April 28. 1855.] 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



335 



variation all over England. I have always heard 

 the old Latin quoted thus : 



" Si sol splendescat, Maria purificante, 

 Majus erit frigus postea, quam fuit ante." 



It is one of those old sayings, which it is impos- 

 sible to trace to any known source. I would 

 remark, however, that when your correspondent 

 proclaims the striking verification of this in the 

 present year, he forgets that, like many similar 

 wise sayings, it applied to the old style ; so that it 

 IS not now to be proclaimed of Candlemas, but of 

 St. Valentine's Day. There are many other old 

 rhymes for different days ; for instance, on St. 

 Vincent|s Day, January 22 : 



" Vincenti festo si sol radiet, memor esto, 

 Para tuas cuppas, quia multas colliges uvas." 



And on the Conversion of St. Paul, Jan. 25. : 



" Clara dies Pauli bona tempora denotat anni ; 

 Si fuerint nebulse, pereunt animalia quseque ; 

 Si fuerint venti, designant praelia genti ; 

 Si nix, si pluvia, designant tempora cara." 



F. C. H. 



Presfbury Priory (Vol. xi., p. 266.). — The 

 following extracts from the Rev. G. Roberts' His- 

 tory of Llanthony Priory will, I think, answer the 

 Query of your correspondent Catholicus, If there 

 ever was any priory at Prestbury ? 



" Milo, Earl of Hereford, was in y" year 1144 buried in 

 the chapter-house of Llanthony, near Gloucester. The 

 name of the old priory in Monmouthshire was given to 

 the new one at Prestbury, as Clement, a monk and his- 

 torian of Llanthony says, ' to prevent any doubt in after 

 years, as to which was really the mother, which the 

 daughter, which the church, which the cell.' And in 

 Abbott Froucestre's MS. Chronicle of the Abbey of St. 

 Peter's, Gloucester, the following notice occurs : ' On the 

 8th of the kalends of June (May 25th) was founded the 

 Priory of Llanthony, near Gloucester, by the Lord Milo, 

 Constable of England, a.d. 1136.' Atkyns, in his History 

 of Gloucestershire, says, ' Prestbury was so named because 

 it was a town belonging to the priests.' The Bishops of 

 Hereford erected a moated mansion in the parish. In 

 Ecton, ' Prestburie V. St. Mary, Pri. Llanthony Proper.' " 



H.J. 



Handsworth. 



Hoggerty Maw (Vol. xi., p. 282.). — If your 

 correspondent H. J. had referred to Halliwell's 

 Dictionary of Archaic and Provincial Words, he 

 would have found that Hoggerdemow is an instru- 

 ment for cutting hedges with. It is in truth a 

 hill-hook fixed to a long handle, and would be 

 a sufficiently formidable weapon in the hands of a 

 courageous woman. F. B — w. 



Relptive Value of Money temp. James I. (Vol. xi., 

 p«265.). — Questions with respect to the value of 

 money are seldom so stated as to admit of a de- 

 finite answer. " What would lOZ. 13*. 4d., temp. 

 Jacobus, be worth now ?" must be taken as equi- 

 valent to — What would coins, then a legal tender 



for that sum, sell for now as bullion ? Before this 

 can be answered, it must be said whether gold 

 coins or silver be meant. If the former — and 

 they are supposed to conform accurately to the 

 mint regulations of 1604 — according to which a 

 pound troy of gold of the present standard, coined 

 into 371. 4s. by tale, we shall find that at the pre- 

 sent price of gold, namely, 31. 17s. lO^d. per oz., 

 coins then rated at \l. sterling would now sell for 

 P25605 pounds sterling : so that the sum speci- 

 fied would, to the nearest farthing, be equivalent 

 to 13Z. 71. M^d.; but if silver coins are meant, no 

 such precise answer can be given, for the follow- 

 ing reason : — Since 1816, there is no mint price 

 for silver bullion. The silver coinage is altogether 

 in the hands of government, which, from time to 

 time, purchase silver in the bullion market at the 

 varying price of the day. The two principal 

 writers, who, since 1816, have written on the sub- 

 ject of the exchange. Dr. Kelly and Mr. Tate, 

 assume, respectively, sixty-two and sixty pence as 

 the price of the ounce of standard silver. As, by 

 the mint regulations of 1604, the pound of silver 

 was coined into 62s., a shilling of that coinage 

 would, on Dr. Kelly's supposition, be now worth a 

 shilling ; on Mr. Tate's, the value would be re- 

 duced in the proportion of thirty to thirty-one. 

 The same remark of course applies to any other 

 amount of silver coin. 



In " N. & Q." (Vol. xi., p. 248.) it was stated 

 that 31s. of Charles' time are equivalent to 33s. of 

 the present time. They are doubtless equivalent 

 in weight ; but if we found thirty-one old shillings, 

 one could not melt them down and sell the bullion 

 for 33s. The reason of the difference being, that 

 since 1816 silver circulates in England at more than 

 its intrinsic value ; and has ceased to be, except 

 in small sums, a legal tender. The error of omit- 

 ting this consideration seems to be a common 

 one. It affects, for instance, the determination of 

 the value of Greek silver coin, which will be 

 found in the English edition of Boeckh's (Economy 

 of Athens, one of the translators of which is now 

 Chancellor of the Exchequer. A. H. 



Latin and English Nomenclature (Vol. xi., 

 p. 311.). — Among the 150 " copper cuts " in this 

 curious manual, is one which may be said to 

 present something like the germinal idea of the 

 phrenological theory. A human head, with the 

 cerebral mass exposed, and marked in three 

 divisions, is said to contain the inward and outward 

 senses : 



" The inward senses are three : the common sense, under 

 the fore part of the head, apprehendeth things taken from 

 the outward senses ; the phantasie, under the crown of the 

 head, judgeth of those things, thinketh, and detaineth; 

 the memory, under the liinder part of the head, layeth up 

 every thing, and fetcheth them out ; it loseth some, and 

 this is forgetfulness." 



J.H. 



