Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 11.djvu/135

 9 th S. XL FKB. 14, 1903.]

NOTES AND QUERIES.

127

on to explain why the helpers wished the miniature ship to be called the John and Lily. It says :

"The naming of the model John and Lily was owing to the fact that, 62 years ago to the very day on which the above performance took place, a ship (an East Indiaman), homeward bound, came ashore on Appledore bar, loaded with a general cargo, and there became a total wreck, her cargo being washed ashore. The people of Appledore were made the richer by being able to secure from her articles of clothing, &c. At the time the following verse was sung through the streets :

The John and Lily

Came ashore To feed the hungry

And clothe the poor.

At the time the vessel foundered the people in and around Appledore were in great distress, and her coming was considered a great boon. In many of the homes of Appledore to-day may be found articles, such as antique china, clothing, old guns, pistols, and such like, recovered at the time, and kept as mementoes of the occasion."

This brings before us a curious mental picture : the stately East Indiaman, laden with valuable lives and precious goods, driven out of her course on to the cruel rocks of the Cornish coast ; lives lost, goods wasted, industry robbed a cry for mercy and for pity going up to God from the doomed ship, while on shore the people rejoiced at what they considered a great gift a boon from God, to whom the Appledore poor were so precious that He drove the great East India- man on the rocks, " to feed the hungry and clothe the poor " by means of the destruction and impoverishment of others. And now, after sixty-two years of so-called civilization, the people, instead of being ashamed of their ancestors, regretfully recall the incident by naming their toy shipful of presents after the poor wrecked East Indiaman !

The extract does not proceed to record the text from which the preacher discoursed on the following Sunday. Was it by any chance "Your fathers slew the prophets, and ve build their tombs '"?

W. SYKES, M.D., F.S.A.

Exeter.

LUCK MONEY. Many curious superstitions still linger in the remote hilly districts of Lancashire. A few years ago 1 sold a vener- able carriage, which had for long encumbered our coachhouse, to a young innkeeper in East Lancashire for wedding and funeral purposes. In handing me the money he asked me "for something back 'for luck'" in such a serious and formal manner, that I felt that here was a survival of some ancient ceremony, and that I ought not to attempt to escape from taking part in it.

When he received my florin he held it in the palm of his hand with some solemnity, and then ceremoniously covered it with saliva before putting it in his pocket. Some inter- esting facts about this curious superstition are to be found in El worthy's 'Evil Eye.'

HENRY TAYLOE. [See 5 th S. iv. 495.]

Qnttits.

WE must request correspondents desiring infor- mation on family matters of only private interest to affix their names and addresses to their queries, in order that the answers maybe addressed to them direct.

" LOON-SLATT." In the ' Dictionary of the Canting Crew,' by B. E., published near the end of the seventeenth century, I find the entry: " Loon-slatt, a Thirteen Pence half Penny." The word and its explanation seem equally enigmatical. Was there any coin which circulated at the value of Is. \\d. 1 This is a quarter of the old nominal par value of the Spanish dollar, but the equivalence does not seem to suggest any meaning for the strange-sounding word.

HENRY BRADLEY.

Clarendon Press, Oxford.

GARRET JOHNSON. In the MSS. preserved at Belvoir Castle a Mr. Garret Johnson is more than once mentioned in connexion with the Manners family tombs in the neighbour- ing church at Bottesford. These exception- ally beautiful alabaster tombs were erected, I believe, during the reign of Queen Eliza- beth, and it appears probable that they were worked by Johnson in London.

Richard Parker, "the alablaster man," is also mentioned as employed at Bottesford about the same date. Is anything known of these sculptors? C. L. LINDSAY.

97, Cadogan Gardens.

SAVOIR VIVRE CLUB. Messrs. Timbs, Wheatley, and Boulton state that the club was founded about 1762 (or 1765), and that it was subsequently Boodle's i.e., 28, St. James's Street. But none of them gives any autho- rity for the statement. On the other hand, Larwood, in ' The Story of the London Parks,' says that it was established in St. James's Street, about 1770, by young men of fashion who had made the grand tour, and intro- duced macaroni, which became a standing dish at the club, thus giving rise to the term "Macaronies." The clubhouse was later a public-house, the " Savoy Weaver," the name being a corruption of Savoir Vivre. Lar-