Page:Notes and Queries - Series 12 - Volume 5.djvu/116

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NOTES AND QUERIES. [12 s. v. APRIL, 19.9.

My father used to tell me that in former days, when the municipal authorities walked the bounds of the borough, a man named Toby Townsend was employed to trace the more inaccessible parts of the boundary, and that in the course of his task he had to wade through the whole length of the before- mentioned mill-pond. My father said that when Toby got opposite the Shoulder of Mutton he always came out of the pond and went into that hostelry for a refresher, and this done he re-entered the water and resumed his perambulation up the centre of the pond.

The Bell is frequently found in com- bination with another sign. Messrs. Lar- wood and Hotten, ' History of Signboards ' (Chatto <fe Windus, 1898), while not noticing the Bell and Shoulder, mention the Bell and Anchor at Hammersmith ; the Bell and Lion at Crewe ; the Bell and Bullock at Netherem, Penrith ; the Bell and Cuckoo at Erdington, near Birmingham ; the Bell and Candlestick at Birmingham ; and several other combinations.

They also record the Shoulder of Mutton and Cucumbers at Yapton, Arundel, and the Shoulder of Mutton and Cat at Hackney. The signboard of the latter formerly had the following rhymes on it :

Pray, Puss, don't tear,

For the mutton is so dear ;

Pray, Puss, don't claw,

For the mutton yet is raw. Various reasons have been advanced for these combined signs. Messrs. Larwood and Hotten point out that at the beginning of the seventeenth century pigns had no combinations, while a century later very heterogeneous objects joined together are met with. They suggest that many of the strange combinations may have arisen (1) from mistakes as to the objects which the signboard portrayed, or (2) from, mis- pronunciation, e.g., the Shovel and Boot might be a mistake for the Shovel and Boat, a3 the Shovel and Ship is a common sign in place 5 where grain is carried by canal boats, (3) Whimsical persons would frequently aim at the most odd combination they could imagine, for no other reason than to attract attention.

They also refer to another reason for combination of signs, which is given in an article in The Spectator, No. 28, April 2, 1710, where the writer states

" that it is usual for a young tradesman, at his first setting up, to add to his own sign that of the master whom he served, as the husband, after marriage, gives a place to his mistress's arms in his own coat."

Yet another cause of " quartering " signs was that it was customary, on removing from one shop to another, to add the sign of the old shop to that of the new one.

WM. SELF WEEKS. Westwood, Clitheroe.

CHRISTMAS VERSES AT SHEFFIELD (12 S. iv. 324 ; v. 46, 82). The New Year's Song given by PROF. MOORE SMITH at the second reference is identical with one I have known in the county of Durham for the last fifty years. J. W. FAWCETT.

Consett, co. Durham.

ST. CLEMENT AS PATRON SAINT (12 S. iv. 14, 82). He seems to be the particular patron of blacksmiths, a song ori the lines of the sailors' chanties being sung by them while at work. Pip learned it from Joe Gargery, and repeated it for Miss Havisham (' Great Expectations,' chap. xii.). See also 171, and an article by F. E. Sawyer on " Old Clem " celebrations and blacksmiths' lore (Folk-lore Journal, ii. 321-9).
 * Old English Customs ' (Ditchfield), pp. 168-

J. ARDAGH.

SIR THOMAS BROWNE : TOM BROWN ( 12 S. v. 6). No doubt the Tom Brown referred to by PROF. BENSLY is the one praised by Benjamin the barber in ' Tom Jones ' "as one of the greatest wits that ever the nation produced," though I must say that at one time I thought this referred to the more famous knight, who certainly had a con- siderable amount of unconscious humour.

Can any reader inform me if the latter's skull is still in Norwich Museum ? Mr. Edmund Gosse, in his volume on Browne, refers to it as concluding its extraordinary adventures there. W. KENT.

JJote; 0n

Indexes to Irish Wills. Vol. IV. Dromore, Jfeivry, and Mourne. Edited by Gertrude Thrift. (Phillimore & Co., II. Is.) THE pages of ' N. & Q.' supply ample evidence of the interest taken by American citizens in their Irish ancestors, and the good work which is being done by Messrs. Phillimore's " Irish Record Series " deserves to be widely known. The first three volumes related to dioceses in the south of Ireland ; this is devoted to an Ulster diocese.

Mr. T. M. Blagg, the general editor of the series, supplies in the preface an interesting account of the exempt, or " peculiar," jurisdiction of Newry and Mourne, showing that it was a survival of the episcopal jurisdiction exercised by the Cistercian Abbey of the B.V.M. and St. Patrick of Newry, founded in 1157 by Maurice