Page:Notes and Queries - Series 12 - Volume 8.djvu/268

 218 NOTES AND QUERIES. [12 S. VIII. MARCH 12, 1921. THE MANNEQUIN OR DRESSMAKER'S DOLL (12 S. viii. 170). There is a reference to this important article in Franklin's ' La Vie Privee d'Autrefois : Les Magasins de Nou- veautes III.' It is amusing to read (p. 237) that when war was being waged between England and Louis XIV. the ministers of the contending states agreed to let the doll pass freely across the Channel. In Marie- Antoinette's time, she, Mme. Bert in and Mme. Iloffe combined in dictating the laws of fashion to the civilized world : " Une fois par mois au moins Ton expediait a Londres la poupee de la rue Saint-Honore, manne- quin charg6 d'aller porter aux dames anglaises le type de la mode nouvelle. De Londres la poupee tait successivement transmise a toutes les grandes capitales et jusqu'a Constantinople. ' Ainsi,' dit Mercier, ' le pli qu'a donne une main francoise se repete chez toutes les nations, humbles observatrices du gout de la rue Saint- Honor^ ' " (pp. 136, 137). I was once privileged to see many years ago at a woman- tailor's in Bond Street Redfern's, I believe a dressed doll which I had an impression was a survival of the old exemplary poupee. It is interesting to learn, from franklin's valuable notes, that in the eighteenth century bodices were tailor-made, but that skirts and trimmings were confided to feminine ingenuity. ST. SWITHIN. PARLIAMENT HILL ( 12 S. viii. 192). There are two traditions respecting the genesis of this name. One is that cited by MR. ACKERMANN, but the more common one, according to Mr. Thorne, is that it was so called from the Parliamentary generals having planted cannon on it for the defence of London (see Walford's Old and New London ' vol. v. p. 405). WlLLOUGHBY MAYCOCK. Until 1702, when they were removed to Brentford, the hustings for the election of members of Parliament for Middlesex stood on the open space near Jack Straw's Castle, Hampstead. Hence the name Parliament Hill. W. AVER. Primrose Club, Park Place, St. James's, S.W.I. MRS. SUSANNA GORDON (12 S. viii. 170). Mrs. Susanna Gordon, the wife of Alexander Gordon, Charterhouse Square, was the daughter of William Osborne and Hannah Herbert and died in New Milman Street, Mar. 31, 1834. She had ten children includ- ing George Osborne Gordon, father of the well-known Rev. Osborne Gordon (1813-83), King Edward's tutor at Oxford (see ' D.N.B.' and Marshall's 'Memoir,' 1883). I pub-- lished a long account of these Gordons in. The Huntly Express, Aberdeenshire, Aug. 23 and 30, 1907. But there is no mention of a Plees in the notes. The tradition in the family is that it is descended from the Gordons of Abergeldie. Certain it is that Susanna Gordon's husband, if not her father- in-law, founded in 1769 the well-known gin distillery in Go swell Road. Perhaps the distillery records might help ? J. M. BULLOCH. 37 Bedford Square, W.C.I. CAPT. COOK : MEMORIALS (12 S. viii. 132, . 176, 198). In the church of St. Andrew the Great in Cambridge there is a monu- ment to the memory of Capt. James Cook,- R.N., the navigator, and to his sons ; Nathaniel, "who we left in the Thunderer Man-of-War, Capt. Boyle, Walsingham, in a most terrible hurricane, in October, 1780 ; aged 16 years"; Hugh, of Christ's College,, who died aged 17 ; James Cook, Com- mander R.N., who died in 1794, aged 31; to Eliza, Joseph and George Cook, who all i died in infancy and to the memory of the - navigator's widow Elizabeth, who, after' surviving- her husband 56 years, died at Clapham, Surrey, aged 94, and lies beneath the middle aisle of the church. She left 1,OOOZ. in Consols for the upkeep of the- monument and grave stone, the residue to be paid to five poor aged women. The above particulars are contained in a booklet compiled by a late vicar. T. H. W. could 1 probably obtain a copy from the present: vicar. F. P. LEYBURN-YARKER. 20 St. Andrew's Street, Cambridge, SHEFFIELD PLATE : MATTHEW BOTH/TON (12 S. viii. 170). Matthew Boulton was educated in Birmingham, his father, Mat- thew, sprang from a Northamptonshire family residing in Lichfield. Matthew Boulton, junior, was born in* 1728 ; he died in 1809, and was buried in Handsworth Church, Birmingham. It is - presumed that he acquired his training in the manufacture of old Sheffield plate in this city, and it is recorded that he left Sheffield about 1764, but no authentic- particulars of his connexion with the locality have so far come to light. He had many manufacturing interests besides the above mentioned industry as reference to an old print from the Birming- ham Directory of the year 1800 clearly shows. In 1784 as " M. Boulton & Cb., ; '