Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 7.djvu/143

 9* s. vii. FEB. 16, 1901.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

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daughters; the eldest son, William, died a lieutenant R.N. Lady Carroll was sister of Capt. Sidney Colpoys Dacres, R.N, niece of James Richard Dacres, Vice- Admiral of the Red, and cousin of Rear- Admiral Dacres. JOHN RADCLIFFE.

In an old * Knightage ' in my possession (dated 1856) he is stated to have married in 1813 Martha, daughter of Admiral Sir R. Dacres, G.C.H. W. D. PINK.

BROKEN ON THE WHEEL (9 th S. vi. 251, 314, 373, 455, 513)." It was in 1788 that the last instance of a sentence of breaking on the wheel occurred." So commences chap. xix. of 'Memoirs of the Sansons,' the hereditary executioners of France. In this instance the populace of Versailles prevented the sentence being carried into effect. They rescued the prisoner and burnt the scaffold. Henry Sanson says that the old criminal legislation of France inflicted this punish- ment in one hundred and fifteen kinds of crime. He adds :

"From 1770 to 1780 I find in my grandfather's notes that culprits broken on the wheel were far more numerous than those who perished by the

noose I could fill half a volume with the names

of culprits who were broken. The wheel always excited the disgust of the public at large, and all the petitions of the deputies to the States-General in 1789 asked for its abolition." ' Memoirs of the Sansons,' p. 182.

K.

Mr. Albert Hartshorne, in his gruesome little book entitled 'Hanging in Chains (New York, Cassell Publishing Company, 1893), states that the last sentence of break- ing on the wheel was carried out at Vienna in 1786. He does not give his authority for the statement. W. E. WILSON.

ANCIENT MARRIAGE CUSTOM IN NORTH- UMBERLAND (9 th S. vii. 6). In 1874, and in several years previous to this, I assisted in jumping a bride over the jumping -stone placed at the entrance of the porch of the church at Wood horn, Northumberland. This performance took place as the bridal party were leaving the church. Its omission would have been considered very unlucky.

J. B. W.

moss grows upon their backs. One bushy kind of moss is often to be seen there on oak trees, looking for all the world like a man's long beard or a horse's tail. There is also a rarer species that runs from tree to tree like a spider's web in continuous lengths of fully thirty or forty feet. HARRY HEMS.

Fair Park, Exeter.

HEALING STONE (9 th S. vi. 370, 477 ; vii. 12). Dr. William Wright gives an account of two inscribed stones in Syria reputed to pos- sess healing properties. Of one at Hamath he writes :

" We were told that a great many rheumatic people had been cured by stretching themselves on this stone, and our informants assured us that it was equally efficacious to the true believer calling on the name of Mohammed, and to the unbelieving Nasara muttering the names of St. George and the Virgin Mary. The inscribed part was simply cut off the stone and carried to the Serai. It would be interesting to know if the remaining part lost its healing virtue when the inscription was cut off." ' Empire of the Hittites,' p. 140.

The inscription is now at the Imperial Museum, Constantinople. Of an inscription at Aleppo, since destroyed by the Moslems to prevent its falling into profane hands, Dr. Wright says, on the authority of Mr. Bos- cawen, that

" the stone was worn away by the people rubbing their eyes against it in order that they might be cured of ophthalmia." Idem, p. 143.

F. W. READ.

WINE IN THE EARLY CHRISTIAN CHURCH (9 th S. vii. 4). Will MR. AXON kindly supple- ment his note by telling me what he means by " early Acts " ? GUSTOS.

" ROKER " (9 th S. vii. 28). To * ' roke about " is a common expression in Sussex for search- ing for anything, or for turning over an accumulation of any sort of objects. Thus a curiosity dealer a good friend of mine of ten says when I visit his establishment, "Well, I 'm busy now ; I '11 leave you to roke about."

E. E. STREET.

Chichester.

NATIONAL NICKNAMES (9 th S. iv. 28, 90, 212, 238, 296, 401). Residents in the Western State of Oregon, U.S., are known in the States as "Web-feet," rain being as pro- verbial there as in Manchester or Fort William, N.B. They are also called " Moss- backs." Moss grows abundantly in that particular state, and as Oregonians, taken as a whole, are considered slow, it is supposed

The word is extremely common. For more than fifty years, and to the present day, I have heard said and say, " Roke out the fire," "Roke the firebars," "I want to roke out my pipe," "Can't you roke out the rat with your stick 1 " &c. The word is obviously the same as to rake. It was used in the sense of the editorial note in my school many years ago.

H. P. L.

WYVILL BARONETCY (9 th S. vi. 489). The baronetcy of Wy vill is not considered extinct, but dormant. On the death of Marmaduke,