426 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[2'"J S. KTo 48,, Kov. 29. '50. 



secret praj'ei'S. For living in a great house, of which the 

 middle part was ruined in the wars, she cliose a- closet in 

 the farther end, where she thought none heard her. But 

 some that overheard her, said they never hreard so fervent 

 prayer from any one." — From Richard Baxter's Life of 

 his Wife, Margaret Charlton. 



2. " Her own Lord (knowing her hours of prayer) once 

 conveyed a grave minister to a secret place, within hear- 

 ing, whom, if I should name, would not be denied to be a 

 competent judge, who much admired her humble fer- 

 vency." — Rev. Antony Walker's Funeral Sermon for the 

 Countess of Warwick, 1678. 



3. " Morning and evening she never failed, by her good 

 will, to read some portion of Scripture (if not called away 

 by extraordinary business on a sudden), and so pour out 

 her heart to GoA.\n private Prayer ; for which, because no 

 place in the house was so convenient, and so far from noise, 

 and sight of others, as one certain remote room, where none 

 usually came at those times, therefore that place of all 

 others she made choice of, in the dark winter evenings, 

 and the morning before the family was up ; many a time 

 hath she visited one corner of that Room, which was most 

 retired, with eyes and hands lift up to heaven, kneeling at 

 a chair, with great affection, which though she never 

 knew, that any took the least notice of (for that would 

 have been a trouble to her), j'et a certain near relation 

 that often looked in at a cranny of the door, which she 

 had fostened inwardly, and did not a little joy to see her 

 so empZo^ed, is yet surviving as an eye-witness of it." — 

 From the Life of Miss Susanna Penwich (of Hackney), 

 by John Batchiler. 1661. 



In this last extract is preserved the peculiar 

 italicising of the original. A. R. 



MlCHAEtMAS GOOSK DINNER, 



The custom of serving a goose for dinner on the 

 Michaelmas-day is said to have arisen from the 

 accidental circumstance of Queen Elizabeth being 

 in the full enjoyment of her dinner off that savoury 

 bird, when she was informed of the victory ob- 

 tained by Sir Francis Drake over the Spanish 

 Armada while advancing towards Tilbury Fort. 

 But the probability is Her Majesty was only in- 

 dulging in one of the whimsical predilections of 

 her subjects. 



Norfolk has long been famed for the breed of 

 this bird, nor is the culinary department entirely 

 bereft of all claims to commendation. Our fore- 

 fathers rejoiced over the " stubble-goose," a dainty 

 which has now given place to those more delicately 

 fed. The' rustic call for the goose is " Willie ; " 

 whether this is " wily," in jest of their alleged 

 simplicity, or " y-like," in reference to the in- 

 verted form of that letter which they uniformly 

 adopt in their flight, are doubts not easily solved. 

 *' The Goose and Gridiron " is a Norfolk sign, but 

 the meaning remains hitherto unexplained. And 

 it is well known a Norfolk man will scarcely feel 

 himself aggrieved at the well-known sobriquet 

 derived from them, and so unsparingly lavished 

 upon him by his facetious neighbours in the 

 *' shires " 



The Norfolk goose of the London markets is 

 generally imported from Prussia or the Rhenish 

 provinces. One caterer in Norwich has imported 

 as many as six thousand in one year, and has ob- 

 served, while feeding them, their attachment to 

 light, by their rarely taking food in the dark nights, 

 but they will enjoy themselves under the full moon 

 as under the midday sun. 



The goose, from its harmless habits, figures in 

 many of our nursery tales and rhymes, but no- 

 where more prominently than in the Legends of 

 Ashwell-Thorpe Hall. 



The habitual practice of serving a goose on the 

 tacitly appointed day is observed with singular 

 scrupulosity in most private families ; but the 

 maintenance of the custom to gratify alike the 

 taste and inherent, if not superstitious, feelings of 

 the indigent, proves at least a deep-rooted venera- 

 tion for what may appear to indifferent observers 

 a puerile custom. 



" The Old Man's Hospital," a retreat for the 

 aged, is on the largest scale, and on the most libe- 

 ral principles, and the inmates of the two sexes, 

 amounting in the present year to upwards of two 

 hundred, are annually regaled on the Michaelmas 

 Day off their self-omened bird. The provision for 

 this feast was made by the late worthy Alderman 

 Partridge in 1816, who, by his will, directed that 

 a goose should be provided there for every four 

 persons. This was done as the economists of the 

 day proposed to discontinue the annual feast. 



Tlie " Michaelmas Day " at this hospital is the 

 gala day of the year ; the inmates are in their 

 best attire, and, cheered with the delicious prospect, 

 tempt the visitors to a " mardle," which generally 

 turns upon the wonders of the " Eagle Ward," so- 

 called from the pencilling of the splendid roof of 

 the now desecrated church. The great kitchen is: 

 thrown open to the public, where hundreds throng 

 to see the novel sight, and to inhale the suffocating 

 heat from a ton of burning coals. A skeleton 

 cylinder is formed of seven or eight bars ; on each 

 is spitted seven geese ; the whole is then made to 

 revolve round before the immense fire by a turn- 

 spit, whose occupation requires frequent relief to 

 prevent his mingling with the revolving victims. 



Henry D'Avenex". 



Hoops V. Crinoliiie, — Pray insert the enclosed 

 from The Weeldy Journal, or Saturday Post, April 

 26, 1718, for the benefit of your witty contempo- 

 rary. Punch. It may give Mr. Leech a hint, which 

 he will know how to turn to a good account : — 



" One day last week a Gentlewoman vmluckily stooping 

 to buckle her Shoe at a Linen Draper's Shop, her Hoop 

 Petticoat, of more than ordinary Circumference, flew up, 

 and an arch little Chimney Sweeper passing by at that 



