Page:Notes and Queries - Series 10 - Volume 11.djvu/481

 10 s. XL MAY i.->,

NOTES AND QUERIES.

397

emblematical of the sign, " The Jolly Sailor," with a few words underneath, give them from memory :

Brother shipmate, I prithee stop And lend a hand to strop this block.

When the old house was pulled down anc rebuilt according to modern ideas, the figure was placed on a bracket outside where it can still, I believe, be seen. This naturally brings us to " The Wooden Mid- shipman," which many readers of ' N. & Q. have seen in Leadenhall Street, and which is immortalized by Dickens. A. RHODES.

ABRAHAM LINCOLN AND ' MORTALITY ' {10 S. xi. 247). Among the many American centenary tributes to Abraham Lincoln is one in Putnam's Magazine, written by General Grant Wilson, who, as a young staff officer in the Army of the North, was intimate with the President. In that article he shows that the account of Lincoln and the poem of ' Mortality,' given by MR. GRIGOR is not entirely in accordance with the facts. Writing of an evening at the White House in January, 1865, the General remarks :

"Mr. Lincoln's favorite poem, he said, was entitled ' Mortality,' the author of which he had failed to discover. I was pleased to be able to inform him that it was written by William Knox, a youn? Scottish poet who died in 1825. He was

freatly interested, and was still more gratified y the receipt, a few days later, of a collection of Knox's poems containing his favorite, which had appeared in hundreds of newspapers throughout the country, and had been frequently attributed to Mr. Lincoln. A characteristic note of thanks for the volume was received from the President. This note was abstracted a score of years later, pre- sumably by some Lincoln admirer, from a large autograph album containing my most precious literary treasures."

J. G. W. New York.

BELLS RUNG BACKWARDS (10 S. ix. 229, 418, 473; x. 335; xi. 297). There is an earlier example than those referred to by MR. THORNTON in Burton's ' Anatomy of Melancholy,' part. 2, sect. 2, memb. 6, subs. 2 : " The Physitians caused the bells to be rung backward, and told him the towne was on fire " (p. 246 in the second edition, 1624 ; the first edition is not at hand).

EDWARD BENSLY.

Aberystwyth.

CARSTARES OR CARSTAIRS (10 S. xi. 290). According to ' The Scottish Nation,' by James Macveigh (1888), Carstairs is a sur- name derived from the parish of that name in the upper ward of Lanarkshire. He splits

the word up into caer, the British walled place or castle ; and stairs, staer, or ster, a corrupt form of the word terrce or terrace, signifying lands pertaining to or holding of the castle. A. R. BAYLEY.

Macleod and Dewar's ' Gaelic Dictionary ' has cabstar, cabstair, a curb, the bit of a bridle. TOM JONES.

NANNY NATTY COTE : LUCY LOCKET ( 10 S. xi. 268). I have heard these two rimes ever since I was a child. They are well known both in Northamptonshire and Warwick- shire. The first is a riddle, to which the Editor has supplied the answer. Our version, as follows, varies slightly :

Little Miss Hetty Cote

In a white petticoat And a red nose.

The longer she stands

The shorter she grows.

Our third line of ' Lucy Locket ' also differs slightly from A. G.'s version :

Lucy Locket lost her pocket, Kitty Fisher found it ; Nothing in it but rusty pins, And all the binding round it.

JOHN T. PAGE. Long Itchington, Warwickshire.

If A. G. will refer to the note on Kitty Fisher ante, p. 245, he will see that she at least was not a " noted courtesan in the reign of Charles II."

HORACE BLEACKLEY.

My old nurse in Somerset used to repeat the riddle thus :

Old Nancy Netty Cote Had a white petticoat

And a red nose. The longer she lives The shorter she grows.

The " red nose," I was told, was the burning wick of the candle. J. HARRIS STONE.

In the United States the ditty in regard bo Nan Netty Cote is always regarded as a riddle, and has a third line, "And a red nose " of course, the flame.

HENRY LEFFMANN. Philadelphia.

LADY'S HERALDIC MOTTO (10 S. xi. 268). Cussans's ' Handbook of Heraldry,' by ar the best of the elementary books on the science, is emphatic on this question : ' The use of the Motto is in all cases forbidden ,o Ladies, the Queen excepted " (p. 199). R. L. MORETON. [MR. A. R. BAYLEY writes to the same effect.]