Page:Notes and Queries - Series 12 - Volume 3.djvu/527

 12 S. 111. DEC., 1917.]

NOTES AND QUERIES.

521

As there was a bakery in the locality mentioned, connected formerly with the ,bbey, Loafner's Yard probably became a rendezvous for workmen who met there to take their midday meal ; and the word's pronunciation and spelling were perhaps affected by the spelling of the word " loaf," if " loafiier " is not an actual provincial variant of " levener." N. W. HILL.

STATUE AS WATER-FOUNTAIN (12 S. lii. 478). The work of art for which H. K. ST. J. S. inquires is, I venture to think, the " Mannekin " at Brussels, a bronze statue of a boy by Francois Du- quesnoy (1594-1646). The figure is at the corner of the Rue du Chene (Eikstraat), not far from the Market-Place. It is decorated -on great occasions, and is a source of humour for designers of picture post-cards humour which would have pained Mr. Podsnap.

EDWARD BENSLY.

The question of H. K. ST. J. S. would be answered by a reference to the Mannikin at Brussels, as I saw it in August, 1863. Whether it still exists as it was I know not ; but the 1894 edition of Baedeker's ' Hand- book to Belgium ' seems to imply that it ^existed at that date. ADEONA.

I wonder if your correspondent means the Mannekin fountain which I saw in Brussels (it was not then a German town, but is now, A similar statue in stone formerly stood there, to which Charles V., among others, presented a gala suit of clothes.
 * alas ! though I trust only temporarily).

ARCHIBALD SPARKE.

[MR. J. B. WAINEWRIGHT also refers to Baedeker's account of the Mannikin.]

AUSTRALIAN SLANG (12 S. iii. 296, 400). I believe it a mistake to translate boko as the nose, either in Australia or anywhere else. Here at home I have not infrequently heard the term in use, and it has always meant the cheek in the intention of the person employing it. May we not say that the word is the Latin bucca ?

H. MAXWELL PRIDEAUX.

SORCERY IN ESSEX IN 1863 (12 S. iii. 478). It is unfortunately too true that an extremely aged and afflicted man did die as the result of being thrown into a stream for alleged witchcraft, and there is ample confirmation of the facts, as two of the principal assailants were sentenced to six months' hard labour at the Chelmsford .Assizes on March 8, 1864. The following

particulars are summarized from an ex- cellent account of the circumstances by V. de S. Fowke in vol. xviii. of The Essex Review, p. 121.

The place concerned was Sible Hedingham, and the victim, commonly supposed to be a Frenchman, over 80 years of age, and deaf and dumb. He had lived in Sible Heding- ham for seven or eight years, and before that for some years in Braintree, prior to which nothing is known of him. He was undoubtedly eccentric, wore several hats 01 different kinds at the same time, and usually had two or three dogs with him. He was commonly known as Dummy, and made a little money by fortune-telling. In his wanderings he solicited a night's lodging from a Mrs. Emma Smith, whose husband kept a beershop in Ridgewell, a village a few miles away. This request was refused, and lie left angrily. Mrs. Smith shortly after became unwell, and conceived the idea that she had been bewitched by Dummy, and, believing that only he could lift the spell, she sought him until she found him on Aug. 3, 1863, in the taproom of the Swan at Hedingham. Although bribed by an offer of 31., he refused to go to Ridgewell and spend the night in her house, whereupon she became abusive, and the old man was badly baited in the taproom, the sympathies of the onlookers being with Mrs. Smith. At closing time persecuted and persecutors were alike turned out, and Mrs. Smith in a highly excited state renewed her entreaties ; and upon his further reiusal she assaulted him with a stick, and, dragging him to the brook, pushed him in, and when he would have struggled out on the other side, she, assisted by a man named Samuel Stammers, pushed him in again. Again he managed to get out, and then the woman and Stammers lifted him bodily by the arms and legs, and threw him into the deeper part of the brook. Here some amount of re- morse or fear seems to have entered Stam- mers' s mind, for he jumped in and pulled the old man out, and apparently he and the crowd made off, leaving Dummy lying exhausted by the stream-side. He managed to crawl to the Swan, and asked for shelter at an adjoining house, but this was refused ; and he was led back to his own hut, where he lay all night in his wet clothes. Two days after he was removed to the workhouse infirmary, where he died on Sept. 4 from the results of the immersion and ill-treatment. Smith and Stammers were charged by the police on Sept. 25 with having "unlawfully assaulted an old Frenchman commonly