Page:Notes and Queries - Series 10 - Volume 10.djvu/186

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NOTES AND QUERIES. [io s. x. AUG. 22,

curious sketch of nun (' Analecta,' iii. 85). Was he a " stickit " priest ? In the preface to his pamphlet he says he was educated at Douai, and was made a father confessor in 1714, while in Italy. I cannot, however, recognize him in Father Forbes-Leith's
 * Scots Colleges.' J. M. BULLOCH.

118, Pall Mall, S.W.

SIMPSON OB SIMSON FAMILY. Can any reader give me information respecting William Simpson, Rector of St. George' s- in-the-East, 1729 to 1764 ? Is there any biography of him ?

Is anything known of William Simson, a cabinet-maker of St. George's-in-the-East about 1800 ? His son John was apprenticed to John Browning, 25, Prince's Square, Ratcliff Highway, in 1800, and obtained the freedom of the City in 1815.

(Miss) I. SIMSON TUBNEB.

Llysfaen, Wilbraham Road, Chorlton-cum-Hardy

SPANISH WOBKS IN BOBBOW. Can any one say if the following, all quoted by Borrow in ' The Zincali,' have ever been reprinted, or, if not, if they are at all easy of access ?

1. Don Juan de Quinones (1632).

2. Martin del Rio, ' Tractatus de Magia ' (after

3; J. M., ' Historia de los Gitanos,' Barcelona (1832).

ALEX. RUSSELL. Stromness, Orkney.

JOHN-A-DUCK. The following phrase occurs in Scott's ' Ivanhoe,' chap. xxvi. : " I am like John-a-Duck's mare, that will let no man mount her but John-a-Duck." What is the full tradition concerning John-a-Duck, and from what part of the country does the phrase spring ?

READEB, [Asked at 9 S. iii. 90, but without eliciting a reply.]

MICHAELMAS DAY : ITS DATE. Blunt, in ' The Annotated Book of Common Prayer,' says that " there were anciently two days dedicated to St. Michael, May 8th and September 29th." But he gives no reason for the selection of either of these days. Can any of your readers suggest a probable reason ? The second is the only one now observed in the Western Church ; but in the Eastern 8 November" is St. Michael's Day.

W. T. LYNN.

Blackheath.

AMEBICAN NOTIONS : PLACE-NAMES AS POSSESSIVES. Mr. Francis Miltoun, who has done numerous books, chiefly about foreign cathedrals, and whose English

strikes the mere Englishman as strange, says in ' Cathedrals and Churches of the Rhine ' (p. 253) :

" Tom Hood, a supposed humourist, but in reality a sad soul, wailed over Cologne's cathedral when he saw it in the early years of the nineteenth century, and called it 'a broken promise to God.' "

There is evidently much to be learnt from the Americans. I have always thought that Hood was undoubtedly a humourist, but nobody who has read his poems should need to be told, even once, that he also plumbed the very depths of sadness.

" Cologne's cathedral " is hard for English tongues to utter. Can anybody tell why it has become so common for newspapers to write about, say, Ipswich's Town-Hall, Selby's Abbey, and so forth, instead of using place-names as adjectives after the fashion of our forefathers ?

ST. SWITHIN.

JUpIte*.

NONCONFORMIST BURIAL-GROUNDS

AND GRAVESTONES. (10 S. ix. 188, 233, 297, 336, 434; x. 31.)

As reference has been made to Quaker gravestones, perhaps a few notes concerning a visit I paid to the Friends' Burial-Ground at Barking (the last resting-place of the great prison reformer Mrs. Fry) in April, 1892, may be of interest.

In the main street of Barking, about five minutes' walk northwards from the church, stands the little Friends' Meeting-House. A somewhat high wall separates it from the road. Just opposite, on the west side of the way, is the burial-ground. It is almost square, and is surrounded by a brick wall about 10 ft. high. On the inner side the wall is almost completely fringed with trees and shrubs. Admission to the enclosure is gained by a doorway in the wall. The ground is divided into two unequal portions by a path which runs westward from the entrance, and deviates towards the south. About half the space has been used for burials, the stones which mark the graves being uniform in shape and about 2 ft. in height. They simply record the name, year of death, and age. The surface of the ground is quite even, no mounds being raised over the graves. The inscriptions on most of the stones face the east ; but those referring to the Buxton, Gurney, and Fry families are, all but one, an excep- tion to this rule, being set southwards.