Page:Notes and Queries - Series 10 - Volume 4.djvu/181

 ID- a. iv. AUG. ID, 1905.) NOTES AND QUERIES. 145 ea parmuam ft Locuur uof cr nfif (n SIR JOHN FASTOLF.—In a notice of Mr. Copinger's ' County of Suffolk' (ante, p. 99), the reviewer writes : " Under Cotton Manor we find the mention of Sir John Faatolf (sic)." Does the sic imply objection to the spelling of the name, or doubt as to actual existence of its bearer ? Sir John Fastolf (or Fastolfe) was a real man. He is portrayed in Shakespeare's '1 King Henry VI.,' Act III. so. ii., not flatteringly, since he is there made to own that he would " leave all the Talbots in the world to save his life,"* yet more than 400 years after hia death (in 1459) is found worthy of a niche in the 'D.N.B.1 There, or in the Paston Letters, of which he wrote very many, we learn, among other things, that lie went • May not the imaginary Falstaff have been meant as a caricature of Fastolf, and not, as is generally supposed, of the "good Lord Cobham "? through the long French war begun by Henry V., was made Governor of the Bastille and other places in France, helped to negotiate the Peace of Arras (1434). built the castle at Caister, Norfolk, his birthplace, was of irascible tern per, gave up soldiering, and took to law, trade, and usury, once lent the Duke of York (the first "White Rose") 437Z., a large sum of money in those days, holding, meanwhile, in pledge the impecunious Duke's, plate and jewels, kept six vessels flying be- tween Yarmouth and London, left property to his cousin John Paston, and managed to accomplish a good deal more in the course- of a long and busy life. ELEANOR C. SMYTH. 363, Gillott Road, Edgbaston. PROROGATION OF PARLIAMENT.—One of the most firmly established beliefs in the mind not only of the man in the street, but of