Page:Notes and Queries - Series 10 - Volume 4.djvu/612

 506 NOTES AND QUERIES. [io* s. iv. DEC. 23.1905. A young unmarried woman told me a short time ago that, whenever she saw a black cat cross her path a few feet before her, she heard in a short time of the death or serious illness of a close friend. When the cat came to her and rubbed against her dress, the •death of a member of her family followed. She gave me two instances of the latter, and mentioned several instances of the former. She has a particular aversion to a black cat, And had this aversion even before she noted trouble coming after such visitations. Other •cats she likes. THOS. RATCLIFFE. Worksop. " AN IRISH WATCHMAN."—In an old album •of nearly eighty years ago is a page thus •headed. There is a quaint picture in water colours of the watchman, with staff and lantern, and four lines entitled :— PAST TWELVE ! To-night is the day, I say it with sorrow. That we were all to have been burnt up to-morrow, Therefore take care of fire and candle light, TIN a fine frosty moruing, and so good-night. M. A. J. THOS. RATCLIFFE. THE BOAR'S HEAD. — It may be worth noting that at St. Cuthbert's College, Worksop, on the evening of 30 November this year, the boar's head was conducted from the kitchen to the supper-room with a procession with lanterns and torches. The college baker, dressed in the apron and cap of his profession, carried the head on high. The chaplain, the Rev. B. R. Hibbert, sang the carol " Caput apri defero, Reddens laudes Domino." THOS. RATCLIFFE. Worksop. "DRINKINGS": "DRINKING TIME."—It is •many years since I heard the terms "drink- ings " and "drinking time," and I wonder whether they are still in use, now that the working conditions of farm and other labourers are so altered from what they were upwards of fifty years ago. In the fields, by the roadside, and in quarry work of every kind there were set terms for taking " drink- ings." The '"leven o'clock" was tfie recog- nized "drinking time" in the forenoon, and " five o'clock " in the post noon. The leader of a gang of men, looking upwards where the sun was or ought to be, said, " 'Leven o'clock, 'tis drinking time," or "Let's hev ar drink- ings"; ana supping kegs and stone bottles were drawn from cool recesses, and, with or without tots, each man had his " 'lowance " in ale, small beer, or " bang-up "—the last a compound from various herbs, worked with barm, or " bang-up barm," stingy to the taste, and even a little heady into the bargain. There was tea also as a drinking, but not in much favour, for the worker in the open liked something " rough on th' tongue," as he would put it, and nothing he could get could be too strong for his taste. Some called it " bite and sup time"—that is, the forenoon pause; but most of them favoured "drink- ings " and " drinking time." THOS. RATCLIFFE. Worksop. "JACK TAR, HAVE YOU HEARD OF THE NEWS ? "—I give the first few lines of an old song I heard in my childhood, and somehow it is often very present with me. It used to be sung by an old nurse :— Jack Tar, have you heard of the news ? "I'i.s peace by land and by sea ; Great guns are no more to be used, They are all disbanded (?) away. 1'ololderololderol, Fololderololderoladdie. " Disbanded " the old woman sang it. JOHN J. SMYTH. Rathcoursey, co. Cork. SIR JAMES PENNETHORNE AND 'THE SATUR- DAY REVIEW.' (See ante, p. 402.)—The article on the ' Rebuilding of the Public Offices' in The Saturday Review of 17 November, 1855, was probably written by Mr. Beresford Hope, an enthusiastic advocate of the Gothic style for public buildings—indeed, for buildings of every kind. He once declared that he hoped to live to see a Gothic theatre, and must have been disappointed at the result of his advice in the designs for the Gaiety Theatre, London, and the Shakespere Theatre at Stratford-on-Avon. Mr. Beresford Hope did scant justice to Sir James Pennethorne (not Pennington, as at p. 402), the surveyor to the Office of Works, who was an accomplished architect, and no_t merely & surveyor, as suggested in the article. He was brought up in the office of his uncle, John Nash, under whom and Augustus Pugin he received his professional education, which was supplemented by an extensive tour in France and Italy daring the years 1824-6. The article enumerates some of Penne- thorne's works, including the offices for the Duchy of Cornwall, Buckingham Gate, and the west wing of Somerset House, fronting oti Lancaster Place, but omits to mention the Museum of Economic Geology in Piccadilly, his finest work at that time, and by many considered to be not surpassed by his later work for the University of London, Barling- ton Gardens (1866-70), now occupied by the