July 19. 1851.] 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



43 



" statutes " is explained in Blount's Dictionary as 

 follows : 



" It is also used in our vulgar discourse for the Petty 

 Sessions which are yearly kept for the disposing of 

 servants in service by the statute 5 Eliz. chap, iv." 

 (§48.)_ 



See in the Archaic and Provincial Dictionary, 

 " Sittings " and "Statute." In Holderness (I 

 collect it from the Query of F. R. H.) the term 

 "sittings" is used in the same sense as "statute" 

 in the West Riding, and in many other parts of 

 the kingdom. " Fest sittings " appear then to 

 mean " the annual assemblage of servants who 

 hire themselves to board from home." In many 

 places the "statute" or "stattie" is connected 

 with the fiiir. 



" Statute Fairs," my friend writes, " are held at 

 Settle, Long Preston, and other places, wliicli don't 

 occur to me, in our district (Craven). At Settle ser- 

 vants wishing to hire stand with a small white wand 

 in their hands, to show their object. In like manner 

 horses, when taken to a fair, wear on their heads a white 

 leather kind of bridle; and (to come nearer home) 

 when a young lady has attained a certain age, and 

 begins to look with anxious eye to future prospects, we 

 say that she also has put on the white bridle." 



He adds : " I have myself had servants hire<l at 

 Long Preston Statute Fair." Another friend 

 writes to me : 



" Richmond Statties are very famous, every servant 

 desirous of hiring having a peeled twig or stick. At 

 Penrith they put a straw in their mouths. I remem- 

 ber a poor girl being killed by an infuriated cow at 

 Penrith ; and the poor thing had the straw in her 

 mouth when dead." 



In the East Riding, Pocklington Statute is 

 well known ; and York has its Statute Fair. At 

 these "statutes "or "statties" ("Stattie Fairs" 

 and " Sittings," or Fest Sittings), servants " fest 

 themselves," that is, hire themselves to board from 

 Lome. 



Standing in the market-place to be hired will 

 occur to any one who may take the trouble of 

 reading these desultory observations. 



Excuse my adding irrelevantly the following use 

 of the word " sitting." It is said that a young 

 man is " sitting a young woman," when he is 

 wooinjr or courtinn; her. F. W. T. 



les plus neeessaires de la langue franyaise. Nouv. 

 edit. Paris, D. Mariette, 1702, in-12. 



" La premiere edition a paru en 1681. 



" Histoire des Severambes (Roman poli- 

 tique) nouv. edit. Amsterdam, Etienne Roger, 1716, 

 2 vol. in-12. 



" La premiere edition parut de 1677 a 1679, en trois 

 vol. in-12. 



" Cet ouvrage a ^te relmprime dans la collection 

 des Voyages imaginaires. " 



La France Litteraire is a compilation of extra- 

 ordinary labour and research ; and, in the absence 

 of more authentic information, I believe we may 

 safely rely on the above statement. The facts, 

 tlierefore, in so far as they have been brought to 

 light, may be summed up as follows : — 



1. The original work was written in English, 

 was entitled History of the Sevarites, and pub- 

 lished in 1675. 



2. That work suggested the idea of the Histoire 

 des Seoeramhes, which was published in 1677-9, 

 and in all essential respects may be said to be an 

 original composition. 



3. The Captain Liden of one edition, and the 

 Captain Siden of another (from whose memoirs 

 the work is said to have been translated), are one 

 and the same imaginary personage. 



4. The author of the History of the Seoarites 

 has not been ascertained ; the claims of Vairasse, 

 Algernon Sidney, and Isaac Vossius, being founded 

 on mere conjecture. 



5. There seems no reason to doubt that Denis 

 Vairasse d'Alais was the author of Histoii'e des 

 Severambes ; supported as that opinion is by tlie 

 testimony of Christian Thomasius, Barbier, and 

 Querard. Heney H. Breen. 



St. Lucia, June, 1851. 



histoire des severambes. 

 (Vol. iii., pp. 4. 72. 147. 374.) 



In Querard's France Litteraire (Didot, Paris, 

 1839), tome x. p. 10., I read the following notice 

 of the author of Histoire des Seoerambes : — 



" Vairasse ( Denis) d'Alais, 6crlvain fran^ais du 

 XVn. Siecle. 



" ———— Gramniairc ralsonnec et methodique, con- 

 tenant en abrege les ptincipes de cet art et les regies 



SALTING THE DEAD. 



(Vol. iv., p. 6.) 



An amusing instance of this custom — perhaps 

 even now, under certain circumstances, prevalent 

 in some parts of England — occurs in Mrs. Bray's 

 Letters on the Superstitions, §,'c. of Devonshire. 

 A traveller while passing over one of the large 

 uninclosed tracts of land near Tavistock, was 

 overtaken by a violent snowstorm, which com- 

 pelled him to seek a night's shelter from the inha- 

 bitants of a lonely cottage on the moor. In the 

 chamber assigned for his repose, he observed a 

 curiously carved oak chest of antique appearance. 



" He noticed or made some remarks upon it to the 

 old woman who had lighted him up stairs, in order to 

 see that all things in his room might be as comfortable 

 as circumstances would permit for his rest. There was 

 something he thought shy and odd about the manner of 

 the woman when lie observed the chest ; and after she 

 was gone, he had half a mind to take a peep into it." 



After a while he does, and horrihile dictu! a 



