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NOTES AND QUERIES. [11 s. i. JUNE 25, 1910.

" DICKY BIRDS ? ' = OMNIBUS CONDUCTORS. In relating the romance of a certain family in the peerage, a friend of mine spoke of a certain individual as having begun his career as a "dicky bird" on a Greenwich omnibus. I had never heard the expression in that sense, but on inquiring of several old men I find the term is remembered. On consulting likely works of reference, how- ever, I have not found it. These comprise the 'N.E.D.,' the ' E.D.D., ? Barrere and Leland's * Dictionary of Slang,' Hotten's ' Slang Dictionary,' Farmer's ' Slang and its Analogues,' and Mayhew's ' London Labour and London Poor.* Can some correspondent of *N. & Q.' furnish a reference ?

A. RHODES.

" SENPERE" : ? BRIDGEKEEPER. Infor- mation as to the above word is desired. It occurs in 11. 500, 513 of the Trentham MS. (c. 1440) of ' Flores and Blancheflour ' :

Childe, he seide, to a brygge ]>ou shalt come, The Senpere fynde at hoome : He woneth at }>e brygges ende ;

. ]>e Senperes name was Darys. Florys gret him wel feire ywys.

H. P. L.

FEOFFMENT SEPARITITE. Will some reader inform me where I can obtain par- ticulars of this obsolete form of conveyance ? The expression occurs in a list of deeds relating to property in Cumberland. The deed in question related to a mortgage and was about a century old. The second word may be " separitate " the writing is a little indistinct. A. F. H.

BATH KING OF ARMS. The Court Circtdar of 21 June mentions " Bath King of Arms." Is this right ? B. K. O.

ARMS OF STONELEY PRIORY. The Rev. W. Cole in Brit. Mus. Add. MS. 5819 gives the following coat of arms : Azure, a sword in bend proper, piercing a human heart gules, and as a matter of probability assigns them to Stoneley Priory, Huntingdonshire. Cole notes that they occur in the windows of Kimbolton Church, in which parish the Priory was situated, and is of opinion they are the Priory arms " as the manner of their bearing is singular, and not like those given as family arms."' Can any correspondent guide me to evidence in support of Cole's suggestion, or give me any information showing, if personal arms, whose they are ? GEORGE MATTHEWS.

Muswell Hill.

A GENEALOGICAL SOCIETY FOR THE

UNITED KINGDOM.

(11 S. i. 401.)

MAY I submit the following observations ?

1. A good title should be chosen. "The National Genealogical Society." How would that do ? There are many people, however, who are deeply interested in their surroundings (local history), for whom the word "genealogy'* has no attraction. We must needs impress upon this class that genealogy implies no more (and no less), than the discovery of what their own personal blood-relationship maybe to scenes, places, and events, and the men and women who took part in them that a pedigree is not, as commonly supposed, an affair of mere vaingloriousness and pretence.

2. It should not be a printing Society, but one essentially for collecting and index- ing. An Annual Report, with Catalogue of Collection, and donors' and members' names, might be printed.

3. Its primary function should be the compiling of one great Index to genealogical, biographical, and local documents, on the Card Index system. Hints as to enlisting voluntary effort in the writing out of slip references, their sorting, arrangement, and storage, might be gained by a study of the methods of Dr. Murray and his assistants in the compilation of the huge ' New English Dictionary on Historical Principles.' One may suggest, as probably the most useful method of arrangement, the descriptive cataloguing of documents under place-names, as in Rye's ' Norfolk Topography,' Copinger's ' Suffolk Records,' and Mr. Marcham's Catalogues of Deeds.

4. A Register of Experts in various branches of research should be kept, and of competent record-searchers in various parts of the country. These should all be elected Fellows, and all inquiries addressed to the Society should be referred to them in rotation when it happens that two or more of them have made a special study of the same branch of genealogical knowledge.

,5. The ideal which such a society should set before it is the ready production, to any inquirer, of a body of direct reference to documentary evidence concerning any place or family in the kingdom.

GEORGE SHERWOOD.

227, Strand, W.C.