June 8. 1850.] 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



25 



quiries on the suhject, have always, I believe, re- 

 ceived an explicit answer. 



Henry George Bohn. 

 May 30. 1850. 



UMBRELLAS. 



Although Dr. Rimbault's Query (Vol. i., p. 415.) 

 as to the first introduction of umbrellas into 

 England, is to a certain extent answered in the 

 following number (p. 436.) by a quotation from 

 Mr. Cunninsfham's Handbook, a few additional 

 remarks may, perhaps, be deemed admissible. 

 Hanway is there stated to have been " the first 

 man who ventured to walk the streets of London 

 with one over his head," and that after continuing 

 its use nearly thirty years, he saw them come into 

 general use. As Hanway died in 1786, we may 

 thus infer that the introduction of umbrellas may 

 be placed at about 1750. But it is, I think, pro- 

 bable that their use must have been at least par- 

 tially known in London long before that period, 

 judging from the following extract from Gay's 

 Trivia, or Art of Walking the Streets of London, 

 puijlished 1712 : — 



" Good housewives all the winter's rage despise, 

 Defended by the ridinghood's disguise; 

 Or, vmderneatli tli' iimhrella's oily shade, 

 Safe through the wet ou clinking pattens tread. 

 Let Persian dames the nvibrellii's ribs display, 

 To guard their beauties from the sunny ray ; 

 Or sweating slaves support the shady load, 

 When Eastern monarchs show their state abroad ; 

 Britain in winter only knows its aid, 

 To guard from chilly showers the walking maid." 



Book i. lines 209 — 218. 



That it was, perhaps, an article of curiosity 

 rather than use in the middle of the seventeenth 

 century, is evident in the fact of its being men- 

 tioned in the " Muscmm Tradescantianum, or Col- 

 lection of Rarities, preserved at South Lambeth 

 near London, by John Tradescant." 12mo. 1656. 

 It occurs under the head of " Utensils," and is 

 simply mentioned as " An Umbrella." 



E.B.Price. 



[Mr. St. Croix has also referred Dr. Uimbault to 

 Gay's Tnvia.'\ 



Jonas Hanway the philanthropist is reputed 

 first to have used an "umbrella" in England. I 

 am the more inclined to think it may be so, as my 

 own father, who wius born in 1744, and lived to 

 ninety-two years of age, has told me the same thing, 

 and he lived in the same jjarish as Mr. Ilanway, 

 who resided in lied Lion Square. 



Mr. Hanway was born in 1712. J. W. 



The Introduction of this article of general con- 

 venience is attributed, and I believe accurately so, 

 to Jonas Planway, the Eastern traveller, who on 



his return to his native land rendered himself 

 justly celebrated by his practical benevolence. In 

 a little book with a long title, published in 1787, 

 written by '■'■John Pugh," I find many curious 

 anecdotes related of Hanway, and apropos of um- 

 brellas, in describing his dress Mr. Pugh says, — 

 " When it rained, a small parapluie defended his 

 face and wig; thus he was always prepared to 

 enter into any company without impropriety, or 

 the appearance of negligence. And he (Hanway) 

 was the first man who ventured to walk the streets 

 of London witii an umbrella over Ids head : after 

 carrying one near thirty years, he saw them come 

 into general use." Hanway died 1786. J. F. 



As far as I remember, there is a portrait of 

 Hanway with an umbrella as a frontispiece to the 

 book of Travels published by him about 1753, in 

 four vols. 4to. ; and I have no doubt that he had 

 used one in his travels through Greece, Turkey, 

 &e. T. G. L. 



In the hall of my father's house, at Stamford in 

 Lincolnshire, there was, when I was a child, the 

 wreck of a very large green silk umbi-ella, appa- 

 rently of Chinese manufiicture, brought by my 

 father from Hollaml, somewhere between 1770 

 and 1780, and, as I have often heard, the first um- 

 brella seen at Stamford. I well remember also an 

 amusing description given by the late i\Ir. Warry, 

 so many years consul at Smyrna, of the astonish- 

 ment and envy of his mother's neighbours at Saw- 

 bridgeworth, in Herts, where his father had a 

 country-house, when he ran home and came back 

 with an umbrella, which he had just brought from 

 Leghorn, to shelter them from a pelting shower 

 which detained them in the church-porch, after the 

 service, on one summer Sunday. From Mr. Warry 's 

 age at the time he mentioned this, and other cir- 

 cumstances in his history, I conjecture that it 

 occurred not later than 1775 or 1776. As Saw- 

 bridgeworth is so near London, it is evident that 

 even there umbrellas were at that time almost 

 unknown. 



[f I have " spun too long a yarn," the dates, at 

 least, will not be unacceptable to others like 

 myself. G. C. Kenouaru. 



Swanscombe Rectory, May 1. 



Dr. Jamieson was the first who introduced um- 

 brellas to Glasgow in the year 1782; he boujiht 

 liis in Paris. I remember very well when this 

 took place. At this time the umbrella was made of 

 heavy wax cloth, with cane ribs, and was a pon- 

 derous article. K,. R. 



emancipation of ti:e jews. 

 (Vol. i., pp. 474, 475.) 

 From a scarce collection of j)ainphlets con- 

 cerning the naturalisation of the Jews in England, 



