Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 1.djvu/473

 ii s. i. JUNE 11, mo.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

465

43. Expository notes on the Apocalypse. 8vo

vol. 45. Notes on Joshua, Judges, Samuel, Kings.

8vo vol.

40. Notes on the Apocalypse. 47. Correspondence of Sermon on the Mount and

Decalogue.

A. B. G.

EDWARD DENNIS, THE * BARNABY RTJDGE ' HANGMAN. The fact that Edward Dennis, the London hangman of the period, was sentenced to death for participation in the Gordon Riots of 1780 is well known. Dickens, in chap. Ixxvii. of ' Barnaby Rudge,' paints a lurid picture of his craven conduct when being taken from Newgate to the gallows, the cowardly wretch clinging to the last to the hope that *'' the King and Government n would spare him if they kne*w he had been " hangman here, nigh thirty year." The novelist does not explicitly state, though he certainly implies, that Dennis was hanged ; but MB. HORACE BLEACKLEY has shown in *N. & Q.' (10 S. viii. 245) that, though convicted, he was ultimately let off. I would now add a curious piece of almost contemporary evidence to the same effect. In ' The Political Songster ; or, A Touch on the Times, on Various Subjects, and adapted to Common Tunes,' by John Freeth, first published at Birmingham in 1788, which reached a sixth edition in two years, was a poem on ' Ned Dennis ; commonly called, Jack Ketch.' This told of the hangman's condemnation for his share in the Gordon Riots, and added

To crown the plan, Jack's Journeyman

Begs leave to hang his Master. Condemn'd he was and lost his place,

Which worst of all things griev'd him ; Yet soon he made (at Court, 'tis said)

That int'rest which repriev'd him : His fears were ceas'd, his mind 's appeas'd,

The rogue the world has cheated ; Contracts for Ropes, and lives in hopes,

Of being reinstated.

ALFRED F. ROBBINS.

CINDERELLA OR SLEEPING BEAUTY. Prof. Walter Raleigh in his ' Life of Shake- speare ' has the following passage :

" He [Shakespeare] could have made an enthralling romance of the story of Cinderella, and the German critics would have found the inner meaning of the play in the Kantian doctrine of time."

It has been pointed out by a Hungarian reviewer that the author had probably the Sleeping Beauty in his mind, Cinderella being a slip of the pen. L. L. K.

SIGNS OF OLD LONDON. (See ante, p. 402.) The following contemporary sign-list is compiled from the MS. Index Locorum to the Chancery Proceedings of temp. James I. :

Blue Boar Inn without Aldgate.

Horn Tavern, Fleet Street (2).

Golden Lion, afterwards George, Cheapside, parish

of St. Vedast. Three Cranes, Vintry (2). Goat Tavern, West Smithfield. Rutland Place, Thames Street. Antelope, Holborn. Symond's Inn, Chancery Lane. Saracen's Head Inn (two references, no locality), Bell Inn, West Smithfield. White Bear Inn, Basinghall Street (2). Swan, Bishopsgate. Mermaid, Fleet Street. Lily Pot (messuage, no place given). Swan with Two Necks, Lad Lane. Three Pidgeons, Fleet Street. King's Head Tavern, Paul's Chain. Black Spread Eagle, Fleet Street, parish of St. Bride.

WILLIAM McMuRRAY.

" PIGGINS ? ' = JOISTS. The 'Dialect Dic- tionary ' knows this only as a plural word, and not before 1777, but in an inquest held at Black Torrington (20 Car. I.) a Woman is stated to have hanged herself in a stable to " quandam trabem, Anglice a peggyn."

OLD SARUM.

Miss CORNELIA KNIGHT. The Miss Cor- nelia Knight mentioned by Mrs. St. George (see ante, ' Nelson among his Intimates,' p. 124) was the daughter of Admiral Sir Joseph Knight, and Was born in 1757. After the Admiral's death, Lady Knight With Cornelia fixed her residence in Italy, residing for twenty years in Rome and Naples. While in the latter city they became acquainted with Sir William and Lady Hamilton.

In 1799 Lady Knight died at Palermo, and in accordance With her mother's dying injunctions, Cornelia placed herself under the care of the Hamiltons. When Nelson came to Naples he joined the party also ; and When Sir W. Hamilton was superseded by Sir A. Paget, the Whole party left Naples, and proceeded towards England.

On this journey they stopped at Dresden, and there met Mrs. St. George. In her the Elliots, but gives a very different account of their frolics from Mrs. St. George's; for this is all she says :
 * Autobiography ' Miss Knight mentions

" On the 1st of October [1800] we embarked on the Elbe at Lowositz, and reached Dresden the following evening. Mr. Elliot, brother of Lord Minto, was at that time British minister in Saxony. He was very fond of Dresden, and said it was a good sofa to repose upon, for, of