Page:Notes and Queries - Series 12 - Volume 9.djvu/628

 518 NOTES AND QUERIES. [12 S. IX. DEC. 24, 1921. VERLAINE AT STICKNEY (12 S. ix. 429, 472). It is interesting to hear that Verlaine was master in a school at Ramsgate in 1870-71, but it seems somewhat odd that this fact should have escaped the notice explains (a) that " to avoid giving pain to persons now living " she has altered the names of all the characters in the story ; (b) that she is the hero's cousin, " Madge Plunkett," who is mentioned once or twice of his industrious and detailed biographer, | in the novel. M. Lepelletier. The movements of Verlaine It would appear that this is all literarv during the period in question are pretty j machinery invented by Du Maurier, and well known; he was in love, and constant that Lady. . . alias Madge Plunkett in his visits to the object of his affections. | had no more existence than Jedidiah Cleish-^ He was married during the war and resided botham. M H. DODDS with his wife during the siege of Paris. But in 1872 he came to London to escape the CULCHETH HALL (12 S. ix. 291, 336, 358, attentions of her legal advisers, and his j 395, 435). I was very pleased to have those letters are the sort of compositions that we few notes from A., and should be very should expect from a man visiting a much obliged if he would loan me the same, country for the first time. M. Lepelletier I possess a pedigree of the Culcheths of had no suspicion, apparently, that Verlaine ' Abram and should like to complete it by had been in England before, for, in reference j additional entries and notes. The Cul- to a letter written by Verlaine in 1872, he ! cheths of Abram are headed by Richard de exclaims, " Voici 1'une de ces premieres ! Culcheth, the son and heir of Richard, son impressions anglaises." In one of his letters j f Hugh de Hindley. Members of this Verlaine says, " Nous apprenons 1'anglais | branch crop up frequently and appear to be peu"; and in another letter he gives a list j more numerous than the Culcheths of of very ordinary English words and phrases, Culcheth. and comments on them in a way which Culcheth has innumerable variations in suggests that he had not known them very | spelling, and it is curious to note that it is long. It is hardly likely that he would written to-day as it. appeared in centuries have been engaged to teach in an English past, correct to the letter. Culshaw is school unless he had had a fair knowledge i still a family name. I know of two persons of English. | bearing the name, and both, though living Again, when he decided to try and earn i far away from here, are connected with the a living in England after his imprisonment | ancient family, if only by tradition. The in Belgium, it was suggested that a man so place-name is interesting, and though many enamoured of freedom as he was would j have let it slip by in their compilation of never be able to put up with the restraints I place-names, we, here in our little village, imposed on masters in English schools. I believe it to have been arrived at by the To this objection he replied that he had I planting of a religious house, in the days pre- become so accustomed in prison to the loss vious to the King and St. Oswald. Cul of his liberty that he anticipated no difficulty on that score. I may add that Mr. Nicolson, his most recent biographer, does not mention Ramsgate in connexion with Verlaine, though he says that he was employed for a short time at Lymington (Hants) before he went to Bournemouth. No doubt in a vagabond life like Ver- laine's there is an opening for literary discoverers. T. PERCY ARMSTRONG. The Authors' Club, Whitehall Court, S.W. " LADY MADGE PLTINKET " (12 S. ix. 371). Dn TVTanrifir's "nrwfil ' Ppitfvr TKVrfrkri ' -io i (kil) = a church, cheth (cet)=wood : the church in the wood. Many, yes, very many, disagree as to the origin. RONALD D. WHITTENBURY-KAYE. Newchurch, Culcheth, nr. Warrington. I made some inquiries a few years ago as to the situation of Cob Font, Culcheth. The ut- most that I could learn was that it was some- where between Culcheth and Leigh, but none could remember a Catholic chapel there. Is it not possible the name should be Cob Fowt, the Lancashire ' dialect word for "Fold" ? -Du Maurier' s novel ' Peter Ibbotson ' is j And is it not still further possible that the supposed to be written by the hero Peter, j fine old sixteenth- or seventeenth-century ~H>,T 4- <- ,.. j-Y* * *~. "!-,.,-..! * ~ j __!-_ -iii'ii- i t* But as the conclusion is tragic he could not have published it himself. Accordingly Da Maurier has provided him with an executrix, who is supposed to write the pre- face and is called Ladv building snugly ensconced under a clump of trees in Culcheth Park, within a stone's-throw of the front door of the hall, is the identical chapel inquired about. I obtained for the She Leigh Public Library some years ago a MS.