Oct. 21. 1854.] 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



321 



£ s. d. 

 It. p* Ben Page for nailes used about the glaxes 8 

 It. expentied then in beere, and the next day 



when the King came through Culston - - 8 10 

 It. p** Rich*! Board for earring the glaxe down 



to brod ryne - - - - - -010" 



"What the "glaxe" is, no one can tell me, nor is 

 any such word known to the western people. 



One of our family, Richard Alford, was church- 

 warden in the year of the battle ; and there is a 

 legend in the family, that he, being a Monmouthite, 

 thereby saved himself by bringing out to a party 

 of the king's soldiers a jug of cider, which had 

 the king's head on it, and thereby escaping question. 



It does not appear from Macaulay that the 

 king visited Sedgmoor the year after the battle ; 

 but from these entries it must have been so. 



I may add, that the old registers at Weston- 

 Zoyland are unusually full and perfect, but most 

 miserably kept at present, being tumbled into a 

 large chest with rubbish ; and the parish book 

 containing the above interesting entries is partly 

 eaten by mice. Henbt Alford. 



FOLK LORE. 



Baptismal Superstition in Surrey. — It is cus- 

 tomary in many parts of Surrey, when several 

 children are brought to be baptized, for the clerk 

 to take especial care that the male infants be first 

 baptized ; for it is thought that, should the young 

 ladies take precedence, the boys will grow up 

 beardless. Is this belief confined to the above 

 county ? Clekicus Rusticus. 



Extraordinary Superstition in Devonshire. — 



"An instance of the intense feeling of superstition 

 which pervades the ignorant among our rural population 

 in the west of England occurred at Northlew last week. 

 Some gipsies having encamped in the neighbourhood, one 

 of the female members of the tribe ascertained from the 

 wife of a farm labourer that she had a daughter in the 

 last stage of consumption. The gipsey represented that 

 the child had been 'bewitched;' and that she could rule 

 the spell, which would effect a cure, for two sovereigns. 

 The mother of the child cheerfully paid the money, but 

 the next day the wily gipsey returned it, and said it was 

 not sufficient, but 20^. more in gold would do it. The 

 cottager's wife, in her native simplicity, went and bor- 

 rowed 10/. from a neighbour; and, with another ten 

 gf sovereigns she had in the house saved from her husband's 

 K earnings, added the 20/. to the 21. already in the gipsey's 

 W hands. Soon as the money was paid, the affrighted 

 woman was bound over to secrecy by the gipsey, who 

 mumbled out a few disjointed texts of Scripture, and left 

 with the promise that the child would be cured on the 

 following Friday, when an angel would appear and return 

 the money. Since that time, however, it is needless to 

 add, neither gipsey nor money have turned up, although 

 the impoverished husband and the police have been daily 

 on the look out for the gipsey impostor. On Sunday last 

 another specimen of deep-rooted superstition was presented 

 within the porch of the western door at Exeter Cathedral. 

 As the congregation were leaving the church, a decrepit 



old woman took up a position within the porch, bearing a 

 begging petition, setting forth that she had been attacked 

 by a paralytic seizure, and had been recommended by 

 ' the wise woman ' to get a penny each from forty single 

 men on leaving the church, and her infirmity would by 

 this charm be banished for ever." — Exeter Paper. 



S. R. P. 



Distich on St. Mattheiv's Day. — As Thursday, 

 September 21, was St. Matthew's Day, perhaps an 

 old distich relative to that day will not be thought 

 amiss. 



" St. Matthew' 

 Brings the cold rain and dew." 



In some counties rain is looked for on St. James' 

 Day to christen the apples. E. S. B. 



Cambridgeshire Folk Lore. — The following 

 charm is used in the county of Cambridge by 

 young men and women who are desirous of know- 

 ing the name of their future husbands or wives. 

 The " clover of two " means a piece of clover with 

 only two leaves upon it. 



" A Clover, a Clover of two, 



Put it in your right shoe ; 

 I The first young man [woman] you meet, 

 ■ In field, street, or lane, 



You'll have him [her] or one of his [her] name." 



Harriet Normaw. 



Fulbourn, Cambridgeshire. 



Remedy for Jaundice. — I scarcely know whether 

 ears polite will tolerate the record of a sovereign 

 remedy for jaundice which fell under my notice 

 in a parish in Dorsetshire a few weeks since, but 

 which I find, upon inquiry, to be generally known 

 and practised in the neighbourhood. The patient 

 is made to eat nine lice on a piece of bread and 

 butter. In the case referred to, I am bound to 

 state, for the credit of the parish, that the ani- 

 malcules were somewhat difficult of attainment ; 

 but that, after having been duly collected by the 

 indefatigable labours of the village doctress, they 

 were administered with the most perfect success. 



C. W. B. 



Adjuration to Bees. — The following curious 

 piece, which Is said to be copied from a St. Gall 

 MS., may be interesting to apiarian readers. The 

 Latinity is almost as wonderful as the substance 



of it : 



" Ad revocandum examen apum dispersum. 



" Adjuro te. mater aviorum, per Deum Regem coelorum, 

 et per ilium Redemptorem Filium Dei te adjuro ut non 

 te altum levare, nee long^ volare: sed qukm plus citd 

 potes ad arborem venire, ibi te allocas cum omni tua' 

 genera, vel cum socia tua. Ibi habeo bono vaso parato, . 

 ubi vos ibi in Dei nomine laboretis, et nos in Dei nomine 

 luminaria faciamus in Ecclesia Dei, et per virtutem Do- 

 mini nostri Jesu-Christi, ut nos non offendat Dominus de 

 radio solis, sicut vos offendit de egalo flos, in nomine 

 sanctae Trinitatis. Amen." — RecueU des Historiens de la 

 France, ed. Bouquet, iv. 609. 



J. C. R 



