Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 1.djvu/87

 ii s. i. JAN. 22, i9io.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

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INSECT NAMES IN SCOTLAND (10 S. xii. 245). " Clock " is used for beetle as far south as Lincolnshire. %

With regard to spiders being " etter- caps," is it not possible that certain of them do inflict a slight wound ? I have been told by two people in North- West Lincolnshire that they have been bitten. My first in- formant, a very intelligent domestic servant, fond of observing the habits of animals, averred that she and other people had suffered from the attacks of little black spiders in a certain old house. The bites caused some slight inflammation in persons who had very sensitive skins. A gentleman - farmer to whom I repeated the story said that he himself had been bitten by a house - spider, but it was a large one. Several people of my acquaintance complain of the bites of earwigs, declaring that they <jan give a sharp nip. L. I. O.

In Forfarshire the usual name for an ear- wig was '* horn-golach. n I. N. S.

A beetle here is known as a " clock-bell " ; a humble bee as a " bumler " ; the ladybird as " cushie-coo-lady,"' hence the local rime : Cushie-coo-ladie, fly away hyem [home], Yer hoos is afire, yer childer arl gyen [all gone].

R. B B.

South Shields.

CHILDREN WITH THE SAME CHRISTIAN NAME (10 S. xii. 365 ; US. i. 35). In The Genealogist, N.S., vol. xxi. p. 106 (October, 1904), I printed a pedigree of the family of Forsett. Among the sons of Richard Forsett, Reader of Gray's Inn (obiit 1561), are two Williams. The elder was alive in 1589, the younger in 1583.

G. C. MOORE SMITH.

Sheffield.

In Ireland it is regarded as a certain way of bringing ill-luck and early death to " call a child for n a dead brother or sister. " The name is already registered in heaven " used to be the solemn reply to the natural question, " Why is it so unlucky ? n and fifty years ago both Catholics and Protestants shared in this " freit. ? ' My own family gave several convincing instances in early deaths that " those who look to freits, freits wil] follow them.' J Y. T.

MARCH MALEN (10 S. xii. 489). The proverb " in ore vulgi " is Welsh, not Gaelic. " Varch " is correct. The radical form is " March," but m mutates to v (/) after the preposition ar. H. I. B.

NOTES ON BOOKS, &c.

Memorials of Old Stissex. Edited by Percy D. Mundy. With many Illustrations. (Allen & Sons. )

THE publishers indicated above have taken over bhe series once issued by Messrs. Bemrose, and we are glad to notice that the recent volumes in it fully maintain the interest of the " Memorials." Local history is much more popular than it used to be, and in this volume the reader will find enough of a varied character to induce him to ontinue his researches on the lines he prefers.

No single volume can exhibit anything like all that is noteworthy in an English county. The difficulty lies, as the Preface of this one indicates, in the matter of selection. Here the general history of the county has been omitted, a proceeding to which we do not object, as all the space is needed for the several special subjects which receive treatment.

Sussex has been the subject of a good many books of late years, and it is the more creditable to find that all the articles here have an air of freshness and that mastery of detail which comes from real knowledge. Mr. Tavenor-Perry deals well with ' Saxon Architecture ' and ' The Castles of Sussex.' The Rev. Dr. Cox has a subject after his heart in ' The Forests of Sussex.' Prebendary Deedes, an old contributor to our own columns, writes on Chichester, the beautiful Market Cross of which forms a suitable frontispiece ; and the editor on ' Monastic Remains ' and ' Country Life in the Past.' Perhaps the most interesting of the antiquarian articles is that on ' Mural Paintings ' by Mr. P. M. Johnston, dealing admirably with a subject which may almost be called new in view of the inattention or destruction which was the lot of these early memorials of piety in the nineteenth century.

No book on the county is complete without the prose of Mr. Belloc, and he leads off with a few of his characteristic pages on ' The Individuality of Sussex,' full of his usual attractive, if audacious generalization. He talks disparagingly of "chance settlers," but it seems to us that many of the old families who have been in Sussex for years might reasonably regard him in that light. He has good hope that the characteristics of the county will be permanent :

" The thing that would wound us, and perhaps destroy us, would be the discovery of metal or of coal. Men of science assure us that this is im- possible. Their word is extremely doubtful upon all matters, but upon this matter it is, for once, a comforting and a reassuring word."

Mr. M. Jourdain has an agreeable style, and is consequently well suited for the account of ' Literary Associations ' (inevitably disappointing so far as Shelley is concerned) and the charm of Rye. Hayley and Blake at Felpham receive a- special chapter.

The " Long Man " or " Giant " of Wilmington is one of the oldest memorials, we believe, of the county. The two writers who deal with it Mr. G. Clinch in ' Celtic Antiquities,' and Mr. William Martin in 'The Downland ' are not exactly at one regarding its antiquity. The paving of the outlines of the figure with white