July 8. 1854.] 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



27 



John Henderson had a relation named Mary 

 Macy, who lived on RedclifF Hill : she was a very 

 extraordinary Avoman, and had a sort of gift of 

 second sight. One night she dreamed that John 

 Henderson was gone to Oxford, and that he died 

 there. In the course of the next day, John Hen- 

 derson called to take leave of her, saying that he 

 was going to Oxford to study something concern- 

 ing which he could not obtain the information 

 he wanted in Bristol. Mary Macy said to him, 

 " John, you'll die there ;" to which he answered, 

 *' I know it." 



Some time afterwards Mary Macy waked her 

 husband, saying to him, " Remember that John 

 Henderson died at two o'clock this morning, and 

 it is now three." Philip Macy made light of it, 

 but she told him that she had dreamed (and was 

 conscious that she was dreaming) that she was 

 transported to Oxford, to which city she had 

 never been in reality ; and that she entered a room 

 there, in which she saw John Henderson in bed, 

 the landlady supporting his head, and the land- 

 lord and others surrounding him. While looking 

 at him, she saw some one give him medicine ; after 

 which John Henderson saw her, and said, " Oh ! 

 Mrs. Macy, I am going to die ; I am so glad you 

 are come, for I want to tell you that my father is 

 going to be very ill, and that you must go to see 

 him." He then proceeded to describe a room in 

 his father's house, and a bureau in it : " In which 

 is a box containing some pills ; give him so many 

 of them, and he will recover." Her impression of 

 all in the room was most vivid, and she even 

 described the appearance of the houses on the 

 opposite side of the street. The only object she 

 appeared not to have seen was a clergyman, who 

 was In attendance on John Henderson. Hender- 

 son's father, going to the funeral, took Philip 

 Macy with him ; and on the way to Oxford, Philip 

 Macy told him the particulars of his son's death, 

 which they found to have been strictly correct as 

 related by Mary Macy. Mary Macy was too 

 much interested about John Henderson's death 

 to think anything of his directions about the pills, 

 yet, some time afterwards, she was sent for by the 

 father, who was ill. She then remembered her 

 dream ; found the room, the bureau, and the pills, 

 exactly as had been foretold, and they had the 

 promised effect, for Henderson was cured. 



Hannah More several times alludes to John 

 Henderson in her letters, and appears to have 

 known him personally. N. J. A. 



Herrick and Southei/. — The article in the 

 Quarterly/ Review for 1810, on Dr. Nott's jffernc/;, 

 was not written by Southey, to whom it is com- 

 monly attributed, but by the late Mr. Barron 



Field, the friend of Charles Lamb, and, I have 

 pleasure in adding, my friend as well. Your 

 able correspondent Mk. Singer (as the editor of 

 Herrick) may be glad to know this. Mr. Singer 

 has followed the common report, but my inform- 

 ant was Mr. Field himself. If Mr. Field had 

 lived another year, I was to have accompanied 

 him on his second visit to Dean Prior. 



Peter Cunningham. 

 Kensington. 



Westminster Abhey a Cathedral. — 



"Robbing Peter to pay Paul. — On the 17th De- 

 cember, 1540, the abbey church of S. Peter, West- 

 minster, was advanced to the dignity of a cathedral by 

 the king's letters patent. Dr. Thos. Thirlby was obliged 

 to surrender his see in 1550, when the diocese of Mid- 

 dlesex was rejoined to that of London ; and several 

 estates belonging to the Dean of Westminster were 

 granted in trust for tlie repairs of S. Paul's Cathe- 

 dral. Hence is said to have sprung the adage, ' Rob- 

 bing Peter to pay Paul.' An act of parliament after- 

 wards passed, declaring that Westminster should still 

 remain a cathedral, under a dean and chapter, but sub- 

 ordinate to the diocese of London." — See Winkle's 

 Cathedrals, Introd. ( The Guardian, Nov. 16, 1853.) 



A.A.D. 



Barony of Ferrers of Chartley. — I have not 

 seen noticed in any of the periodicals the curious 

 coincidence that the recent death of Lord Charles 

 Townshend s. p. places his nephew, Mr. Ferrers 

 of Baddesley-Cllnton, In the next degree of suc- 

 cession, not only to the peerage, in which his 

 family occupied a prominent station for three cen- 

 turies, but to the very title of his own male 

 ancestry. J. S. Warden. 



Vampires. — The following paragraph Is, per- 

 haps, worth preserving in the columns of "N. & 

 Q." I send it to you as copied from The Times 

 of June 23 : 



"Vampires in the United States. — The Norwich (U. 

 S.) Courier relates a strange and almost incredible tale 

 of superstition recently enacted at Jewett City in that 

 vicinity. About eight years ago, Horace Ray, of Gris- 

 wold, died of consumption. Since that time two of 

 his children, grown-up people, have died of the same 

 disease — the last one dying some two years since. 

 Not long ago the same fatal disease seized upon an- 

 other son, whereupon it was determined to exhume 

 the bodies of the two brothers already dead and burn 

 them, because the dead were supposed to feed upon 

 the living ; and so long as the dead body in the grave 

 remained in a state of decomposition, either wholly or 

 in part, the surviving members of the family must con- 

 tinue to furnish the substance on which the dead body 

 fed. Acting under the influence of this strange and 

 blind superstition, the family and friends of the de- 

 ceased proceeded to the burial-ground at Jewett City 

 on the 8th instant, dug up the bodies of the deceased 

 brethren, and burnt them on the spot." 



E.V.T. 



