Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 6.djvu/357

11 S. VI. 12, 1912.] shoes, whence it was elicited that he used to travel the distance through the air, making his body invisible and his shoes appear as flying birds ('Yuen-kien-lui-han,' 1703, tom, cccxviii., quoting Ying Chau, 'Fung-süh-tung,' second century ).

(11 S. vi. 89, 158).—The introduction into England of forks for eating meat has been attributed to Thomas Coryate the traveller, and the opposition to their introduction and use arose because they were not considered to be so cleanly as the use of fingers, and were also supposed to do away with the use of napkins. Ben Jonson was a friend of Coryate, and in his comedy 'The Divell is an Asse,' 1616, makes a character speak of forks. "Forks, what be they?" Then follows the reply as to the use of forks "brought into custom here, as they are in Italy, to the saving of napkins." The early users of forks were laughed at, because it was supposed to be a form of foppery to carry them, as the fashion was, in a case in the pocket, to be brought out and shown with much pride. Heylin in his 'Cosmography,' 1652, speaks of them as still a novelty, "taken up of late by some of the spruce gallants."

Coryate when in Italy says:—

Coryate himself started the use of forks on his return to England, and for this he was once quipped by his friend Lawrence Whitaker of Yeovil, who called him "Forcifer." Coryate, I may add, was a native of Odcombe in Somersetshire, near Yeovil, and his boots were hung up in Odcombe Church when he returned from his travels. The boots were hanging there in the beginning of the eighteenth century. When they were removed is not known.

At the Court of Henry III. of France there was a society of fops, distinguished for their ultra-refined notions concerning manners and dress, who were known as "Mignons." The ways of this little circle were ridiculed in a satirical pamphlet called 'The Island of the Hermaphrodites,' which was published in the seventeenth century. The custom of eating with forks was held up to scorn in this pamphlet. The habit of washing, which in early times was regularly practised as well before as after eating, seems to have fallen into disuse on the introduction of forks about the year 1620. See Ritson, quoted in Child's ' Ballads,' v. 25, note.

A Frenchman writing in 1589 states that in his country meat is never touched with the hands, but with forks, the user "stretching out his neck over his plate." Forks were used for eating fruit before they were used for other purposes. In the wardrobe account of Edward I. (1297) there is mentioned a fork of crystal. In 1313 Edward II. had three forks of silver for eating pears. In 1423, 2 Henry VI., the King's inventory contains one fork of "berill" and silver gilt, worth 5s. In 'Bury Wills' (Camden Society) there is a reference in a will dated 1463: "I beqwethe to Davn John Kertelynge my silvir forke for grene gyngour." In the same volume is another will dated 1554: "I geve and bequeath my neighbʳ …my spone with a forke at the end." For an illustration of an early fork, see Archæologia, vol. xv. See also vols. xii. and xxvii. of the same work.

By far the best account of forks is to be found in a paper by Mr. Emanuel Green, F.S.A., in the Somersetshire Archæol. and Nat. Hist. Society's Proceedings for 1886, pp. 24-47. Beckmann's 'History of Inventions,' 1846, vol. ii. 407-14, is also excellent. There is a good article in Popular Science Monthly, vol. xxxv. (by J. van Falke). Chambers's 'Book of Days,' vol. ii. p. 573; The Penny Magazine, vol. i.; and The Art Journal, September, 1892 (by A. Vallance), may be consulted.

(11 S. vi. 131, 176, 217, 237).—But for 's appeal I should have silently acquiesced in 's better identification of the Col. Lowther whose identity was sought for at the first reference. Had I known that he was buried in Westminster Abbey, Col. Chester's note would, for me, have settled the matter, though, curiously enough, in the Abbey Register he is (of course, wrongly) called "the Hon. Major-General Lowther." There were, indeed, three contemporary Anthony Lowthers, all nearly related. If 'N. & Q.' can find room for a short pedigree, their relationship may be easily exhibited. It is the marine's father who has caused the difficulty of identification (1) by being