Various

“ A greater act of injustice could hardly be perpetrated than this virtual abrogation of the original charter, after so many years of labour had been expended, charges incurred, loss of estates and relations, and the other evils attending planting this colony which absence from England gave rise to. Sir Edmund Plowden was not inferior to any of his co-governors in ability, fortune, position, or family. ”

“ In Buckinghamshire it is common, on the death of any one of the family, for the nurse to go to all the bee-hives in the garden, and tap gently three times, each time repeating three times these words, 'Little brownie, little brownie, your master's dead;' when the bees, beginning to hum, show their consent to remain. ”

“ A young queen, surrounded by ruffians, barbarians, and selfish and unprincipled leaders of factions, placed in a situation in which every feeling of the woman was outraged, every sentiment lacerated, her honour, her station, her life in jeopardy, her memory liable to degradation and disgrace, in terror, having in such extremity no friend to whom she could apply for advice and succour, she may have been induced to adopt means for her safety which, if injudicious, were excusable. ”

“ They have secured for America one of the finest countries in the world, which may one day be an empire of vast power. Its separation from the mother country was the greatest national calamity that ever befell her. ”

“ Therefore We, for Us, our heirs, and successors, do give unto the aforesaid Sir Edmund Plowden, and his heirs and assigns, free and full power graciously to confer favours and honours upon the well-deserving citizens and inhabitants within the province aforesaid with whatever titles and dignities he shall choose to decorate them with (in such a manner as they may but now be usurped in England) , and to cut and stamp different pieces of gold such as shall be lawful, current, and acceptable to all the inhabitants ”

“ AN OLD BENGAL CIVILIAN is informed that, no matter whom Byron may have intended to designate by the above glorious appellation, there is but ONE to whom it properly belongs. If your correspondent will consult the 110th Psalm, he will find David representing God the Father as thus addressing God the Son, the Lord Jesus Christ: "The dew of Thy birth is of the womb of the morning." ”

“ Though he made a greater sacrifice than any, he never received the slightest compensation like the other early colonisers. We conclude that family dissentions connected with the disinheritance of Francis Plowden, must have tended to facilitate Charles II.'s illegal conduct; for, in Thomas Plowden's Will, 1698, in the Prerogative Court of Canterbury, he alludes to his son-in-law, Walter Hall, illegally and forcibly retaining papers connected with the estates: Province of New Albion Charter, the Patent for the Peerage of Ireland. ”

“ Three taps are made on the hives with the house-key, while the informant repeats: "Bees, bees, bees, your master is dead, and you must work for ——," naming the future owner. A piece of black crape is then fastened to the hive. Many bee owners think it is politic to inform the bees of the death of a relation: but in this case they never give the name, but the degree of relationship; as "your master's brother, sister, aunt, &c. is dead." On weddings the bees always expect to be informed of the auspicious event, and to have their hive decorated with a wedding favour. ”

“ I have therefore appended to the catalogue of modern historians a few of the principal cotemporary works, disciplinary, doctrinal, and historical, from age to age down to the end of the twelfth century, which would be a far more trustworthy clue to the real sentiments of the times than could be gained from a more modern source, and could not, I think, fail to be a corrective to narrow misapprehensions, and a great help to the student whose wish it is to be fair and candid. ”

“ This is a very difficult question to solve. Take the first syllable: Grim, grime, dirt, sullying blackness.
"She sweats; a man may go over shoes in the grime of it."—Shakspeare.
Then the word ditch: this is derived from dic (Saxon) , dük (Erse) ; but whatever may be the true etymology of the word, it can scarcely be doubted that it is of Anglo-Saxon origin.
I may however add that there is a tradition in the Grimsditch family of Cheshire, said to have been handed down for many ages, as to the origin of the name, to the following effect:
That in remote ages their first parents were warriors ”

