Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 6.djvu/164

 134 NOTES AND QUERIES. [9th s. vi. A™, is, 1900. Robert do Vico, in 1272, in England. The fief of Vec or Vic is mentioned in Normandy, and there seems some association also with Vectis, or Isle of Wight (vide Baldin de Wyke). T. W. CAREY. Guernsey. RUBBING THE EYES WITH GOLD FOR LUCK (9th S. v. 104, 212). —In 1860, when I was officiating for a friend in Wensleydale. North Yorkshire, one of the servants wno was troubled with an inflamed eye borrowed niy gold signet ring in order to rub the pimple, but whether the remedy was success- ful or not I cannot say. In Timbs's ' Popular Errors Explained' (p. 164) is the following note on this subject:— "Sty-an-eye.—This is a small, troublesome, in- flamed pimple at the edge of the eyelid, the charm for reducing which is rubbing the part affected nine times with a wedding ring, or any other piece of gold. In the ' Anglo-Latin Lexicon,' 1440, occurs ' Stanye yn the eye,' and in Beaumont and Fletcher's 'Mad Lovers':— I have a sty here, Chilax ; 1 have no gold to cure it—not a penny, Not one cross, cavalier. " The name of ' Golden Ointment.' for diseases of the eye, was doubtless borrowed from the above practice." JOHN PICKFORD, M.A. Newbonrne Rectory, Woodbridge. During the forties and fifties I remember that in London and Yorkshire styes on the eyelids were rubbed with a gold wedding ring. This was supposed to be a golden remedy. HARRY HEMS. Fair Park, Exeter. The charm for stye on the eyelid is a wedding ring. Coin is useless. J. P. STILWELL. Hilfield. afterwards for feudal holdings, always bear- ing in mind that wooden walls alone were possible on newly made mounds and ramparts of earth. The building of a church within the earthworks (see ante, p. 77) was probably not rare, as in many cases the castle not only consisted of moated mound and moated court, but included an outer or second court or bailey, in which one would expect to find that a church had been erected ; but naturally the outer court walls have been mostly de- stroyed by the growth of the vijlages or towns originally confined within their shelter —for example, note the position of the church of Ongar in Essex. I. C. GOULD. "PLOUGHING THE SANDS" (8th S. xii. 306, 432; 9th S. iii. 2, 72). — Massinger can be quoted in this connexion, for Vitelli, the hero of 'The Renegado,' first acted in 1624, ex- claims to his confessor that, in certain con- ditions, You may boldly say, you did not plough, Or trust the barren and ungrateful sands With the fruitful grain of your religion)! counsels. The introduction of the phrase into British political use by Mr. Asquith, by the way, was not " towards the end of 1897," as stated in 9th S. iii. 2, but on 21 Nov., 1894, when he was Home Secretary in the Administration of Lord Rosebery, and when, speaking at Bir- mingham, he said :— "All our time, all our labour, and all our assiduity is aa certain to be thrown away as if you were to plough the sands of the seashore the moment that [the Welsh Disestablishment] Bill reaches the Upper Chamber." ALFRED F. ROBBINS. MOATED MOUNDS (9th S. v. 309, 399, 454; vi. 11, 76).—The date of erection of these " mounds of mystery " being too large and controverted a question for the space that the Editor can spare, I hesitate to write, especially as I hope to put into print the reasons for the " faith that is in me. Without reciting these reasons, permit me to say there is ample deductive evidence of the existence of moated mound and court earthwork forts prior to the Norman invasion of England, but that the economic conditions of the Norman period alone can account for vast numbers of examples which remain. In short, I believe it cannot be said that these works are distinctively Danish, Saxon, or Norman, but that for between three and four centuries they were found to be the most useful form of defence for advanced posts, and WIFE OF DEAN ROBINSON (9th S. vi. 7).—In the Yorkshire Archaeological and Topographical Journal, vol. i., 1870, is a very interesting paper by R. H. Skaife, entitled the 'Register of Burials in York Minster' from 1634 to 1836, when the last burial within the walls of the Minster took place. Prefixed is a plan of the monuments in the choir aisles and retro- choir or Lady chapel, but there is no mention or record of Dean Robinson or his wife in the paper or in the interesting illustrative notes -appended bv the author. The pro- bability is that Dean Robinson held in conjunction with his deanery some country benefice in the diocese of York, and that he and his wife were buried there, or perhaps there may be some memorial in the church of St. Michael le Belfry, where several of the dignitaries of the cathedral lie buried. The last dean who was buried in the Min- ster seems to have been the Hon. and Rev. Henry Finch, who " died at the Bath Sep. 8.