Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 12.djvu/41

 9^ s. xn. JULY n, iocs.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

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idolatry. From the will of Master William Lychfeld, whose brass still survives in the chancel of Willesdon Church, it would appear that the image of Our Lady of Willesdon was suspended above the high altar. An excel- lent account of this image by Mr. J. G. Waller will be found in the Transactions of the London and Middlesex Archaeological Society, iv. 173. W. F. PRIDE AUX.

"HooK IT "(9 th S. xi. 348). The 'H.E.D.' has, s.v. * Hook,' v. : " 3. intr. To move with a sudden turn or twist. Now slang or dial. To make off. Also hook it." The illustrative quotations are more or less to the point, but this hardly seems to cover the whole ground, as the variants take your hook and sling your hook have to be accounted for. It would, I suppose, be thought unscholarly to connect the latter with Dryden's From rivers drive the kids, and sling your hook : Anon I '11 wash them in the shallow brook [!].

Virgil, ' Pastorals,' iii. 150-1. C. C. B.

When I began Baskish I thought "hook it "might be derived from Baskish hoakit= go thou for me, but the ' H.E.D.' makes it a nautical term from hook in the sense of turn, just as it turns us from any inclination to connect heriot with Baskish herio = death.

E. S. DODGSON.

PRIMROSE SUPERSTITION (9 th S. xi. 448). The superstition, if such it be, that the root of the primrose, if planted upside down, will produce a darker-coloured flower than usual, is a curious one, since a similar belief is current in at least two other counties besides Somersetshire, namely, in Kent and Norfolk. In Kent it is believed that the inverted root will produce a reddish flower. I myself have seen a variety having a pink blossom, and in South Wales it is said to be common. Again, a writer in the Leisure Hour of April, 1890, under the title 'About Primroses,' says :

"In some parts of Norfolk the idea is current that the primrose and the cowslip may be changed the one into the other. I well remember years ago carrying out the directions of the country folk, and planting a row of the former upside down, in the hope of effecting such a transformation. I was not disappointed; probably because in a few days I was doing something else, certainly not because my efforts were perceptibly successful." P. 389. Can this belief be through the root being planted where, and about the time, the cow- slip is due, the darker hue and similarity of the petals of the latter to those of what Chaucer calls the "primerole" being well known? I do not think intelligent gardeners believe in this wonderful transformation;

but I knew a gentlewoman lately deceased possessing both culture and common sense, who, as she said, "was silly enough" to try the experiment. Hers, however, never came

up at all. J. HOLDEN MACMlCHAEL.

Some of the children here profess to believe that if a cowslip is planted upside down it will grow into a primrose. I have also heard it stated that a common yellow primrose nurtured with bullock's blood will afterwards bear pink or red coloured flowers. I do not, of course, believe the former, and have never tried the latter, but I may say that I have growing this year in my garden a scarlet cowslip, the root of which I obtained from a labouring man a short time ago.

JOHN T. PAGE.

West Haddon, Northamptonshire.

A gardener in Somerset was known to say some twenty-two years ago that if you planted yellow primroses with their roots upwards on Good Friday they would bloom red the next year. E. S. DODGSON.

HISTORICAL RIME (9 th S. xi. 209, 330). There is a * Poetical Chronology of the Kings of England,' by T. M., Esq., in the Gentleman's Magazine, 1773, xliii. 454, 511, 571, 613, 655; and I have " Poetical Chronology of Ancient and English History, with Historical and Explanatory Notes. New Edition, with Index. 12mo. London, printed by A. J. Valpy, 1825." In the advertisement, signed R. V. (i.e., Richard Valpy), allusion is made to Hooke's * Chrono- logical Verses of Ancient History.' There is

also "English History in Rhyme from

B.C. 55 to A.D. 1872. By Edward B. Goodwin, late of Caius College, Cambridge."

ADRIAN WHEELER.

FATHERS OF THE HOUSE OF COMMONS (8 th S. ii. 327; iii. 34; iv. 249, 418; vi. 74; 9 th S. viii. 147). The following extract from the * Poli- tical Notes' of the Times for 29 June effec- tively supplements and brings up to date the earlier information given on this subject :

" By the death of Sir Joseph Pease the title of 'Father' of the Liberal party in the House of Com- mons has passed to Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman, who entered Parliament at the general election of 1868, simultaneously with Lord George Hamilton, Mr. Chaplin, Mr. Talbot, Mr. Round, and Sir A. H. Brown. Sir Wilfrid Lawspn first appeared at St. Stephen's as a member in 1859, when, as Mr. Lawson, he was returned for Carlisle in place of Mr. W. N. Hodgson; while Mr. Labouchere and Sir Arthur Hayter entered the House in 1865. But all three have gaps in their Parliamentary service, whereas Sir H. Campbell-Bannerman has sat con- tinuously for the Stirling Burghs for nearly 35 years. Sir William Harcourt and Sir Charles Dilke, who entered Parliament at the same time as Sir Henry