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NOTES AND QUERIES. [io s. xn. JULY 31, im

lio,' 1635, says that one is sure to have a disease should he happen to sneeze in bed very early on New Year's morning, and instantly to spring out of bed is the only preventive.

Further, quoting a poem from an anthology compiled in 905 A.D., Kitamura proves that the Japanese about that period used to put off starting on a journey when one happened to hear even a neighbour sneeze. This reminds us of the Tongans, who hold a sneeze on the setting out of an expedition a most evil presage (Mariner, ap. Tylor, '^Primitive Culture,' 3rd American ed., vol. i. p. 99) ; and of the various indigenous tribes of Formosa, who stop a while, or alter their direction, or even desist from the enter- prise, whenever sneezing occurs on their march in hunting, &c. (Y. In6, ' Sneezing Superstitions of the Formosan Aborigines,' The Journal of the Anthropological Society of Tokyo, No. 270, p. 465, Sept., 1908). According to Sei Shonagon (fl. c. 1000 A.D.), a Court lady celebrated for her wit, the Japanese of her time believed sneezing early on New Year's morning to be an unfailing indication of longevity, which is diametrically opposed to the Chinese opinion mentioned above. In the fourteenth and subsequent centuries it became an established custom with the Japanese nurse to utter " Kusame " every time the child she was suckling sneezed, calling this act " to harmonize the noses " the word " Kusame " being apparently a contraction of a charm, " Kusoku mammei ! " ("Rest in peace for a myriad generations ! ") Also, every child of high birth had its protecting sword adorned with the so-called " nose-cord," a blue cord, about thirteen inches long, in which a knot had to be quietly tied by the attendant on every occasion of its sneezing evidently to avoid disturbing the little one by the noises of " harmonizing the noses." Even nowadays Japan does not entirely lack old-fashioned folks who, after every sternutation, pronounce the formula " Toku Manzai ! " (" Live a myriad years ! ")

KUMAGUSU MlNAKATA.

Tanabe, Kii, Japan.

SUFFRAGAN BISHOPS : THEIR ARMS (10 S. xi. 109, 193). MR. FINNY will see from the late Rev. Dr. Woodward's ' Ecclesiastical Heraldry' (1894), p. 197, that suffragan bishops (or chorepiscopi) appointed under the Acts 26 l^Eenry VIII. and 1 Elizabeth are entitled to use only their paternal arms, enshrined with the mitre.

J. S. UDAL, F.S.A.

Antigua, W.I.

HAMLET AS A CHRISTIAN NAME (10 S. vii. 4, 155, 237, 329, 418, 436). Since con- tributing my former reply on this subject (viii. 156) I have met with two other London references to the name which may be deemed worthy of mention in these pages. Both are contemporary with Shakespeare.

My earliest reference is of date 1571, and refers to a workman who figures in a bill for bricklaying operations then per- formed for the parish of SS. Anne and Agnes. This man bore the singularly feminine- sounding name of Hamleta Deane (not " Hamlet-a-Deane," apparently, as might be supposed).

My second reference is from a Vicar- General's faculty of 1608 referring to the parish church of St. Sepulchre, the curate whereof was then named Hamlett Marshall. WILLIAM MOMURRAY.

HEALEN PENNY (10 S. xi. 507). This was probably " healing gold," i.e., gold given by the King collectively, in the ceremony of touching for the evil. The individual coin with a hole in it for suspending round the neck would no doubt be known as a healing penny (see Pegge's ' Anecdotes of Old Times,' iii. 163).

Halliwell-Phillipps alludes to " Privy-purse healing gold, 500Z.," mentioned in a Treasury Warrant dated 17 Nov., 1683, in his own possession (' Archaic Words ').

J. HOLDEN MACMlCHAEL.

MR. PETER may like to compare his items with the following note from the church- wardens' accounts of St. Michael's, Worcester, transcribed by Mr. Richard Murray, but not yet printed :

1684. "Feb. 16 for the King's proclamation

about the healing, the K s Heill, and the Arch- bishop's directions about the feast of St. Mathias."

In the churchwardens' accounts of the parish of Northfield, Worcestershire, which have been very instructively edited by Mr. Frank S. Pearson (see Transactions of Birmingham Archceological Society for 1908, vol. xxxiv.), there occurs the item :

1683. "Paid to the Parriter about the King's Evill, Is. Id."

E. LEGA-WEEKES.

CLARIONETT AS A SURNAME (10 S. xi. 487). One William Clargenet was a Yorkshire Catholic priest in prison in 1588 (Cath. Rec, Soc. v. 155, 157, 161), and banished in 1606 (Challoner's 'Missionary Priests,' ii 29). I suppose this is the same name.

JOHN B. WAINEWRIGHT.