Page:Notes and Queries - Series 12 - Volume 2.djvu/285

 12 3. II. SWT. 30, 1916.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

279

The change from Mid. Eng. ee to Mod. Eng. e is quite normal ; cp. what Chaucer says of the Clerke of Oxenforde :

For him was lever have at his beddes heed Twenty bookes, clothed iu blak and reed,

than rich dresses and musical instruments. Here " heed " and " reed " are forebears of the modern " head " and " red."

In the Great Survey we get " Staninges." If the slip giving the Domesday particulars about Steyning had been prepared by a Xorman steward, we should have found Estaninges, with prosthetic e, as in " Estoc- brige " and " Eslindon " ( = Stockbridge and Slindon). It appears to me that the steward was a West Saxon, and I believe he wrote Kent or Sussexwould have written *Steninges, which would not have yielded " Staninges " in transcription. But with *Staeninges on the slip before him the Norman-French official, who had no ce in his script, was constrained to set down a as he did in other cases, e.g., " Estrat " for Street, now Street.
 * Stseninges. A well- instructed native of

" Steningum " in Alfred's will is South- East ern in dialect. A prototheme Stdn- (cp. Sweet, ' The Oldest English Texts,' No. 589), which occurs in Stan-wine, Stan-mser, and the like, would yield a patronymic *Stan-ing-, and that would become the West Saxon St sen-ing- and the Sussex and Kentish Sten-ing (cp. Wright, ' O.E. Grammar,' 119, 134, 188).

In Asser (c. 895) we get Stemruga (with em : : an and r : : i) for *Staningu, i.e., Staeningurn. ALFRED ANSCOMBE.

TOPP FAMILY CREST (12 S. ii. 128). In Wilts Notes and Queries, September, 1914, ' Notes on the Descendants of Edward Combe of Tisbury, and Norton Ferrers Manor, Somerset,' there is an account of the family of Topp from information supplied by Mr. R. G. Fitzgerald Uniake, Upminster, Essex. Edward Topp of Whitton, who was buried in 16P9 in Tormarton Church, was grandson of Alexander Topp of Stockton, Wilts. S. T.

SHAKESPEARE ALLUSION (12 S. ii. 147). The volume which MR. MAURICE JONAS cites is by Richard Flecknoe. See ' D.N.B.'

H. DAVEY.

89 Moutpelier Road, Brighton.

' THE WORKING MAN'S WAY IN THE WORLD' (12 S. i. 468; ii. 16, 110, 175).

Perhaps F d may be identified with

Falkland Knoll, about fourteen miles south- west from Bristol, and seven or eight from Bath. \V. C. J.

" SCREAD," "SCREED" (12 S. ii. 208). In the variant forms " screed " and " skreed," this word is quite common in Scottish authors, and in speech (whatever may be the spelling implied) it enjoys favour at the present time. It indicates variously some- thing torn off, the sound made by such action, the thing itself thus detached ; and it likewise has metaphorical significance, as when spoken of a harangue, a catalogue, a bit of one's mind, and a drinking bout- " Skreidis in men's claith " and " skreidis to sleeves " are old expressions in reference to- the tailor's art. In Mrs. Hamilton's ' Cottagers of Glenburnie ' occurs this meta- phorical application : " If I warna sae sick. I wad gae her a screed o' doctrine." In Burns's ' Epistle to William Simpson ' he- touches on a personal experience when he says : " Lasses gie my heart a screed " ; and in the ' Inventory ' he uses the verb in the sense of " harangue " or " recite," describing one who will " screed yoti aff Effectual Calling." The student of Scott will remember Dandie Dinmont's assurance in ' Guy Mannering,' chap, xxv., in " Naething confuses me unless it be a screed o' drink at an orra time." THOMAS BAYNE.

This word, which is still in common use, is given on p. 278 of vol. v. of the ' E.D.D./ with illustrations of its use, in a sense similar to that employed by the landlord of the Fox Inn at South Witham : " He's got a screed o' good land the tother side the planting " ; " I've ta'en a screed of garden land " ; " At Ashby (Lincolnshire) there was a long and narrow pasture-field called the Skreeds " ; " Them screeds o 1 Scotch firs wants fellin'." A. C. C.

THEOPHILUS GALE, THE NONCONFORMIST TUTOR (12 S. ii. 209). According to an article by Mr. A. J. P. Skinner in Devon Notes and Queries, vol. v. p. 71 (1908), Gale's mother was Brigit, daughter of John Walrond of Bovey, Seaton, co. Devon. Prince (' Worthies "of Devon') says that Gale died " in the latter end of February or the beginning of March, 1677 " (i.e., 1677/8). The burial was at Bunhill Fields. M.

THEATRICAL M.P.s. (12 S. ii. 210). 3. For " well-natured Richardson " see ' D.N.B.,' xlviii. pp. 238-9. He married Sarah, a relative of Dr. Isaac Watts.

A. R. BAYLEY.

MARSHALS OF FRANCE (12 S. ii. 182,235). Conspicuous by its absence from MR. CHEETHAM'S list is the name of Marshal Soult. N. W. HILL.