518 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[2nd s. No 52., Dec. 27. •56. 



Gelsthrop Arms (2°'^ S. ii. 211. 377.) — In reply 

 to C. T., I have no authority to state whether 

 there was either an individual or a family entitled 

 to armorial bearings of this name. My desire for 

 information on this point arose from finding the 

 name in connexion with the ancient, but now 

 extinct, family of Pendock, formerly of Pendock 

 and Gotherton, co. Worcester. Richard Pendock, 

 of this family, married the heiress of the feudal 

 family of Barry of Tollerton, co. Notts ; and in 

 the pedigree before me, their great grand-son, 

 Richard Pendock of Tollerton, married Anne 

 (Elizabeth), daughter of William Gelsthorpe of 

 Wharton. The connexion of the Gelsthorpes with 

 Fishlake, co. York, is not mentioned in this pedi- 

 gree ; but in Burke's Commoners (vide Barry of 

 Roclaveston), there is a short notice of the Pen- 

 docks, in which William Gelsthorpe is stated to 

 have been of Wharton and Fishlake. 



I have not been able to ascertain any bearings 

 ascribed to the name of Gelsthorpe, and have only 

 concluded they might be entitled to arms from their 

 alliance with the Pendocks. T. B. 



Naked Boy Court (2°* S. ii. 387. 460.)— Pannier 

 Alley and Naked Boy Court were not one and the 

 same place, as suggested by Mr. Taylor : the 

 former running from Blow-bladder Street (so 

 called from the bladders formerly sold there, 

 ■when the shambles were in Newgate Street,) to 

 Paternoster Row, while the latter was situated on 

 Ludgate Hill. It is probable the name of Naked 

 Boy Court took its origin from a sign at some 

 time affixed to one of the houses situated therein, 

 and was not peculiar to Ludgate Hill ; as there 

 ■were other places of the same name, in Little El- 

 bow Lane, Thames Street, and the Strand, while 

 Naked Boy Alleys were situated in Piccadilly 

 and Southwark; and Naked Boy Yards in Back 

 Street, Lambeth, and Deadman's Place ; whilst 

 Pannier Alley, more probably, derived its name 

 from being the standing-place of bakers with their 

 panniers, when bread was sold, not in shops as at 

 the present day, but in markets only. 



EvEBARD Home Coleman. 



79. Wood Street, Cheapside. 



Names of Streets (2°'> S. ii. 387.)— The two 

 Queries in " N. & Q" on " Public House Signs," 

 "The Naked Man" and "Naked Boy Court," 

 remind me of a very remarkable name of a street 

 in Amiens, some thirty-five years since, which 

 gave strong reminiscence of the revolutionary 

 period of 1792. The street bore the ominous 

 name of Rue Corps nu sans tete. Our neighbours 

 have, to English ears at least, some very strange 

 names for their streets : few places perhaps more 

 than Boulogne-sur-Mer, which rejoices, among 

 others, in the following : Rue des Vieillards, Rue 

 Fiel de Bceuf, Rue Puits d^ Amour ^ Rue tant perde 



tant paye — possibly formerly the location of a 

 gambling house. But under what circumstances 

 the following singular appellation was given has 

 always been a puzzle to me. Rue ecoute si plaie, 

 I should be glad if any of your intelligent corre- 

 spondents could give the origin of these odd 

 phrases, particularly the last two ? R. H. 



Kensington. 



Races on Foot by naked Men (2"'^ S. ii. 329.) — 

 In reply to a Query by your correspondent, 

 Henry T. Riley on this subject, such races as he 

 describes are now in vogue in South Staffordshire ; 

 and were, until within the last few years, very 

 common : in fact, all the foot-races I have heard 

 of in this vicinity have come off in the same man- 

 ner as the first race described by Mr. Riley on 

 Whitworth Moor. One Whitmonday, about four 

 years ago, I saw a race "against time" run on a 

 public turnpike road in Westbromwich, by a man 

 whose only clothing was a veri/ small pair of 

 drawers ; this race was witnessed by some hun- 

 dreds of people of both sexes. In the summer 

 season, I have often come upon a batch of " run- 

 ners" practising in a secluded spot for some forth- 

 coming race, and they were invariably divested of 

 all clothing, save the drawers ; their object being 

 to carry as little weight as possible. E. P. 



Dudley-. 



NOTES ON BOOKS, ETC. 



Mr. Peter Cunningham is a very lucky fellow. He has 

 been entrusted, and his peculiar knowledge justifies the 

 selection, with the editorship of the first collected edition 

 of an English Classic ; and as this will no doubt hereafter 

 be the standard one, Cunningham's Walpole will hence- 

 forward be as regularly quoted as T^Twhitt's Chaucer. 

 That Walpole is an English classic, who will gainsay ? 

 With the exception of James Howel, he was in point of 

 time the first of English letter-writers. That he is first 

 in literar3' rank the majority of readers will readily admit. 

 With fancy and imagination enough for a poet, learning 

 sufficient to have established his reputation as a scholar, 

 wit equal to both, and a social position which put him in 

 possession of all the gossip and scandal of the day, what 

 wonder is it that Horace Walpole should shine pre- 

 eminent as a letter- writer? His style, modelled upon 

 those sparkling French writers whom he so delighted in, 

 is perfect in its ease and simplicity ; and his pictures of 

 society combine at once the truth of Hogarth and the 

 grace of Watteau. When we add that in his delightful 

 correspondence one may read the political and social his- 

 tory of England from the middle of the reign of George 

 the Second to the breaking out of the lust French Revo- 

 lution, we do not risk damaging our reputation as pro- 

 phets, when we predict that, great as has been the success 

 of former publications of these Letters, yet greater suc- 

 cess will attend the present edition. For be it remem- 

 bered, this edition contains not only all the letters hitherto 

 published, arranged in chronological order, and many 

 now first collected or first made public, but also the 

 notes of all previous editors, among whom are Lord 



