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NOTES AND QUERIES.

x. NOV. i, IE.

" ODOUR of SANCTITY " (9 th S. viii. 483 ; ix. 54 ; x. 298). Among the evidence adduced in 1424 in support of the claims of St. Osmund, Bishop of Salisbury, to canonization was a statement, made in 1228, by William Dunecan, Canonicus Regularis, who (inter alia) stated, "Quod cum ssepe oraret ad Tumbarn dicti Episcopi sensit suavissimum odorem exire inter duos lapides." A. R. MALDEN.

Salisbury.

HOME ALLEY, LONDON (9 th S. x. 289). This query involves a curious example of the progress of error. First, the church of St. Botolph, Aldersgate, was not consumed at the Great Fire of 1666, but was rebuilt in 1790. Second, it never was united to that of St. George, Botolph Lane, which is in the ward of Billingsgate, for the simple reason that the two churches are three-quarters of a mile apart as the bird flies. Third, there is no record of a place named " Home Alley " in London, but by Ogilby and Morgan's map, dated 1677, Home Alley was on the east side of Aldersgate Street, about sixty yards south of Jewin Street.

EVERARD HOME COLEMAN. 71, Brecknock Road.

I cannot find that there was any place of this name in London in the time of Elizabeth, or indeed at any time. I think that MR. TALBOT must refer to Horn Alley, which was in the parish of St. Botolph without Aiders- gate, and turned out of Aldersgate Street near Jewin Street. The parish of St. George, Botolph Lane, was not united to that of St. Botolph without Aldersgate after the Great Fire of 1666, but to that of St. Botolph, Billingsgate. W. F. PRIDEAUX.

RETARDED GERMINATION OF SEEDS (9 th S. x. 287). I remember well a large piece of land nearly a hundred acres being broken up for the plough soon after the close of the Crimean war, when wheat was making some- thing like eighty shillings a quarter. There was a hollow place at one side of it, and here a huge pond was dug, some ten or twelve feet deep, and into this the surrounding part was drained. This was done at the back- end of the year, and next summer the banks of the pond were literally covered with char- locks. The seeds of these plants must have been buried yards below the surface for at least a hundred years, as the ground had not been ploughed within the memory of any one then living. C. C. B.

CLEOPATRA'S NEEDLE (9 th S. x. 304). May I refer R. B. P. to a lengthy and most

nteresting article on this monolith, written >y Basil H. Cooper, which appeared in the Graphic of 2 February, 1878 ? He will there ind full particulars concerning " the first plan for making the Needle British, and what came of it," &c. The writer states that ' a document in the British Museum lately Drought to light by Mr. Walter de Gray Birch, of the Manuscript Department, and communicated by him to the Athenaeum, gives the exact history of this interesting monument." May 1 ask for the missing date?

JOHN T. PAGE.

West Haddon, Northamptonshire.

\_Athencnum, 22 September, 1877. Other articles appeared on 7 July, 27 October, 3 November, and 15 December.]

NOTES ON BOOKS, &c.

The. Minute Books of the Dorset Standing Com- mittee, 1646-1650. Edited by Charles Herbert Mayo, M.A. (Exeter, Pollard & Co.) THANKS to the energy and industry of the Rev. u. H. Mayo, the vicar of Long Burton with Holnest, the editor of Somerset and Devon Notes and Queries, and the compiler of ' Bibliotheca Dorsetiensis ' and other works of more than local interest, ' The Minute Books of the Dorset Standing Committee' have for the first time been rendered accessible to the historical student. By those occupied with the affairs of the Commonwealth their value is fully recognized. In his ' History of the Great Civil War ' Dr. Samuel Rawson Gardiner mentions his having had access to them (see vol. iii. p. 9 note), and draws from them in part conclusions as to the relief afforded by the committees to clergymen ejected from their livings and dependent upon the "fifths" allotted them in the same way as to lay delinquents whose property was sequestered. These, which were derived from succeeding incum- bents, were often grudgingly paid. In Dorset, at least, it is established that the committee enforced payment even when the nice conscience of the Puritan incumbent would not allow him to con- tribute to the support of malignants.

In their way the Dorset Minute Books are unique. In every county there existed a committee charged in the Parliamentary interest with the general management of affairs. It is reasonable to suppose that minutes of proceedings were in every case kept. Of all these records two volumes only survive. They are in the possession of Mr. Bankes, of King- ston Lacy, Dorset, have been reported upon by the Historical Manuscripts Commission (Appendix to Eighth Report, 1881, p. 210), and are now, thanks to Mr. Mayo, secured against loss or ravage. No stronger proof of the indifference with which local records have been treated can be supplied than the fact that two alone of the numerous volumes written should remain for the present generation. An account of the appearance of the two volumes and the contents, which range from 23 December, 1646, to 8 May, 1650, is given. A gap exists between 8 July, 1647, when the first volume ends, and 11 November, 1647, when the second begins. The lettering on the fly-leaf to the first volume,