Page:Notes and Queries - Series 12 - Volume 1.djvu/365

 12 S. I. APRIL 29, 1916.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

359'

According to * The Newgate Calendar,' by A. Knapp and Wm. Baldwin, 1828, iv. 215-9, the three Ashcrofts and William Holden

" had for several years subsisted by plunder and gaming ; for although brought up to the trade of weavers they had long declined seeking their livelihood by an honest pursuit of their business.

James Ashcroft, the elder had formerly been

in the Methodist connexion, but had been expelled

for immoral conduct. He was quite a fanatic,

and was fully persuaded that he could work

miracles, and that, having once attained the per- fection of grace, he could never again fall ; conse- quently, he imagined he could offend Heaven with

impunity there was not a man in the country

who read the evidence against them who did not rejoice in their conviction and punishment."

Joseph Nadin, Deputy Constable of Man- chester, apprehended the prisoners. He was a much hated person in his day, and his connexion with the case probably helped to ensure sympathy for the Ashcrofts. Cf. Samuel Bamford's ' Life of a Radical ' and Archibald Prentice's ' Hist, of Manchester.' There is an account of the case also in ' Celebrated Trials. . . . ' Knight and Lacey, 1825, yi. 243-52. Sir Richard Richards, who tried it, was an able judge, and the evidence against the accused was very strong.

I should advise MB. R. GBIME to write to The Manchester City News, which used to contain a local ' Notes and Queries ' column, if, as I hope, that excellent journal still exists. HORACE BLEACKLEY.

[We are glad to be able to say that our Man- chester contemporary still flourishes.]

0n

Athenaeum Subject Index to Periodicals : Theology and Philosophy. Is. Qd. net. European War. Is. Qd. net. Sports and Games. 6d. net. Economic and Political Sciences. Is. net. Education. Is. net. Fine Arts and Archceology. Is. net. Music. 6d. net.

Science and Technology. 2s. Qd. net. Preventive Medicine and Hygiene. Qd. net. Language and Literature. Is. Qd. net.

(Athenceum Office, Bream's Buildings.)

THE latest of The Athenceum Subject Indexes to Periodicals for 1915, ' Language and Literature,' is the third in point of size, the two larger ones being ' Science and Technology ' and the ' Euro- pean War.' In all ten have now been pub- lished, and this gives an opportunity for glancing at the general value of the new Index, which is stated to be " issued at the request of the Council of the Library Association." Both The Athenceum and the Association deserve warm congratu- lations and encouragement on having under-

taken a task so huge and arduous, and, from the publisher's point of view, so thankless. When Poole's invaluable ' Index ' came to an end some years ago it was dealing with fewer than forty periodicals. Fletcher and Bowker's, which took up the work later, was courageous enough to- index a hundred more. But the present under- taking goes far beyond their modest aims, and actually indexes at any rate the most important articles in some four hundred periodicals, includ- ing a number of weekly journals of a literary, technical, or general character, as well as the monthlies and quarterlies. The list of publica- tions indexed is probably an eye-opener to many persons unacquainted with the extent of current periodical literature, although it embraces very few foreign periodicals, except a fair number of American origin.

Whatever we may say here by way of criticism (and it is not much ) will be said in the most friendly spirit, and ha the hope of inducing others to help, by means of financial or practical support, in making this very promising Index a still more comprehensive work of reference to the immense stores of information and learning that lie half- unused in the world's periodicals. We should like to see more foreign periodicals indexed, especially such works as the Revue Celtique, Romania, Americana Germania, and Anglia and more attention paid to the transactions of learned societies, both at home and abroad, and to the scientific and technical journals, the enor- mous number of which can be realized by a glance at the list of periodicals taken in by the Science Library at South Kensington, or by any good university library. Articles are continually appearing in these publications of much higher importance in their particular branches of investi- gation than the majority of those in the better- known periodicals, although their interest is, of course, limited to a comparatively small circle of' readers. Thus under * Numismatics ' we missed, the journals of the Royal and the British Numis- matic Societies ; nor do we find that of the British Archaeological Association. Local anti- quarian societies also, like the Essex Field Club,, are constantly publishing articles which deserve to be recorded ; for example, there is a report,, on the scale of a comprehensive monograph, recently issued by the Prehistoric Society of' East Anglia, on Grimes' Graves. This body of" work is not included in the Index. Under ' Moun- taineering ' we find the Royal Geographical Society's journal, but not The Alpine Journal a serious omission. Under ' Sport,' The Scottish 1 Field is quite as well worth including as our English Field. The Chicago Dial ought certainly to be indexed in the literary section. There also- the periodical collections of essays and studies issued by the English Association might well have been included. The only way to get such sources adequately opened up would be to enlist the services of students interested in special sub- jects. It would, perhaps, be enough if attention were called to items of peculiar importance, with- out any attempt to index such publications exhaustively. It is true that many articles of this class eventually appear in book-form ; but this does not alter the case for their admission, since a great many of those included for instance, the Shakespearian papers of Mrs. Stopes, and several essays by James Huneker have already so appeared.