Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 1.djvu/95

 9 th S. I. JAN. 29, '98.]

NOTES AND QUERIES.

j domestic building. It well repays a visi

3 those interested in ecclesiastical anti

. uities. N. S.

We must request correspondents desiring infor lation on family matters of only private interes o affix their names and addresses to their queries n order that the answers may be addressed t hem direct. _

" CREEKES." In Tusser's ' Husbandrie,' ed 1580, E.D.S. 1878, p. 92, we find : Good peason and leekes Makes pottage for creekes.

[n the glossary creekes is explained as mean ing servants. Nail's 'Glossary of East Anglia, 1866, has " Creek, a servant," as a Suffolk word I should be glad to hear of any other quota tion for the word in our early literature, o to get any information about its present use in East Anglia. THE EDITOR OF THE

'ENGLISH DIALECT DICTIONARY. The Clarendon Press, Oxford.

" HESMEL." (See I 8t S. ii. 153, 169, 203.) " Let their hesmel be high istihed,* all with- out broach." At the first reference "our valued correspondent J. MN." asks the meaning oi (among other words) hesmel, but without any indication of the age or the class of the docu- ment in which it occurs. I have not found any reply to the query, and beg to repeat it.

ROBT. J. WHITWELL. 70, Banbury Road, Oxford.

R. W. Buss, ARTIST. The undersigned would be glad to hear from any one pos- sessing drawings, or photographs of same, by the above relating to the works of Charles Dickens. FRED. G. KITTON.

Pre Mill House, St. Albans.

GOUDHURST, IN KENT. Can any one give me a satisfactory derivation of the name of this place? The difficulty is in the first syllable. JULIAN MARSHALL.

Miss FANNY VAVASOUR. There exists a print by Godby, after David, of a lady, full face, three-quarter-length, leaning on a stone parapet, published and sold 25 March, 1807, by Edward Orme, 59, Bond Street. It is said to be a portrait of Miss Fanny Vavasour. Where is the original picture by David 1 Who was Miss Vavasour? Can the portrait be identified with some more likely person 1

C. LINDSAY.

WREN AND RIDOUT FAMILIES. Can any one tell me the maiden name of the wife of


 * See erratwn at p. 204.

Lieut.-General Jordan Wren, 41st Regiment- who was at the battle of Culloden, and died in 1784 (brother of Sir Christopher Wren), and how he was related to theRidout family?

L. C. PRICE.

SUPERSTITIONS. Can you or any of your readers give information as to the meaning or origin of the following ?

The Dark Man. The first person spoken to on New Year's Day must, for good luck's sake, be a dark man. I have heard that this superstition is of Scotch origin, but it suggests some remnant of devil worship. I know a family who hire a very dark man to come at midnight on New Year's Eve, and wish each person present a happy new year as soon as the clocks have struck twelve. A liberal "tip" to the dark man completes the cere- mony.

Travelling North. In the same family it is considered of great importance that the first journey of the new year should be towards the north. This year one member of the family who had to go down to the west on New Year's Day was obliged, at some in- convenience, to go to Euston Square and travel to Willesden and back before taking the other journey. This superstition is not iikely to be of Scotch origin, and the family has no connexion with Scotland. V.

Chelsea.

FRANCIS DOUCE. Amongst an array of memorabilia touching this once well-known name, gathered probably by John Bowyer Sfichols, found in Nichols's 'Literary His- fact of Mr. Douce, who died in 1834, having eft directions that his literary remains were These relics are mentioned as being full of nteresting, perhaps extraordinary, matter, rearing directly upon Mr. Douce's friends, many of whom were the choice literati of his period. Who has the unsealing of this book, and what are the possibilities of its appear- ng in printed form ? J. G. C.
 * ory,' vol. viii. p. 662, allusion is made to the
 * o be sealed up until the close of this century.

SOLOMON'S GIFT OF ISRAELITISH TOWNS TO IIRAM (1 KINGS ix. 11). Can any contributor o * N. & Q.' throw light on this strange act f Solomon's ? Does the passage really imply hat Solomon handed over, or was willing to

ay of accounting for the absence of any msure of the act ? PERTINAX.

THE MANX NAME KERRUISH. Can any [anxman tell me if the name Kerruish is