500 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[2"* S. X. Dec. 22. '60. 



pi'esent day dlsti'ibuted by every family atnong 

 the children of their relatives, in one town, at 

 any rate, in the county of Durham (Sunderland), 

 and I believe that this pleasant and significant 

 custom still obtains in many other places in the 

 north. But these old-fashioned usages, like, in 

 the words of the ballad, 



" The oak and the ash, and the bonny ivy tree. 

 They all flourish best in the North Countree." 



I need scarcely say that dolls made of sweet 

 dough with currant eyes, currant noses, and 

 currant mouths, are made to be eaten, and not 

 nursed, by the little folks. As they appear to 

 be unknown to you, Mr. Editor, or regarded 

 as an extinct custom, I pi-omise you that you 

 shall this year, for once in your life, be regaled 

 with a veritable " Yul Doo." And so shall any 

 curious correspondent who chooses to send his 

 address to your office by Christmas Eve. . Delta. 



[We are much obliged to Delta, and only regret that, 

 owing to the period of publication, few of our corre- 

 spondents will be enabled to express their wishes in time 

 to share our good luck. — Ed. "N. & Q."] 



Nelson of Chaddleworth (2°'* S. x. 127.) — 

 Mr. Jas. Eiiw. Nelson's suspicion is not well 

 founded. WUliam Nelson of Dunham Parva was 

 the son of Edmund Nelson of Scarning, Norfolk, 

 who was the son of Thomas Nelson of Scarning, 

 resident there 1596 ; who is said, in the Nelsoil 

 pedigree contained in Hoare's Modern Wiltshire, 

 to be the son of a William Nelson from Maudes- 

 ley in Lancashire. It is therefore impossible to 

 identify William Nelson of Chaddleworth with 

 the great-grandfather of Lord Nelson. And al- 

 though there is a similarity of baptismal names in 

 both families, that of Francis also occurring in 

 Scarning, the arms are quite diflferent, the Nor- 

 folk Nelsons bearing, Or a cross fleury sa. sur- 

 mounted of a bend gu. G. A. C. 



Is ASTEOLOQT ALTOGETHER IMPOSSIBLE IN THE 



Present DatP — A correspondent asks this ques- 

 tion (2"''S.x. 225.) I beg to assure him it is not only 

 possible, but the practice is much easier than for- 

 merly on account of the discoveries in mathema- 

 tics, and the greater accuracy of astronomical 

 calculation. One of our principal writers, one of 

 our leading barristers, and several members of the 

 vaflous antiquarian societies, are practised astro- 

 logers at this hour. But no one cares to let his 

 studies be known, so great is the prejudice that 

 confounds an art requiring the highest education 

 with the jargon of the gipsy fortune-teller, or the 

 obscure almanack-maker, or considers it presump- 

 tion to consult those heavenly bodies which Provi- 

 dence has set for us for " signs and for seasons." 

 (Gen. i. 14.) 



If vour correspondent believes there shall be 

 *' sigCfs in the sun, and the moon, and the Star's " 

 (St. Lizke xxi. 25.), if he believes there are '* in- 



fluences in the Pleiades, and bands in Orion " 

 (Job xxxviii. 35.) ; or " that the stars in their 

 courses fought against Sisera " (Judges v. 20.) ; 

 or that there were hypocrites of old who could 

 look for prognostications of the weather in the 

 skies, but not "for the signs of the times" (St. Matt, 

 xvi. 2., Luke xii. 56.), if he considers it no pre- 

 sumption to look at the barometer or sympieso- 

 meter to foretell the weather, and wishes to know 

 for himself whether there may be any truth in 

 Astral Science, I will tell him how to proceed. 



Let him first get Wilson's Dictionary of Astro- 

 logy, which he will find the most clear and com- 

 mon-sense book on the subject, and let him begin 

 with the article " Figure." As soon as he is mas- 

 ter of this, let him read the article " Horary Ques- 

 tions." This will give him practice in calculation, 

 and also in reading the various configurations 

 fluently ; he may also add the study of Lilly's 

 Introduction. After this he may proceed to Ge- 

 nethliacal Astrology, and read the Tetrabiblos of 

 Ptolemy and the work of Didorus Placidus de 

 Titis on Directions, and he will then be in a fair 

 way to excel, if he bring a candid, laborious, and 

 practical mind to the study. 



PhiLO- MatHEM ATIC ts . 



Weston Family, Co. Dorset (2"'* S. x. 266.) 

 — The arms on the monument referred to. Sable, 

 a cross engrailed, or, quartered with arg. a cross 

 moline gules — are Willoughby and Beke. The 

 Willoughbys assumed the Uflbrd arms. G. A. C. 



Hesioi> and Milton (2°" S. x. 347. 437.) — t 

 feel myself called on to say a word or two on this 

 subject, as I happen to have totally neglected it in 

 my late edition of Milton's Poems, a circumstance 

 that I can only account for'by that imperfection 

 which attends all mortal works ; for I surely M^as 

 well aware that the idea had been suggested to 

 Milton's mind by the passage of Hesiod, which has 

 been adduced. 



It is a curious instance, then, of the tyranny ex- 

 ercised by the imagination over the other mental 

 powers. Milton's imagination being fascinated by 

 the Hesiodic lines, and feeling how beautifully 

 they could be amplified and expanded, he, with- 

 out any hesitation, employed them, never reflect- 

 ing how utterly these ideas were at variance with 

 the pneumatology of his poem ; for if he had been 

 asked who, what, or whence those " spiritual crea- 

 tures" were, what could he have replied ? The 

 World at that time contained none of that kind but 

 Adam and Eve, and Heaven was the abode of the 

 angels, who never entered the precincts of the 

 World but when sent. The whole fiction is in 

 fact as incongruous as the supposition in the pre- 

 ceding book of the stars being inhabited, or as 

 the Limbo of Vanity itself. Thos. Keightlet. 



"HistORT of Jamaica" (2°"» S. x. 450.)-* 

 Abhba will find this work noticed in the Rev. 