“ It is quite clear that the only estate which came to Thomas's eldest son James of Ewhurst was Lassam in Southampton, and his son James also held it; he was married to Sarah Chichely, daughter of Sir John Chichely, son of Sir Henry Chichely, formerly Governor of Virginia, the lineal descendant of Thomas, Lord Mayor of London, and brother of Archbishop Chichely, founder of All Souls, Oxford. ”

“ Your Querist NAUTICUS describes the vallum or ditch called "Grimsdyke, or Grimesditch, or the Devil's Ditch," running from Great Berkhampstead, Hants, to Bradenham, Bucks, and then puts two Queries.
NAUTICUS assumes that this ditch had, at some distant day, been an artificial earthwork; but at the same time he points out that, "from its total want of flank defence, it could hardly hold an enemy in check for long; and that it does not seem to have been a military way." He asks, "Are there other earthworks of the same name (Grimsdyke) in England?" ”

“ In 9 Edward II., John de Plowden was by parliamentary writ, signed at Clopstow 5th March, called to parliament as one of the lords of the township of Plowden, Salop. Edmund Plowden, the great lawyer in Edw. VI. and Elizabeth's reigns, who was in those times called the oracle of the law, was enrolled among Fuller's Worthies of England, with Camden's Latin verses on him: "Vitæ integritati inter homines suæ professionis nulli secundus." ”

“ Londoners themselves appear to have a theoretical notion that the inhabitants of Belgravia, and other enlightened metropolitan districts, are strictly entitled to the designation cockney, in virtue of their birth and residence within the sound of Bow-bells; but practically limit its application to those members of the lower, and more ignorant classes of the community, who traditionally retain some of the obsolete idioms, and other peculiarities of speech, of our Anglo-Saxon forefathers. ”

“ But there is, in Cheshire, a brook or rivulet in its pristine state, called Grimsditch. This brook or rivulet is one of the contributory streams of Cheshire to the great rivers, the Mersey and the Weaver; and is described by the author of King's Vale Royal of England, or the County Palatine of Chester illustrated, published in 1656, as follows:
"The Grimsditch cometh from the Hall of Grimsditch, by Preston, Daresbury, Keckwith, and so falleth into the Marsey." ”

“ The son of Tydeus is foolish and rash, nor is aware that he who fights with the immortals is not long-lived, and that no children, as he returns from war and strife, gather round his knees to call him father. ”

“ When a death occurs, a person is appointed to call the neighbours to the funeral, who delivers the invitations in one form of words: "You are invited to the funeral of A. B., which is to take place at such an hour, on such a day; and there will be dinner on table at —— o'clock." And if it should happen that bees were kept in the garden of the house where the corpse lies (not an unlikely thing near moors) , the messenger is instructed to address the same invitation to the bees in their hives; because it is considered that, if this compliment be omitted, the bees will die. ”

“ And I think it fit that my English lands and estates shall be settled and united to my Honor, County Palatine, and Province of New Albion, for the maintenance of the same; and again, that all my lease lands in England be sold with all convenient speed by my executors and overseers herein named, and with the money arising therefrom to buy good freehold, to be settled and entailed as the rest of my lands are settled on my second son Thomas Plowden, and the heirs male of his body lawfully begotten, or to be begotten ”

“ For the information of your correspondent A TRANSATLANTIC READER, I beg to inform him that Sir Edmund Plowden or Ployden was 2nd son of Francis Plowden of Plowden, Salop, and Shiplake in Berks: a family which can claim its descent from the Saxon kings of England; and by a Saxon charter, granting lands in Salop to the family, that the family had large estates in that remote period. The Saxon derivation of the name (from the Saxon Plean deen, or kill the Dane) alone shows the great antiquity of the family ”

“ The pathetic story of a person sentenced to death for sheep-stealing, winning the heart of the gaoler by a long course of good conduct, and executed at last on the "death-warrant" being found in the office, is utterly apocryphal. ”

“ At the end of the assizes the crown-bar judge and the clerk of assize sit down quietly together, and go over the sentences of the prisoners, after which they are classed, and a fair copy signed by the clerk of the assize—not the judge—is delivered to the undersheriff, which is his only authority for carrying the different sentences into execution. If a man is to be hung, opposite his name is written, "Let him be hanged by the neck," and an asterisk is added to draw the undersheriff's attention. ”

