Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 3.djvu/483

 us. in. JUNK n, mi.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

477

"The White Dogs" (ante, p. 2) seems to be one of the many musical or convivial lubs which met periodically at the close of the eighteenth century and commence- ment of the nineteenth. They had all sorts of names, some of which still survive, though in altered form, such as the Buffaloes. The Elks was another, which I believe migrated to New York. In our days we have the Water Rats and the Terriers, while the corresponding one in America is the Lotus-eaters. A. RHODES.

BOOLE-LEAD: BOLE: BULL (11 S. iii. 326, 411). I am pleased to have been the means of bringing to PROF. SKEAT'S notice the old mining terms in elucidation of which he has contributed so interesting a reply, and I desire to express my thanks both to him and to MR. JOHN HODGKIN.

By an oversight I had failed to consult the ' N.E.D.,' and therefore I ignored (not "suppressed") the evidence quoted there- from, which certainly seems to disprove the idea that bole was derived from bulla. The " definition of 1670" was taken direct from my authority ' Chantrey Land,' by Harold Armitage, on whose pages (in response to PROF. SKEAT'S desire for the dates) I further draw for the following particulars :

"Mr. [Sidney O.] Addy in his 'Glossary' has shown that in West's * Symboleographie,' 1647, Sect. 133, is a form of bond whereby the obligor is

bound to deliver 'ten foothers of lead,' &c In

the Court Rolls of the Manor of Holmesfield for 1669 we are told of ' a paine set that noe person or persons shall digg, hack, or break upp any old bole works upon the Commons or lord's wast within this said manor, upon pavne for every such offence six shillings, eight pence.'"

ETHEL LEGA-WEEKES.

It looks as if " boole-weight " meant the customary weight used at the lead-boles, with a fother based on the stone of Edward III., "every stone to contain fourteen pounds.'' This specification would be in contradistinction to the statute fother of 31 Edward I., based on a stone of about 12 to 121 ib., an d the standard unit of lead- weight to the present time. This stone was possibly intended to pave the way for the 14 Ib. stone, one-eighth of a new hundred- weight, first of 108 Ib., then of 112 Ib., thus abolishing, as far as a statute can, the old 16 Ib. stone and the true hundred- weight. It is described most confusedly in 31 Edward I., a statute requiring much experience of the deluding mediaeval statutes on weights and measures to avoid stumbling over its gross contradictions.

The stone was to be \'2\ Ib. ; it was also to be 12 Ib. ; and both these weights were especially ordered for lead. The fotmal (foot) was to be six stone of 12 Ib., less 2 Ib., " which are 70 Ib., making 5 stone." As these 5 stone are of 14 Ib., it looks as if the words I have quoted were an interpolation temp. Edward III. That the fotmal was also taken as 6 stone of 12J Ib., less 2 Ib., i.e. 73 Ib., is shown by 30 fotmal of this weight = 2 1 9 Ib. , b eing almost exac tly the 19J-hundredweight fother which has come down to the present time.

It was probably the uncertainty of the statute fotmal that led to the use of boole- weight based on the new stone of 14 Ib.

EDWARD NICHOLSON.

Paris.

One of the boundaries in the description of some closes at Norton, co. Derby, in 1650, is "a lane leading between Hymsworth and the Bole hill." W. C. B.

CUSTOM HOUSE CUTTERS (11 S. iii. 228). If I remember rightly, Vanslyperkyn, who in Marry at' s ' Snarleyyow ; or, The Dog Fiend,' commanded a Revenue cutter, was a naval lieutenant. I think that the period of the novel was the reign of William III. ROBERT PIERPOINT.

The coastguard service was transferred in 1856 from the Customs Department to the charge of the Admiralty. In many particulars no radical alteration was made by this change in the conditions prevailing in the eighteenth century. The coastguard stations or districts were under the charge of a Navy captain, who had a guardship at, some port in his district. To this guard- ship the Revenue or Custom House cutters, employed to run down smugglers, were attached as tenders. In all cases, so far as I have read, the cutters were commanded by lieutenants of the Royal Navy. S. S.

SIR WILLIAM ASHTON, KT., M.P. (11 S. iii. 387). An extract from Bean's ' Parlia- mentary Representation of the Six Northern Counties of England ' may perhaps shed some light on the subject of this query :

" Sir R. Assheton (M.P. Lancashire 1694 to 1698) was eldest son of Sir Ralph Assheton, first baronet of Middleton, M.P. for Clitheroe 1660 (who was eldest son of the above [R. Assheton] Parliamentary general), and grandson of Sir Ralph Assheton of Great Lever, who was made a baronet in 1620. He succeeded as second baronet (of Middleton) in April, 1665; and was M.P. for Liverpool 1676. The Assheton who was made a baronet (of Great Lever) in 1620 was son of Ralph Assheton of Lever,