Page:Notes and Queries - Series 12 - Volume 1.djvu/399

 12 S. I. MAY 13, 1916. J

NOTES AND QUERIES.

393

H. Grossman 9

here am i vornal bould took six ships and lead

the spanyard gould took shear of thare castle and port below

made the proud spanyards look dismel and yalow but we was not

danted a toll untill their come a boll and took us in the

goll

and Queback foil from our hands the first brod side the frinch did fire the kild our Englesh men so free we keeld ten thousand of the Frinch the rest of them the rund away o as we march to the Frinch gates with drums and Trumpets so merely

then

be spock the old king of France lo he foil on his

bended knee prince Henry I one of his gollent Company

1 soon

forsook bold London Town we went and took

the spani sh crwn the Spanish crwn we soon then won and

now we have shoud you all our fun

SO

Gentlemen and ladies all your sport is don i can

no longer stay remember still S't george will bear the sway

gentlemen and lades all i hope you will be free for to subscribe

a litle part to pay the docters fee

SI

here comes i that never come yate with a great

head and

litle wit if you please to throw in my hat what you think fit.

Redruth.

THURSTAN PETER.

In T. P.'s Christmas Number, of either 1913 or 1914, there is given a short version of the play, under the heading of ' An Old Mummers' Play.' In The Manchester City News, Jan. 10, 1914, an article entitled ' A School Party of 1861 ' gives a description of the play as performed by the scholars of the Manchester Mechanics' Institute, and incor- porates various excerpts from the play. The play is performed every year at Alderley Park, the seat of Lord Sheffield, and one family has acted in it for the last hundred years. This family, of the name of Barber, should be a trustworthy authority for the local version, though Lord Sheffield himself is said to act as critic and censor, and has the reputation of being " letter perfect " both in the words and "business." Finally, I shall be glad to lend your correspondent a printed version, occupying 8 pp. small octavo, which I picked up at St. Helens about fifteen years ago. It was evidently intended as a textbook for the youths of the district. It may be of interest

to note that I have seen the play enacted in. my present neighbourhood until about 1899,. and fragments of it may still be heard in conversation here. ARTHUR BOWES.

Newton-le- Willows, Lanes.

PATRICK MAD AN (12 S. i. 265). I am able- to furnish MR. HORACE BLEACKLEY with the following notes of this worthy, culled from the Old Bailey Sessions Papers and the Record Office Criminal Entry Books.

At the July Sessions of the Old Bailey r 1774, he was, together with Michael Brannen, capitally convicted before Sir George Nares of " the highway " in respect of Dobbs and Beckenham, but was respited at Tyburn on 19 Aug. following, owing to the avowal at the " fatal tree " of one Amos Merritt that he had no hand in the crime for which he was about to suffer. Brannen' s sentence was commuted to transportatiort for life. At the same July Sessions Madan r with Patrick Crockhall, was acquitted, also before Sir George Nares, of the highway robbery of John Wills, and on three other indictments.

In consequence of Merritt's confession (of the robbery of Dobbs and Beckenham),. Madan, although found to be wearing Beckenham 's coat when taken, received, after a further respite, a free pardon (cf . S. P. Dom- En. Book 91, f. 367, A. R. 1774, p. 169), Michael Brannen was again convicted of " the highway " at the July Sessions, 1779,, and this time he suffered. He must have returned from transportation.

Patrick Madan next figures in the Sessions Papers on a truly extraordinary charge.. In May, 1780, he is charged, together with Joseph Hawes, with larceny in a dwelling- house to wit, the Clerkenwell New Prison,, where he was confined. The prosecutor was one Thomas Pearce, who was " something in the Mercery Branch." He picked up two light women, who took him to see an alleged " brother " of one of them in the prison. They went round among the felons^, the prosecutor standing treat in spirituous liquors contrary to the statute.

Some familiarities were put to the prose- cutor in cross-examination, which he denied,, and he was also asked if he knew anything of a 40Z. reward. Baron Perryn one of the 'airest judges of his time stopped the case, and Madan and his companions were acquitted.

As a sidelight on prison life, in the eigh- beenth century, this little trial should interest MR. BLEACKLEY (cf. a robbery in the