318 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[2nd S. No 94., Oct. 17, '57. 



Hills ofShilston (2°" S. iv. 258.) — 



" Sir Robert Hill, one of the Justices of the Common 

 Pleas, temp. Henry IVth, Vth, and Vlth. His son Ro- 

 bert Hill of Shilston, in Modbury parish, was High Sheriff 

 of Devon, temp. Henry Vlth, a.d. 1427. Hill's Court, 

 Exeter, ancient seat of the family. Flor. a.d. 1460. R. 

 R. Henry IVth. Tomb in Modbury Church, where is a 

 curious acrostic epitaph, a.d. 1573, to Oliver Hill." — 

 Genealogy in p. 365. Prince's Worthies of Devon, fol. edit, 

 printed hy S. Farley, Exeter, a.d. 1701. 



Wm. Collyns. 



Haldon House. 



Pedigrees of this family will be found in almost 

 all of the Devonshire Visitations, and in the works 

 of Pole, Westcott, and Prince. Mary Hill, wife 

 of Sir Rob. Chichester of Ralegh, was daughter 

 of Robert Hill, seventh in descent from Sir Rob. 

 Hill of Shilston, Justice of the Common Pleas in 

 ]414. J. D. S. 



The Nine Gods (2"'i S. iv. 249.) — According 

 to the Etruscan theology, nine gods possessed the 

 privilege of projecting the thunderbolt. " Tus- 

 corum lltterae novem deos emittere fuhnina ex- 

 istimant." — Plin. N. H. ii. 53. It is conjectured by 

 Miiller, Etrusker, vol. ii. p. 84. that eight of these 

 nine gods were Jupiter, Juno, Minerva, Vejovis, 

 Summauus, Vulcan, Saturn, and Mars. L, 



These were the Novensiles of the Roman ; the 

 nine thunderers of the Etrurians : Juno, Minerva, 

 Vulcan, Mars, Saturn, Hercules, Sumnanus, Ve- 

 dius, Tinia being the chief deity. 



Mackenzie Walcott, M.A. 



St. Ann's Wells (2""^ S. iv. 216.) —F.C. H. is 

 surely wrong in disconnecting St. Ann with wells. 

 She is certainly the established saint of all sorts of 

 thirst. How does he get over Shakspeare's — 



" Think'st thou because thou art virtuous there shall 

 be no more cakes and ale? Yes! by St. Anne; and 

 ginger shall be hot i' the mouth too ? " 



Everyone almost is familiar with some bibulous 

 association of the name ; and ostlers, grooms, 

 stable-boys, and poverty, go well along with the 

 tutelary propensity. In fact, where St. Ann has 

 not a well, she seems to have water of some sort 

 in prospect. Thus in Berwickshire and East Lo- 

 thian the popular rhyme, — 



" St. Abb's upon the Nabs, 

 St. Helen's on the lea. 

 But St. Ann's upon Dunbar sands. 

 Stands nearest to the sea." 



The late Mr. T. Bailey, in his Annals of Not- 

 tinghamshire (i. 292.), takes occasion to introduce 

 a whole essay on holy wells in coming to the fact, 

 anno 1409 : 



" St. Anne's Chapel, on the confines of Thorneywood 

 Chase, built this year, which sacred edifice gave its name 

 likewise to the beautiful well of water which flowed from 

 the rock immediately in its vicinity. There can be no 

 doubt but that this well was through several ages the 



resort of pilgrims, and persons afflicted with various ma- 

 ladies who sought relief from their ailment by the eflScacj' 

 of its healing streams blesse'd by that beneficeat saint, 

 who was recognised in almost all parts of this country as the 

 patroness of springs and wells possessing peculiar refreshing 

 and restorative qualities." 



Perhaps it may be urged that Mr. Bailey is un- 

 known as a Hagiologist ; but he gives evidence in 

 this very place of having pursued his careful and 

 curious researches as deeply into holy wells, as ]f 

 he had expected to find truth really hid at the 

 bottoms. After farther discourse concerning St. 

 Anne's Well, he speaks of numerous other springs, 

 of " The Lord's Well," " The Holy Well," and 

 the " Lady Well " at Southwell, a place of wells, 

 having a fourth (St. Catherine's Well) at the ex- 

 tremity of West Thorpe. There was another of 

 these holy wells in Mr. Bailey's own churchyard 

 at Basford. But the most famous well, after St. 

 Anne's, in the whole county of Notts, was St. Ca- 

 tharine's Well at Newark ; and certainly St. Ca- 

 tharine is a very well disposed saint likewise. 



Sholto Macduff. 



John Charles Brooke (2"'» S. iv. 130.) — The 

 arms of Mawhood were blazoned in the old church, 

 Doncaster, as "three bars gemelles, a lion ram- 

 pant." (Vide Miller's History, p. 86.) 



W. H. Lammin. 



Fulham. 



Foreshadowing of the Electric Telegraph (2°'^ S. 

 iv. 266.) — The passage quoted by X. X. X. is 

 very similar to that given by Mr. Wm. Matthews 

 at P* S. viii. 78. X. X. X., however, is in error 

 in attributing the first electric telegraph to Lo- 

 mond, 1787. Even Josaph Bozolus, 1760, would 

 have precedence : but how came X. X. X. to 

 overlook our countryman, Stephen Gray, 1729? 

 C. Mansfield Ingleby. 



Birmingham. 



The Auction of Cats (2""' S. iv. 171. 237.) —This 

 reminds me of the famous poem, Canum cum 

 Cutis Certamen, of about a hundred hexameter 

 lines, every word beginning with the letter C. It 

 is of course too long for " N. & Q.," but the open- 

 ing lines may find admittance : 



" Cattorum canimus certamina clara canumque, 

 Calliope concede chelyn ; clariaeque Camoenae 

 Condite cum cytharis celso condigna cothurno 

 Carmina: certantes canibus committite cattos, 

 Commemorate canum casus casusque catorum, 

 Cumprimis causas certamina cuncta creantes." 



F. C. H. 



The words inquired for, and in part correctly 

 recollected by P. Q., are to be found in The Uni- 

 versal Songster, vol. i., 1828, illustrated by Geo. 

 Cruikshank. S. D. S. 



Chairman's Second, or Casting Vote (2"'^ S. iv. 

 268.) — There is no law upon this subject but 

 that of common sense, for surely no member of a 