“ Whether the word cockney be derived from the the land of cockaigne, or the legend of cockaigne arise from cockney, it appears probable that both words have their origin in the same root with the verb to cook, and that the epithet originally conveyed the imputation to citizens, of a superfluous consumption of cooked meat; inasmuch as the inhabitants of large cities generally consider the daily use of fresh meat almost as a necessary of life, while the provincial population is content to exist on less nutritious food. ”

“ Devonshire leases for lives often reserve a money payment on the death of each life as a "heriot" or "farlieu." Can you inform me of the etymology and meaning of the latter word? it appears almost synonymous with "heriot."
CLERICUS.
[Bailey, in his Dictionary, says "Farleu or Farley is a duty of sixpence paid to the lord of the manor of West Slapton in Devonshire, in the western parts; farleu being distinguished as the best good thing from heriot the best beast."] ”

“ George either died, or was killed, in the massacres by the Indians; as was also Francis, third son of Thomas, along with his wife and family, as alluded to in his father's will, dated 1698.
These attacks on the infant colony were instigated by the Dutch and Swedes of the New Netherlands, as they called New Albion, and who did all they could to obstruct and thwart the Earl Palatine's plans, as is alluded to in The Theatre of the Empire of Great Britain: Speed and Basset, 1676, dedicated to James I.; and recommended as a most authentic work by Sir Richard St. George, Norroy King of Arms. ”

“ I was lately informed by a native of Monmouthshire, that the belief relative to bees is entertained in that and some of the adjacent counties even by educated persons. My informant gravely assured me that though the bees are aware of the approaching event, from the acuteness of their organs of smell, they require to be duly and timely communicated with on the subject, to induce them to remain with the survivors ”

“ I conclude, therefore, that there must be a mistake as to the county.
S. S. S.
"Life of Cromwell" (Vol. iv., p. 117.) .
—No life of Cromwell was ever written by "one Kember;" there is a Life of Oliver Cromwell, Lord Protector of the Commonwealth of England, Scotland, and Ireland, the second edition (London, 1725) of which, greatly enlarged from the first, is now before me, and which has the autograph of Malone, who has on the fly-leaf asserted it to have been "written by Isaac Kimber, a Dissenting minister, who was born at Vantage in Berkshire, Dec. ”

“ GUIDE TO ARCHÆOLOGY. An Archæological Index to Remains of Antiquity of the Celtic, Romano-British, and Anglo-Saxon periods. By JOHN YONGE AKERMAN, fellow and secretary to the Society of Antiquaries. 1 vol. 8vo. illustrated with numerous engravings, comprising upwards of 500 objects, cloth, 15s.
"One of the first wants of an incipient antiquary is the facility of comparison, and here it is furnished him at one glance. The plates, indeed, form the most valuable part of the book, both by their number and the judicious selection of types and examples which they contain. ”

“ John's College, Cambridge, author of the Poems and Glossary in the Dorset dialect. 12mo. cloth, 2s. 6d.
"To those who wish to possess a critical knowledge of their own native English, some acquaintance with Anglo-Saxon is indispensable; and we have never seen an introduction better calculated than the present to supply the wants of a beginner in a short space of time. The declensions and conjugations are well stated, and illustrated by references to the Greek, Latin, French, and other languages. A philosophical spirit pervades every part. ”

“ To show that a similar custom and belief, though varying in some particulars, are found upon the continent of Europe, I give the following extract:
"In Lithuania, when the master or mistress of the house dies, it is considered necessary to give notice of the fact to the bees, horses, and cows, by rattling a bunch of keys; and it is believed, that if this were omitted the bees and cattle would die."—See the Journal of Agriculture. Highland and Agricultural Society of Scotland, Oct. 1848, p. 538.
One word more of bees: "His head is full of bees" is a Scotch proverb, said of a drunkard. ”