April 12. 1851.] 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



283 



A NARRATIVE CONCERNING CROMWELl's DEALINGS WITH 

 THE D L. 



" On )■■= 3d of Sept., in y"= morning, Cromwell took 

 Colonel Lindsey, his intimate friend, and first Capt. of 

 his regiment, to a wood side not far from y* army, and 

 bid him alight and follow him into that wood, & take 

 particular notice of what he saw & heard. 



" After they had both alighted & secured their horses, 

 & walked some small way into the wood, Lindsey began 

 to turn pale, & to be seiz'd with horrour, from some 

 unknown cause; ujjon wch Cromwell askt him how he 

 did, or how he felt himself He answered, that he was 

 in such a trembling & consternation that he never felt 

 yo like in all y" conflicts and battles he had been en- 

 gaged in : But wether it proceeded from the gloomy- 

 ness of y» place, or y' temperament of his body, he knew 

 not. 'How now?' said Cromwell, 'what! trowbled 

 with vapours ? Come forward, man.' They had not 

 gon above 20 yards before Lindsey on a sudden stood 

 still and cry'd out, by all that's good he was seized 

 with such unaccountable terrours & astonishment that 

 it was impossible for him to stir one step further. 

 Upon which Cromwell call'd him faint-hearted fool, & 

 bid him stand there & observe or be witness: and then 

 advancing to some distance from him, he met with a 

 grave elderly man, with a roll of parchment in his 

 hand, who deliver'd it to Cromwell, who eagerly pe- 

 rused it. Lindsey, a little recover'd from his fear, 

 heard severall loud words betwixt them : particularly 

 Cromwell said, ' This is but for seven year. I was to 

 have it for 21, and it must and shall be so.' The other 

 told him positively it coud not be for above seven ; 

 upon which Cromwell cry'd with a great fierceness, it 

 shd be, however, for 14 year; but the other person 

 plorily declared it coud not possibly be for any longer 

 time : and if he woud not take it so, there was others 

 that woud accept of it : Upon which Cromwell at last 

 took y'^ parchment, and returning to Lindsey with 

 great joy in his countenance, he cry'd, ' Now, Lindsey, 

 the battle's our own : I long to be engag'J.' Return- 

 ing out of the wood, they rode to y* army, Cromwell 

 with a resolution to engage as soon as possible, & y= 

 other with a design of leaving y« army as soon. After 

 y' first charge Lindsey deserted his post, and rode 

 away with all possible speed, day and night, till he 

 came into y* county of Norfolk, to y» house of an 

 intimate friend, and minister of that parish : Cromwell, 

 as soon as he mist him, sent all ways after him, with a 

 promise of a great reward to any that w'd bring him 

 alive or dead, 



" Thus far y* narrative of Lindsey himself; but some- 

 thing further is to be remembered to complete & con- 

 firm y" story. 



" When Mr. Thorowgood saw his friend Lindsey 

 come into his yard, his horse and himself just tired, in 

 a sort of amaze he said, ' How, now. Colonel ; we hear 

 there is like to be a battle shortly. What I fled from 

 your colours?' ' A battle !' said >• other; ' yts, there 

 has bin a battle, and I am sure y' King is beaten. If 

 ever I strike a stroke for Cromwell again, may I perish 

 eternally, for I am sure he has made a league with y' 

 Devil, and he will have him in due time.' Then, de- 

 siring his protection from Cromwell's inquisitors, he 



went in & related y" whole story, and all the circum- 

 stances, concluding with these remarkable words, That 

 Cromwell w'd certainly die that day seven year that 

 the battle was fought. 



"The strangeness of his relation caused Mr. Thorow- 

 good to order his son John, then about 12 years of 

 age, to write it in full length in his common place 

 book, & to take it from Lindsey's own mouth. This 

 common place book, and likewise y* same story writen 

 in other books, I am sure is still preserv'd in y* family 

 of y" Ihorowgoods : But how far Lindsey is to be 

 believed, & how far y" story is to be accounted in- 

 credible, is left to y' reader's faith and judgment, & not 

 to any determination of our own." 



Gig Hill (Vol. iii., p. 222.). — Perhaps your cor- 

 respondent is mistaken in saying that " there is no 

 indication of anything in the land to warrant the 

 name." At least, the very fact of its being a bill is 

 suspicious. If I could venture to affront you with 

 a pun, I should say, that it seems to me very na- 

 tural that the tap of a hill should look like a gig. 

 Mercy on us ! do words wear out so fast ? Why, 

 I have not reached three-score, and did not I 

 " whip my gig" when I was an " infant"? — not 

 an infant born in a remote province, sucking in 

 archaism with my mother's milk, playing with 

 heirloom toys, and calling them by obsolete names, 

 but a smart little cockney, born and bred in the 

 parish of St. Andrew, Holborn, where, no doubt, 

 there were gig-whipping brats plenty. In the 

 crowded state of your columns, you would not 

 thank me for enlarging on the top-kic, or I should 

 really feel disposed to enter into a dissertation on 

 the nature and characteristic differences of whip- 

 ping-tops, humming-tops, peg-tops, and gigs. As 

 to the latter, it certainly occurs to me, now that 

 the question is raised, that I have not seen such a 

 thing for a long time ; though I fancy gigs lying 

 in the shop-windows, as they did at a period when 

 I was more likely to observe them ; and if they 

 have become so far forgotten, it may be worth 

 while, for the sake of Shakspeare, to say that they 

 were generally (as far as I remember always) 

 made of horn ; and therefore, when Holofernes says 

 " Go, whip thy gig " (which means just the same as 

 Mr. Oldbuck's "Sew your sampler, monkey!"), 

 Moth replies, " Lend me your ho7-n to make one, 

 and I will whip about your infamy circxim circa; a 

 gig of a cuckold's horn ! " It is enough to add that 

 the gig was made of the tip of the horn, and looked, 

 while spinning, like an inverted extinguisher. It 

 was hollow, but my impression is that there was 

 sometimes lead at the bottom of the inside. Even 

 with the ballast, it was a ticklish, volatile, kickety 

 thing, much more difficult to set up and to keep 

 up than the sober whipping-top, and bearing some- 

 what the same relation to one in bulk and motion, 



