2nd s. N* 109., Jan. 30. '58.] 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



95 



replaced on the lady's head, she expressed her 

 obligations to the men, giving them each some 

 money, and promised a piece of land (to be vested 

 in certain persons in trust) to throw up a hood 

 annually on old Cliinstmas Day ; she also ordered 

 that the twelve men engaged to contest the race 

 for the hood should be clothed {pi'o tern.) in scarlet 

 jerkins and velvet caps : the hood to be thrown 

 up in the same place as the one where she lost 

 her's. The custom is yet followed ; and though 

 the Meeres on which she was riding has long ago 

 been brought into a state of. cultivation, and the 

 road through been diverted, yet an old mill stands 

 in the field where the old road passed through, 

 and is pointed out as the place where the original 

 scene took place, and the hood is usually thrown 

 up from this mill. There is usually a great con- 

 course of people from the neighbouring villages, 

 who also take part in the proceedings ; and when 

 the hood is thrown up by the chief of the Boggons 

 or by the officials, it becomes the object of the vil- 

 lagers to get the hood to their own village by 

 throwing or kicking it, similar to the foot-ball — 

 the other eleven men, called Boggons, being sta- 

 tioned at the corners and sides of the field to 

 prevent, if possible, its being thrown out of the 

 field; and should it chance to fall into any of 

 their hands it is " boggoned " and forthwith re- 

 turned to the chief, who again throws it up from 

 the mill as before. Whoever is fortunate enough 

 to get it out of the field tries to get it to his vil- 

 lage, and usually takes it to the public-house he is 

 accustomed to frequent, and the landlord regales 

 them with hot ale and rum. The game usually 

 continues until dusk, and is frequently attended 

 by broken shins and broken heads. 1 have 

 known a man's leg broken. The next day is oc- 

 cupied by the boggons going round the villages 

 singing as waits, and are regaled with hot fur- 

 menty ; from some they get coppers given them, 

 and from others a small measure of wheat, accord- 

 ing to the means of the donors. The day after that 

 they assume the character of plough bullocks, and 

 at a certain part of Westwoodside they " smoke 

 the fool," that is, straw is brought by those who 

 like and piled on a heap, a rope being tied or 

 slung over tlie branches of the tree next the pile 

 of straw ; the other end of the rope is fastened 

 round the waist of the " fool," and he is drawn 

 up, and fire is put to the straw, the " fool " being 

 swung to a:id fro through the smoke until he is 

 well nigh choked ; after which he goes round 

 with his cap and collects whatever the spectators 

 think proper to give. After which the perform- 

 ance is at an end until the following year. 



I shall be glad if the above information will 

 suit your querist A. E. I forgot to say that the 

 quantity of land left by Lady Mowbray was forty 

 acres, which are known by the name of the Hood- 

 lands, and that the Boggons' dresses and the hood 

 are made from its proceeds. W. H. "VVoomousii. 



STONEHENGE. 



(2"'i S. iv. 453. 499.) 



I was at Stonehenge in the autumn of 1854. 

 The very intelligent old man who acts as a sort of 

 guide there, and who told me he had never been 

 a day absent from the temple for twenty-four 

 years, did not, as well as I recollect, make any 

 mention of a recent fall of any of the triliths ; and 

 as I made a long journey (from Carlisle) solely 

 to visit Stonehenge, and spent some hours on that 

 most interesting spot, I do not think, if he had 

 mentioned so remarkable an occurrence, it would 

 have escaped my memory. With respect to the 

 much disputed name of Stonehenge, not being an 

 Anglo-Saxon scholar, I venture into the contest 

 with much diffidence : still, as the name is allowed 

 to be of Saxon origin, and as " StEenene hengen " 

 means a stone gallows in that language, I think 

 we may get a " glimpse of truth." The stone 

 gallows was, as is well known, a Saxon " insti- 

 tution ; " and it seems to me not impossible that 

 the Saxons, when they overran England, struck 

 with the resemblance the triliths, then of course 

 in a more perfect state, bore to their " domestic 

 institution," may have called them by a name 

 signifying the stone gallows. Of course any one 

 who has visited the temple cannot for a moment 

 suppose that the late Mr. Kemble, in his assertion 

 that the stones were a grand set of gallows erected 

 on some great occasion for the execution of a 

 number of British chieftains, meant anything but 

 a jeu d-esprit. (" N. & Q." 2"* S. iii. 2.) If 

 the triliths were set up as gallows, what was 

 the inner circle of single stones set up for ? It is 

 also a little curious that in the same paper a few 

 lines before, he turns into ridicule the history of 

 the murder of the British chieftains by llengist, 

 and immediately after gives it, as his opinion t^bat 

 the stones were set up as the implements of a 

 wholesale massacre of said British chieftains ! 

 The " Gododin," the authenticity of which has 

 been so fully established, seems to give the best 

 account of what Stonehenge really was, viz. the 

 great temple for the celebration of the Helio- 

 Arkite worship ; that it was afterwards used as 

 a place of solemn assembly : and that the famous 

 or infamous massacre may have taken place there, 

 as related by the traditions, is a matter the pro- 

 bability of which those who are acquainted with 

 British historical records and traditions, and 

 who know how long Druidical customs have been 

 mixed up with Christian observances among the 

 ancient Britons and their descendants, may judge 

 for themselves. Francis Robert L)avies. 



Mo3'glas Mawr. 



[Mr. Kemble does not say tliey were "erected," but 

 " served as gallowses " on some grand occasion. He was 

 discussing the name, and no^tlie origin, of Stonehenge. — 

 Ed. " N. & Q."] 



