68 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[No. 116. 



tion of different kinds of vermin ; but this practice 

 is now entirely discontinued. The following are 

 the prices paid twenty-five years ago by the parish 

 of Corsham, Wilts : — 



Vipers, 6d. each ; slowworms or blindworms, 3d. 

 each ; rats, Id. each (the tails only were required 

 to be brought) ; sparrows' heads, 6d. per dozen, 

 (meaning the old birds) ; sparrows' eggs and 

 young birds, 4d. per dozen. 



I shall never forget, when a boy, and my father 

 was churchwarden, the tricks the young lads 

 and boys used to play in order to palm off other 

 birds' eggs and young birds for sparrows. One 

 young rascal actually painted the eggs very 

 cleverly to imitate the sparrows, till I discovered 

 it. Young birds of all kinds were brought, and 

 many dozens paid for that were not sparrows ; as 

 it was impossible to tell the young birds of many 

 of the hard billed kinds from the sparrow. At 

 last the parish gave up paying for the eggs or 

 young birds, but gave Is. per dozen for the heads 

 of old sparrows, and vast numbers were brought 

 throughout the winter ; and then attempts were 

 made to substitute other birds' heads, which were 

 in many cases paid for. The next year the parish 

 agreed only to pay for the whole birds, so that 

 no deception could be practised. When the New 

 Poor Law came into operation, all these payments 

 were stopped. Glead was a provincial term for 

 the kite and buzzard, the ringtail for the hen 

 harrier hawk, and greashead or greyhead for the 

 female kestrel or greyheaded falcon. In most of 

 the Wiltshire parishes 6d. per head was paid for 

 the hedgehog, as the farmers always believed they 

 sucked the teats of cows when laid down in the 

 fields. The badger was also paid for in some 

 places. J. K. 



North Wilts. 



Alterius Orbis Papa (Vol. iii., p. 497.). — The 

 origin of this title is, I think, still open to explan- 

 ation, and in offering one which I find recorded in 

 Ijambard'' s Perambulation of Kent, 1596, pp.80, 81. 

 I trust the quaint but interesting style of that 

 leai-ned antiquary and historian will be a sufficient 

 excuse to your readers for its insertion at length 

 verbatim et literatim : 



" The whole Province of this Bishopricke of Canter- 

 bury, was at the first divided by Theodorus (the 

 seventli Bishop) into five Dioceses only : howbeit, in 

 processe of time it grew to twentie and one, besides 

 itselfe, leaving to Yorke (which by the first institution 

 should have had as many as it) but Durham, Carleil, 

 and Chester only. And whereas by the same ordinance 

 of Gregorie, neither of these Archbishops ought to be 

 inferiour to other, save onely in respect of the priority 

 of their consecration, Lanfranc (thinking it good reason 

 that he should make a con(]uest of the English clergie, 

 since his maister, King William, had vanquished the 

 whole nation), contended at Windsor with Thomas 

 Norman (.Vrchbishop of Yorke) for the primacie, and 



there (by judgement before Hugo, the Pope's Legate) 

 recovered it from him: so that ever since the one is 

 called Totius Anglice priinas, and the other AnglicB 

 primas, without any further addition. Of which judge- 

 ment, one (forsooth) hath yielded this great reason : 

 that even as the Kentish people, by an auncient prero- 

 gative of manhood, do challenge the first front in each 

 battel, from the Inhabitants of other countries ; so the 

 Archbishop of their Shyre, ought by good congruence 

 to be preferred before the rest of the Bishops of the 

 whole Realme. Moreover, whereas before time, the 

 place of this Archbishop in the generall Councell was 

 to sit next to the Bishop of Sainct Ruffines, Anselmus, 

 the successor of this Lanfranc (for recompence of the 

 good service that hee had done, in ruffling against 

 Priests' wives, and resisting the King for the investi- 

 ture of clerks) was by Pope Urbane endowed with this 

 accession of honour, that he and his Successours should 

 from thencefoorth have place in all generall councels, at 

 the Pope's right foote, who then said withall, ' In- 

 cludamus hunc in orbe nostro, tanquam alterius orbis 

 Papain. ' " 



Pbanciscus. 



Dido and JEneas (Vol. iv., p. 423.). — I beg 

 leave to transcribe for A. A. D. the following pas- 

 sage from the FaceticB Cantabrigiensis, p. 95. 

 (London, Charles Mason, 1836): 



" Porson observing that he could pun on any sul)ject, 

 a person j)resent defied him to do so on the Latin 

 gerunds, which however he immediately did in the 

 following admirable couplet : 



* When Dido found iEneas would not come, 

 She mourned in silence, and was di-do-dum.' " 



I have also seen these lines attributed to Porson 

 in an old volume of The Mirror. Of any other 

 authorities I have no knowledge. J. S. W. 



Stockwell. 



Compositions during the Protectorate (Vol. iv., 

 pp. 406. 490.). — W. H. L. suspects that there is an 

 error in the list of these compositions for Lincoln- 

 shire, as given in Oldfield's History of Wainfleet, 

 and asks, " Where is there any account or list of 

 these ? " H. F. refers W. H. L. to a small volume 

 entitled A Catalogue of the Lords, Knights, and 

 Gentlemen that have compounded for their Estates. 

 London, 1655. I have compared Oldfield's list 

 with the reprint of the Catalogue (Chester, 1733), 

 and find that, with some slight exceptions, they 

 agree. Oldfield, however, omits the following 

 compositions for Lincolnshire : 



£ s. d. 

 " Benson, Clement, of North Kelsey, 



Gent. - - - - 120 O 



Burcroft, Thomas, late of Waltham, 



pro Frances and Jane, his sisters - 70 O 

 Dalton, John, late of Barton on 



Humhcr - - - - 46 



Fines, Morris, of Christhead (Kirk- 

 stead) - - - - 50 

 Leesing, Thomas, of North Somer- 



cotes - - - - 12 7 6 



