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NOTES AND QUERIES. [io s. vm. JULY e, 1907.

Michaelmas 25 Ed. I. on goods, i.e., farm produce, stock, implements, and animals ; it is recorded in Lay Subsidies 135/2 and 135/4 the latter being a membrane acci- dentally detached from the former. In the first entry for Denton, near Grantham, oats are thus recorded : " iiij qr. auen. pt. qr. xviijd." ; in the second and all succeeding thus : " i qr. auen. pt. blad. ut sup r ."

In the same return siligo, usually selected

flour for fine baking, is also used with the

late meaning of rye, as its value was 4s. a

quarter, while wheat (frumentum) was 5s.

ALFRED C. E. WELBY.

26, Sloane Court, S.W.

RICHARD BAXTER ON THE PIED PIPER. There is an allusion to the Hamelin tradition in Baxter's ' Saint's Everlasting Rest ' ,(chap. vii. sect. 2) :

" Most credible and godly writers tell us that on June 20, 1484, at a town called Hamel in Germany, the devil took away one hundred and thirty children, that were never seen again." This is a new version of the Pied Piper.

WILLIAM E. A. AXON.

Manchester.

" DROWSE " = DEVIL. In the sixteenth- century interlude ' Wealth and Health,' recently published by Mr. Farmer in his handy volume ' Lost Tudor Plays,' the following sentence occurs (p. 288) :

Is he gone? farewell, Hanijkin Bowse !

I pray God give him a hounded drouse ;

For I trow a knave brought him to house. Mr. Farmer in his notes suggests that hounded = hundred and drouse = douse. He is probably right as to the first word, but I think a more satisfactory explanation can be found for drouse. In the same play the Dutchman Hanijkin swears " by Got's drowse ! " evidently the same word. I should connect this with modern Dutch droes, which means " devil." There can be little doubt that the puzzling phrase " hounded drouse " really means " hundred devils." JAS. PLATT, Jun.

J. G. MARVIN. Many years ago I asked, I believe, for an account of this American. He was author of a book which has the honour of being on the reference shelves of our National Library, entitled ' Legal Bibliography,' published at Philadelphia in 1847. The most remarkable fact about this is that throughout his ' Dictionary of English Literature ' Allibone quotes Marvin, but he has not included Marvin's name in Jiis list, nor is it in Kirk's supplement.

RALPH THOMAS,

FIRST RUSSIAN CHRISTIAN MARTYR. In the Bulletin of the Imperial Academy of Sciences, St. Petersburg, Series VI., No. 9, Mr. A. A. Shakhmatov discusses the question who bears this honour, based on study of biographies of St. Vladimir of Kiev. The baptism of the people of Kiev is said by different chroniclers to have occurred at the site of the church in honour of (a) the martyr Tur, (6) Peter, (c) Boris and Gleb. Mr. Shakhmatov thinks that the church was dedicated to two Variags, father and son, of whom the former was named Tur or Turi, martyred by the people of Kiev in 983. (The story of the adoption of Byzantine Christianity by St. Vladimir after reports by his envoys, the baptism in the Dnieper, and the destruction of the idol Perun, is recorded in most works on Russian history. ) Tur is said to have refused to sacrifice his son to idols, and to have contended for the faith with the heathen. Following analogy with the Variag names Karli, Bruni, Slodi, &c., Mr. Shakhmatov inclines to the opinion that the name of the martyr was Turi, not Tur. FRANCIS P. MARCHANT.

Streatham Common.

STOWE HOUSE. The Daily Telegraph of 5, 6, and 7 June records the purchase of this historic mansion and estate by Baron de Forest from Baroness Kinloss, the eldest daughter of the last Duke of Buckingham. The articles also deal at length with the history of the house to the date of the great sale of its contents in 1848. This is already common knowledge ; from the profusely illustrated guide ' Stowe : Description of the House and Gardens,' issued by Seeley of Buckingham (1769), to Mr. H. Rumsey Forster's ' The Stowe Catalogue Priced and Annotated' (1848) there has been sufficient information provided.

It will be remembered that Charles O'Conor (1760-1828), a Catholic priest, was librarian there for many years. 1 have before me several of his letters addressed from Stowe during 1816-17 ; in one he gives some few details which make it worth transcribing :

Stowe, 9 Sept., 1817.

DEAR SIR, I send the dimensions you desire. Lord Buckingham requests of you to insert his name in the list of your subscribers for a large- paper copy, to be bound according to his own iirections. I am very busily employed in preparing
 * or publication the first volume of my catalogue

raisoime of this MS. Room, where I had the pleasure of passing some very cheerful hours with you about a year ago. Since that time I have never heard from Mr. Petrie, and having lost his address, may I beg of you to say something kind from me