2°'» S. VIIL July 30. 



.] 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



9S 



was in fact the cruel beauty, and the subject of the song. 

 But the wits were too far eone to distinguish ; and so the 

 honor, if honor there be, nas clung to Molly, who, after 

 all, died a spinster at the age of 67." 



All this is very pleasant; but the Rose Inn at 

 Wokingham, kept by the Mogs, bad more tradi- 

 tions than the writer seems to have been aware 

 of; it had its room called Pope's room, its chair 

 called Pope's chair, and there was an inscription on 

 a pane of glass in Pope's room said to have been 

 written by Pope. But when I was at Wokingham, 

 two or three years ago, what had been the old Inn 

 was the great mercer's shop ; and in the necessary 

 process of adaptation, had been so dismantled and 

 changed, that a cupboard only could be found 

 which had once stood in Pope's room ; and the 

 mercer, in answer to inquiries after the pane of 

 glass, said there was some of the glass taken out 

 of the old window still in a garret, but he was not 

 aware that there was any writing on it. 



The true old Rose Inn — the present mercer's 

 shop — was situated next door to the Bush Inn, 

 and was last kept by the sister of Mrs. Lane of the 

 Bush. An old inhabitant told me that she re- 

 membered that " Molly Mog," with some verses 

 underneath, was written on the old sign. What 

 had become of Pope's chair, or of the old sign, I did 

 not learn ; but it strikes me as probable that they 

 passed as a part of the stock-in-trade to the new 

 Rose, which is situated on the opposite side of the 

 market-place. 



The assertion that Sally was the beauty, and 

 that the " wits were too far gone to distinguish," 

 and thus Molly became the immortal, was told 

 half a century since by Lysons ; but no authority 

 was given, and it is contradicted, I think, inferen- 

 tially, by the announcement in the Gentlemanti 

 Magazine — Deaths, 1766, March 7 — " Mrs. Mary 

 Mogg, at Oakingham : she was the person on 

 whom Gay wrote the song of ' Molly Mogg.' " 

 Farther, one at least of the wits must have known 

 the sisters intimately, and was not likely to fall 

 into such an error. Wokingham, or Oakingham, 

 was the nearest town to Pope's residence : his 

 letters were addressed to Binfield, near Oaking- 

 ham. The Rose was the inn he must have fre- 

 quented, whether he went there on foot or on 

 horseback, on pleasure or on business ; and that 

 he did go there frequently might be inferred from 

 these circumstances, and is confirmed by the tra- 

 dition which gives us Pope's room and Pope's 

 chair. Lysons farther tells us that Edward 

 Standen, of Arborfield, " is said to have been the 

 enamoured swain' to whom the song alludes." 

 Lysons must mean, I suppose, that the poet wrote, 

 or affected to write, in the character of Standen. 

 Was Standen the curate of Wokingham, or of 

 some adjoining parish? — a mere inference from 

 one touch of the humility of the " enamoured" : — 

 " To be sure she's a bit for the Vicar, 

 And so I shall lose Molly Mog." 



Is there any evidence that Swift, whom the 

 writer in the Quarterly makes one of the party at 

 the Rose, was ever either at Wokingham or at 

 Binfield ? M. M. 



Barilla or Barrilla was a Spanish name given 

 to several species of the genera Salicornia, Sal- 

 sola, Suceda, Chenopodina, and their allies, some of 

 which were at one time extensively cultivated in 

 Valentia ; their ashes, after being burned, yield- 

 ing the Barilla of commerce. Some countries 

 preferred one species ; others another. 



Kelp, on the other hand, is obtained solely by 

 burning sea-weed : the best for soda being the 

 "cut-weed," and principally Fiicus vesiculosus; 

 the best for iodine being the " drift-weed," such 

 as the species of Laminaria. Can any of your 

 correspondents inform me when, where, and by 

 whom the idea of manufacturing kelp arose, and 

 what gave rise to the name itself? It is useless 

 to consult such incorrect compilations as Loudon's 

 various works, or any modern popular works, 

 where Kelp and Barilla are often confounded on 

 account of the similarity of produce after combus- 

 tion ; nor can I rely on any modern works on 

 Materia Medica, except Pereira'a and Christison's, 

 and these throw no light oo the precise point. 

 Algological books, although alluding to the manu- 

 facture during last century, are also silent as to 

 its origin. The late Dr. Patrick Neill of Edin- 

 burgh, under the article " Fuci," in the Edinburgh 

 Eiicyclopcedia, edited by Brewster, states as fol- 

 lows : — 



" The making of Kelp from sea-weed was practised in 

 France and England for more than half a century before the 

 manufacture was introduced into Scotland. Mr. James 

 Fea of Whitehall in Stronsay was the first person in 

 Orkney who (about 1722) exported a cargo of Kelp; 

 he sailed with it himself to Newcastle ; and his success 

 in the enterprise soon aroused the attention of the Orca- 

 dians." 



Is there any evidence that kelp (i. e. the article 

 from sea- weed) was ever manufactured on the coasts 

 of England as above stated ? or that it has been so 

 in France before the present century, when iodine 

 was prepared from it ? * From Dr. Neill using 

 the tautological expression, " kelp from sea- weed," 

 I have reason to suspect that he has confounded 

 the French Barilla or Soude with kelp ; but as to 

 England Barilla could not be meant. What, then, 

 was it which was manufactured in England half 

 a century prior to 1722 ? Under the influence of 



• As soda is now prepared almost entirely from sea- 

 salt, " cut-weed" kelp, which was so much valued during 

 last century, is rarely to be see% in the market at the 

 present day ; while "drift -weed kelp is still, on account 

 of the iodine it yields, manufactured in thenorth of Ire- 

 land and west of Scotland, whence it is imported into 

 Glasgow to a large amonnt. 



