already been acted upon by several friendly correspondents, to whom we are greatly indebted. ”

“ John, xix. 13., to mean a sort of elevated [522] mosaic pavement. Andrea Tafi, towards the close of the thirteenth century, is said to have revived this art in Italy, having learned it from a Greek named Apollonius, who worked at the church of St. Mark at Venice, and to have been the founder of the modern mosaic.
Now for the derivation. The Lithostrata, or tesselated pavements of the Romans, being worked in a regular and mechanical manner, were called opus musivum, opera qua ad amussim facta sunt. Hence the Italian musaico, from whence is derived our appellation of mosaic ”

“ MR. DUNKIN'S proposed record of existing monuments will be, if carried into effect, a very useful contribution to genealogists. Many years since I transcribed all the inscriptions inside the parish church of Rochdale, in Lancashire; but I never contemplated the possibility of any antiquary having the ardour to undertake a similar task outside. There are many thousands of gravestones, covering some acres ”

“ Folk lore in Lancashire (Vol. iii., p. 55.) .
—Most of, if not all the instances mentioned under this head by MR. WILKINSON are, as might be expected, current also in the adjacent district of the West Riding of Yorkshire; and, by his leave, I will add a few more, which are familiar to me:
1. If a cock near the door crows with his face towards it, it is a sure prediction of the arrival of a stranger.
2. If the cat frisks about the house in an unusually lively manner, windy or stormy weather is approaching.
3. If a dog howls under a window at night, a death will shortly happen in that house. ”

“ That crickets are lucky about a house, and will do no harm to those who use them well; but that they eat holes in the worsted stockings of such members of the family as kill them. I was assured of this on the experience of a respectable farmer's family. ”

“ When the elbow is rested on the table, and the finger held in a horizontal position, the ring begins to oscillate in the plane of the direction of the finger; but if a female takes hold of the left hand of the person thus experimenting, the ring begins forthwith to oscillate in a plane at right angles to that of its former direction. ”

“ Pilch, an outer garment generally worn in cold weather, and made of skins of fur. 'Pelicium, a pylche.' (Nominale MS.) The term is still retained in connected senses in our dialects. 'A piece of flannel, or other woollen, put under a child next the clout is, in Kent, called a pilch; a coarse shagged piece of rug laid over a saddle, for ease of a rider, is, in our midland parts, called a pilch.' (MS. Lansd. 1033.) 'Warme pilche and warme shon.' (MS. Digby, 86.) 'In our old dramatists the term is applied to a buff or leather jerkin; and Shakspeare has pilcher for the sheath of a sword. ”

“ The crucifix that belonged to this unfortunate queen, and which she is said to have held in her hands on the scaffold, is still preserved with great care by its present owners (a titled family in the neighbourhood of Winchester) , and at whose seat I have frequently seen it. If I mistake not, the figure of our Saviour is of ivory, and the cross of ebony. ”

“ From the replies to my Query on this subject that have been published, it is plain that in all parts of England Dissenters have wished to procure the registry of their children's births or baptisms in their parish churches. In some instances they have been registered as dissenting baptisms ”

“ Thus, upon mere incidental occasions, I have collected sepulchral memorials from many churches in various parts of the country; and, in some instances, all contained in the village church, and the adjacent burying-ground. I have frequently found also that preserving an account of the relative positions of gravestones is important; especially when groups of family memorials occur in the same locality. ”

“ Should a copy of the inscriptions in this receptacle (which are numerous) be acceptable, I will endeavour to procure one; but in this case I should be glad to know whether these extracts should be confined to names, dates, and genealogical information only, or include the various tributes of affection or of friendship, by which they are generally accompanied. ”

“ The yerely sūme of ffiue pounds p'cell of the said yerely rents to be bestowed in wheaten bread, to be made into penny loaves, and upon eu'y Lord's day, [521] called Sonday, throughout eu'y yere of the said terme [40 years or thereabouts] , fowre and twenty loaves of the said bread, wth the inbread allowed by the baker for those twoe dosens of bread, to be timely brought and sett vpon a forme towards the vpp' end of the chancell of the said p'ish church of St. Marie, and ... the same twoe dosens of bread to be giuen and distributed ... to and amongst fowre and twentie poore people ... ”

“ He did by a Policy purchase the Lordship and House of Clift Sachfeld, and enlarged the Barton thereof by gaining of Cornish Wood from the Dean and Chapter fraudulently; building then a very fair and sumptuous house there; he called it Bishop's Clift, and left the same to his successors. Likewise he got the Patronage of Clift Fomesone, now called Sowton, and annexed the same to his new Lordship, which (as it was said) he procured by this means. ”

“ One in the possession of a farmer in the parish of Barton Turf, Norfolk, bears an eagle with a human head at its feet, surrounded by—
"The . Erl . of . Darbeyes . arms." 1660.
W. C. LUKIS.
Great Bedwyn, June, 1851.
St. Pancras (Vol. iii., pp. 285. 397.) .
—St. Pancras was a native of the province of Phrygia, the son of a nobleman of the name of Cledonius ”

“ Oxford, May 28.
"Men may live fools, but fools they cannot die."
—These words are given in Young's Night Thoughts as a quotation. Can any of your correspondents inform me whence they are taken?
E. J. K.
Etymology of Bicêtre.
—In a work entitled Description routière et géographique de l'Empire Français, by R. V., Paris, 1813, the following notice of Bicêtre occurs in vol. i. p. ”

“ It may perhaps be considered not quite irrelevant here to state that there seems once to have been an opinion, that the passage of the sovereign across land had the effect of making a highway thereon. The only allusion, however, to this opinion which I can call to mind, occurs in Peck's Antiquarian Annals of Stanford, lib. xi. s. xii.; an extract from which follows:—
"From Stanford King Edward, as I conceive, went to Huntingdon ”

“ Among those remarkable for their rarity, &c., will be found a fine copy of Purchas's Pilgrimes, 5 vols., 1625; Nuremburg Chronicle, 1493; Dante, printed at Rome, 1487; Coverdale's Bible, 1539; Cranmer's Bible, 1585; Musée Français, 4 vols.; Chaucer's Works; Philosophical Transactions, 88 vols.; Houbraken's Heads, &c., &c.
May be viewed two days previous to the Sale, by Catalogues only (6d. each) , which may be obtained five days prior to the sale, of MESSRS. WICKHAM & YELLAND, 163. Strand, London; at the White Hart Hotel, Bristol; Castle Hotel, Bath; Star Hotel, Oxford; Royal Hotel, Cheltenham ”