Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 2.djvu/377

 9 th S. II. Nov. 5, '98.1

NOTES AND QUERIES.

369

lived in Essex. An ancestor of my own wa the Rev. Samuel Furly, who is described ir the books of his college (Queens', Cambridge merely as " of the county of Essex," but i believed to have been a descendant of Ben jamin Furly. Samuel Furly was born in 173J and died in 1795 as rector of Roche, CornwaL Can any of your Essex readers, especially in the Colchester or Walthamstow districts, give me the connexion between Benjamin anc Samuel? Also any information as to th children of Benjohan and John would b welcome. The descendants of the daughte Dorothy are known. REV. DR. GIBBINS. 6, Newsham Drive, Liverpool.

HYMN. Where can I find the complete hymn(" composed by Master Charles Wesley" from which George Borrow quotes two verses in his book ' Lavengro,' chap. xxv. ?

Jesus, I oast my soul on Thee,

Mighty and merciful to save ;

Thou shalt to death go down with me,

And lay me gently in the grave.

This body then shall rest in hope, This body which the worms destroy ; For Thou shalt surely raise me up To glorious life and endless joy.

\ H. F. MOULE. LLANELIEU, ST. ELLYW, BRECON. In the churchyard on the edge of Black Mountain Common is a large yew tree, of which Miss M. B. Morgan sends me a photograph. It is notable as having been formerly used as a place of punishment, locally known as the " Stocks," or, as is thought by one person in the place, a whipping-post. Two holes are cut in the tree to admit the hands, which are retained in position by a transverse bar passing through other holes bored in the tree. The root is cut away to admit of standing-room, the culprit being placed with his face to the tree, and the hands being put through the holes, palms inwards. The situation is described as "horrible." There is no record of the time when the tree was used as a place of punishment, but it cannot be long ago, or the holes would have grown up. Can any of your readers throw light on this practice ? JOHN LOWE.

PARRY AND PERRY. Can any of your readers tell me if there is any real difference between the names Parry and Perry ? Members of my family now call themselves Parry, but there is no doubt the name was originally Perry, my great-great-grandfather being one of the Perrys of Claverley, Shrop- shire. The change, if it is a change, seems to have been made in my great-grandfather's day. G. S. PARRY, Lieut.-Col.

Iffc

THE BIRDS OF CIRENCESTER. (9 th S. ii. 66, 249.)

THE birds that bore the firebrands are old friends of mine, and I have quite got to terms of intimacy with them, in spite of their variations of time, character, and place. No doubt some wise and diligent folk-lorist has ere now analyzed them and found their pedigree, which must be long and queer; but the following uncritical note makes no pre- tence of being based on any adequate examination and correlation of authorities. The birds are far flown, and many winters have passed since they began their career on the " strongwinged tempest flying," with combustibles tacked on to them or bearing coals of fire in their bills.

In the year 1190, according to Siffrid the priest,* there was a terrific storm, such as surpassed for vehemence the memory of man. Square stones the size of eggs came down with the rain. " Crows also and many other birds were seen flying through the air, carry- ing live coals in their beaks and burning the houses." This strange story Rolewinkt also tells with a reference to the ' Speculum Vincentii,' which most likely means that the tale is borrowed from that fruitful maker and monger of marvellous legend Vincent of Beauvais, whose monumental work I have not had leisure to search. Probably from him it was that the Scottish abbot, Walter Bower, copied the portent to adorn a chapter in his ' Scotichronicon ' (i. 509). On the Continent again, Johann Wolfius in his highly intertaining, scandalous, controversial, whim- sical, and one-idea-ed 'Lectiones Memorabiles' ed. 1600, p. 517) also retails the legend with a good many additional circumstances, pos- sibly due to his having gone for his authority
 * o some quarter where the supernatural

energy was worked up to a higher power lave diabolic accompaniment in their destruc- ive flight, and fiery dragons and "hell- >rands " hurtle through the air by their side, "n spite of mankind's laudable hankering iter impartiality, history is always more or ess deflected by the personal objective point, ,nd the endless 'Lectiones,' being choice xtracts from the literature of sixteen cen- uries, would appear to have started from the
 * han in my sources. With him the birds

' Siffridi Presbyteri Misnensis Epitomes,' year 190. My citation is from ' Germanici Scriptores' ex bibliotheca Joannis Pistorii Nidani D.), vol. i. . 693. f ' Germ. Scrip.,' vol. ii. (second pagination) p. 79.