April 16. 1853.] 



:notes and queries. 



381. 



made about the time of Charles I. ; but adds, that 

 he had forgotten the title, and had never since 

 been able to obtain the book. Can any reader of 

 " N. & Q." identify this " collection," or furnish 

 finy particulars of ilidgley not recorded by Brook, 

 Calamy, or Hunter ? F. R. R. 



Huet's Navigations of Solomon. — Can you or any 

 of your readers inform me if the treatise referred 

 to in the accompanying extract was ever pub- 

 lished ? and, if so, what was the result as to the 

 assertions there made ? 



The History of the Commerce and Navigation 

 of the Ancients. Written in French hy Monsieur 

 Huet, Bishop of Avranches. Wade English from 

 the Paris Edition. London : Printed for B. Lintoty 

 between the Temple Gates, in Fleet Street, and 

 Mears, at the Lamb, without Temple Bar. 1717. 



" 2dly. It is here we must lay down the most 

 Important remark, in point of commerce ; and I 

 shall undeniably establish the truth of it in a treatise 

 which I have beguiv- concerning the navigations of 

 Solomon, that the Cape of Good Hope was known, 

 often frequented, and doubled in Solomon's time, and 

 so it was likewise for many years after ; and that the 

 Portuguese, to whom the glory of this discovery has 

 been attributed, were not the first that found out this 

 place, but mere secondary discoverers." — V. 20. 



Edina. 



Edinburgh. 



Sheriff of Worcestershire in 1781. — Will any 

 one of your correspondents inform me who was 

 sheriiT of Worcestershire in the year 1781*, and 

 give his arms, stating the soui-ce of his knowledge 

 on these points, to much oblige X. 



Tree of the Thousand Images. — Father Hue, 

 in his journey to Thibet, gives an account of a 

 singular tree, bearing this title, and of which the 

 peculiarity is that its leaves and bark are covered 

 with well-defined characters of the Thibetian al- 

 phabet. The tree seen by MM. Hue and Gabet 

 appeared to them to be of great age, and is said 

 by the inhabitants to be the only one of its kind 

 known in the country. According to the account 

 given by these travellers, the letters would appear 

 to be formed by the veins of the leaves ; the re- 

 semblance to Thibetian characters was such as to 

 strike them with astonishment, and they were in- 

 clined at first to suspect fraud, but, after repeated 

 observations, arrived at the conclusion that none 

 existed. Do botanists know or conjecture any- 

 thing about this tree ? C. W. G. 



Be Burgh Family. — I shall feel much obliged 

 for references to the early seals of the English 



[* John Darke of Breedon, Esq. See Nash's Worces- 

 tershire, Supplement, p. 102. — En.] 



branch of the family of De Burgh, descended from 

 Harlowen De Burgh, and Arlotta, mother of Wil- 

 liam the Conqueror, especially of that English 

 branch whose armorial bearings were — Or a cross 

 gules : also for information whether the practice, 

 in reference to the spelling of names, was such as 

 to render Barow, of the latter part of the fifteentb. 

 century, Aborough some fifty years afterwards. 



E. D. B. 



Witchcraft Sermons at Huntingdon. — In an 

 article on Witchcraft in the Retrospective Hevieto 

 (vol. V. p. 121.), it is stated that, in 1593 — 

 " An old man, his wife and daughter, were accused of 

 bewitching the five children of a Mr. Throgmorton, 

 several servants, the lady of Sir Samuel Cromwell, and 

 other persons. .... They were executed, 

 and their goods, which were of the value of forty 

 pounds, being escheated to Sir S. Cromwell, as lord of 

 the manor, he gave the amount to the mayor and 

 aldermen of Huntingdon, for a rent-charge of forty 

 shillings yearly, to be paid out of their town lands, 

 for an annual lecture upon the subject of witchcraft, to 

 be preached at their town every Lady-Day, by a doctor 

 or bachelor of divinity, of Queen's College, Cambridge." 



Is this sum yet paid, and the sermon still 

 preached, or has it fallen into disuse now that it is 

 unpopular to believe in witchcraft and diabolic 

 possession ? Have any of the sermons been pub- 

 lished? Edwabd Peacock, Junior^ 



Bottesford, Kirton in Lindsey. 



Consort. — A former correspondent applied for a 

 notice of Mons. Consort, said to have been a mys- 

 tical impostor similar to the famous Cagliostro. T 

 beg to renew the same inquiry. A. N. 



Creole. — This word is variously represented in. 

 my Lexicons. Bailey says, " The descendant of 

 an European, born in America," and with him 

 agree the rest, with the exception of the Metro- 

 politana ; that Encyclopedia gives the meaning, 

 " The descendant of an European and an American 

 Indian." A friend advocating the first meaning 

 derives the word from the Spanish. Another 

 friend, in favour of the second meaning, derives it 

 originally from Kfpawvfjn, to mix ; which word is ' 

 fetched, perhaps far-fetched, from Kepas, the horn 

 in which liquors are mixed. Light on this word 

 would be acceptable. Gilbert N. Smith. 



Shearman Family. — Is there a family named 

 Shearman or Sherman in Yorkshire, or in the city 

 of York? What are their arms? Is there any 

 record of any of that family settling in Ireland, in 

 the county or city of Kilkenny, about the middle 

 of the seventeenth century, or at an earlier period 

 in Cork ? Are there any genealogical records of 

 them ? Was Robert Shearman, warden of the 

 hospital of St. Cross in Winchester, of that family ? 

 Was Roger Shearman, who signed the Declaration 



