Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 9.djvu/57

 9* 8. IX JAN. 18, 1902.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

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family. Was the Ludgate Hill family related to Robert Fleetwood of Abchurch Lane, will proved 6 February, 1790; and was either connected with a family of the same name settled in Clerkenwell 1

Is there any record of the regicide's death, which is supposed to have occurred in America, and is his will printed in any publication ? He must not be confused with George (brother of Charles, Cromwell's son-in-law), who was made a (Swedish baron, and was present at the battle of Lutzen. R. W. B.

AN OLD CHARM. The editor of the Chemist and Druggist sends me some slips of parch- ment (seven in number), evidently of great age, being much worn and disfigured, which were found recently in an old hall near Bradford, and had been sent to him by a firm of chemists in that town as old medical prescriptions. Each of the slips bears the same inscription, but on none of them is it legible throughout, and it is only by com- parison of one with another that I have been able to read the whole. Possibly, as it is, I have misread a letter here and there, but my reading is certainly substantially correct. The dots represent crosses :

Aon. hora. Cammall. ..

Naadgrass. Dyradgrass. ..

Arassund. yo. Sigrged. ..

dayniss. Tetragrammaton E

Inurmed E Soleysicke. ..

domend. Ame. dias. hora. . M Fiat.

That this formula is magical in character there can, I suppose, be no doubt. The word Tetragrammaton probably gives the key to the whole, but it does not enable me to unlock the mystery. The writer of the article on 'Witchcraft' in 'Chambers's Encyclopaedia ' states that when the Earl of Gowrie was slain (at Perth in 1600) he was wearing an amulet inscribed with this word, which kept his body from bleeding "even when dead." This is probably as true as the kindred superstition that the word Abracadabra which is, according to a quotation in the 'H.E.D.,' of somewhat similar import when written in the form of a triangle and worn round the neck, is a preventive of ague. The Bradford charm, if it is one, is the most elaborate that I have seen, and is worthy of a place in ' N. & Q.' C. C. B.

P.S. A friend versed in such matters tells me the handwriting on these slips is apparently the legal hand of George III.'s time, and adds : " It is interesting that a whole batch of charms should have been made at so late a date." The person who found them says they are three hundred

years old. I should say the formula is a good deal older than that.

KITTENS USED AS CHARMS. The following is an extract from a letter which I lately received. Can any reader of ' N. & Q.' throw light on the matter?

" A friend of some friends of mine was an army surgeon during the Crimean war. Once, when he with others was picking up the wounded after an engagement, he stooped over a Cossack who was dying, in order to help him, and the wounded man put his hand into his coat and brought out a white kitten. The doctor brought it to England, and my friends used to go to see it and its children. Now for the point the Cossacks took kittens into the battlefield as charms. Can you explain this ? "

The story of a dying Cossack giving to an Englishman the kitten he had taken into battle is familiar to me, but I never before heard that the animal was carried as a charm. M. P.

PICTORIAL GRAMMAR. Can any one tell me the name of the artist who drew the quaint woodcut illustrations to B. Steill's ' Pictorial Grammar for Children,' published at 20, Paternoster Row, in 1844 1 They are much in the style of Cruikshank. OWEN.

" FLITTINGS." This term, I am informed, is applied to gatherings in Ireland at Easter for the purpose of hiring farm servants, of a similar character to our old " mops." Can any one tell me where I can find an account of them ? AYEAHR.

HERRICK : SILVER-PENCE. The following lines occur in ' Oberon's Palace ' of Herrick's them explained :
 * Hesperides,' and I shall be glad to have

And these among

Those silver-pence, that cut the tongue Of the red infant, neatly hung.

The decorations, or curiosities, on the walls of a room are referred to. H. P. L.

EDWARD LEE, APOTHECARY, OF STEPNEY, in 1710, entered into a bond (Add. MS. 22,230, fo. 63, Brit. Mus.) bearing a seal engraved with a fesse between three crescents. Can any reader give particulars as to descent, dates of birth and marriage, or information as to his right to use the above arms 1 He is conjectured to have been born c. 1670-80 near Doncaster, and married a Rebecca Wood- fine. Another Edward Lee, a nephew, carried on the practice after his uncle's death in 1756. A history of the Lee-Jortin family was pub- lished. Can any reader tell me where a copy can be seen 1 HENRY J. LEE.

168, Finborough Road, S.W.