Page:Notes and Queries - Series 10 - Volume 7.djvu/457

 10 s. VIL MAY 11, 1907.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

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member. When the " Rumpers " came back in May, 1659, he did not sit with them, and on 30 September of that year was fined 100Z. by the House for non-attendance. By this time his Royalism had become pro- nounced, so that when in February, 1660, Monk enforced the return of the secluded members, he re-entered with them, and was at once 23 February made a member of the new Council of State which brought about the Restoration.

Sir Gregory Norton, the Regicide, was certainly no kin to the Nortons of South- wick. His precise parentage has never been discovered. When made an Irish baronet in 1624, he was described as "of Charlton, co. Berks," and is thought to have been either a grandson or nephew of Sir Dudley Norton, who was long Chief Secretary for Ireland until he retired from office in 1634 from age and infirmity. W. D. PINK.

Lowton, Newton-le- Willows.

COURT LEET: MANOR COURT (10 S. vii. 327). During my recent ten years' resi- dence at West Haddon, Northamptonshire, I attended two manorial Courts Leet sum- moned on behalf of Mrs. Atterbury and her sons and daughters, joint lords and ladies of the manor of West Haddon. I was on the jury of both these courts, which were held on 30 March, 1899, and 27 May, 1904, respectively. They were summoned by public notice issued by the stewards of the manor, setting forth that

"all Persons who owe any Quit, Chief, or other Rents, Suits, or Services to the Lords and Ladies of the said Manor, or claim to be admitted to any Hereditaments within the said Manor, or who have any other Business to transact at the said Courts, are required to attend and Pay and Perform the said Rents, Suits, and Services accordingly." The Court sat at " the Crown " Hotel, and at 12 noon, the bailiff having formally proclaimed the opening of the Court, the jury was duly sworn. Business then pro- ceeded, and consisted in identifying the various properties subject to quit rents, after which the list of properties which had changed hands since the last sitting of the Court was read over and revised for the purpose of levying the admission fees due to the manor. Later in the day the lords of the manor, with the jury and other officials, dined together, after which a convivial evening was spent. JOHN T. PAGE.

Long Itchington, Warwickshire.

FLINT AND STEEL (10 S. vii. 329). My memory does not include records from the days of the tinder-box, but it is clear regarding the later use of steel and flint by

the smoker. In every case thus vividly recalled, the flint, with superimposed match- paper to catch the spark, was held in the left hand, and struck with the steel in per- pendicular strokes rapidly delivered from the right. Of course, if the operator happened to be left-handed, the process was reversed ; but the steel, which in its most developed form was ingeniously contrived to serve the purpose, was invariably the constraining force. A good knife, especially in the hands of the precocious boy, made an efficient substitute for the more dignified and full-dress steel. Held in an upright position between the thumb and the first two fingers of the active hand, the closed knife with a few deft strokes from the back of its blade quickly produced ignition. In those days hawkers at rural fairs used to sell match-paper ordinary grey paper rubbed with saltpetre and perhaps other ingredients giving sheets of about two feet square for the modest sum of one penny. Boys could develope their own paper from domestic resources. THOMAS BAYNE.

As one who remembers the " hungry forties," those barley-bread starvation days, I think that the steel was held in the right hand. The tinder, or rather burnt rag, was kept in the end of a cow's horn (about four or five inches long, with a wooden stopper), which was held in the left hand, the flint being held on the edge between the thumb and finger, and struck with the steel, or, what was almost equally common, the back of the blade of a closed pocket-knife. The steel was generally made of an old rasp, a part of which was turned back to form the handle. (Rev.) J. BROWN.

" PAWS OFF, POMPEY" (10 S. vii. 329). I have always understood this as having been originally addressed to a hound named Pompey. Is not Pompey rather common as a dog's name ? C. C. B.

B.V.M. AND THE BIRTH OF CHILDREN (10 S. vii. 325). I add a few parallel examples to those already given by W. C. B.

Alban Butler in his 'Lives of the Saints,' in a note to his account of St. Eugendus, says the girdle of that saint,

" made of white leather, two fingers broad, has been the instrument of miraculous cures, and that

in 1601 Petronilla Birod, a Calvinist woman

was converted to the Catholic faith with her husband and whole family, having been suddenly freed from imminent danger of death, and [in?] child-bearing, and safely delivered by the applica- tion of this relic." Ed. 1836, vol. i. p. 10.

Miss Lina Eckenstein in her ' Woman