2°"' S. VI. l-iO., Nov. 6, '58.] 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



375 



fant's glove, made of oiled silk." Perhaps some of our 

 medical readers can furnish a more satisfactory explana- 

 tion of this useful article.] 



Note of Matthew Prior : PontacKs. — 

 " S"- Richard, M"" Putlock and I will be at Puntacks 

 till 5, pray come if you can. Yours, sincerely, 



" M. Prior." 



Without date, but addressed to Dr. Bernard 

 (probably Dr. B. of the Old Bailey). Where or 

 what was PuntacKs ? Ci,. Hopper. 



[Pontack's was a celebrated French eating-house in 

 Abchurch-lane. See several quotations respecting it in 

 Cunningham's Handbook of London, edit. 1850, p. 403. 

 De Foe informs us that the name was derived from " the 

 sign of Pontack, a president of the parliament of Bordeaux, 

 from whose name the best French clarets were called 

 so;" and tells us that there, in 1722, "you might be- 

 speak a dinner from four or five shillings a-head to a 

 guinea, or what sum you please." {Journey through 

 England, i. 175.) An earlier notice of this tavern occurs 

 in Rowland Davies's Diari/ (Camden Society), p. 91. : " I 

 went with my brother to the Exchange, where we met 

 the Earl of Orrery, S. Morris, Jasper Morris, C. Old, and 

 J. Hasset; and we went and dined at Pontack's at my 

 expense of five shillings."] 



FergussorHs ^^ Handbook of Architecture." — How 

 is it that Fergusson, in his Illustrated Handhook of 

 Architecture, gives no account of St. Paul's Ca- 

 thedral and St. Peter's, Rome, though he gives an 

 account of the Cathedral of Florence, a work of 

 the same style as St. Peter's ? The omission ap- 

 pears unaccountable, as the second volume of the 

 work professes to be a complete account of all 

 styles of Christian architecture ; and as he does 

 give an account of the Old Basilica of St. Peter's 

 that preceded the present cathedral. Oxoniensis. 



[If Oxoniensis would refer to p. viii. of the Preface to 

 Fergusson, he will find an answer to his inquiry : — " One 

 great division of art still remains to be described before 

 the subject is complete. It is that style which arose in 

 the middle of the 15th centurj-, and culminated with 

 the rebuilding of St. Peter's," &c. &c. Mr. Fergusson has 

 collected materials for this supplemental volume on Pal- 

 ladian architecture, and it is to be hoped that he may be 

 encouraged to proceed and complete it.] 



Etymology of Bonfire. — What is the derivation 

 of " Bonfire ? " The meaning of this word, in its 

 common acceptation, " a fire made for some public 

 cause of triumph or exultation," may be perfectly 

 correct ; but " bon " fire, or pood fire, as John- 

 son has it, by no means satisfies me as the right 

 derivation. In the register of Somerleyton, a 

 parish near Lowestoft, Suffolk, there stands a list 

 of contributions for building a bone fire at the 

 coronation of King Charles II., most of them in 

 money, but others in " kindlings," an East- 

 Anglian term for fire-stuff", or "ling," as it is 

 there called ; some gave faggots ; some firs or 

 furze; but the item, or gift, which particularly 

 took my attention was as follows : — 



" John Dale, 1 load of hones." 

 Query,— Did bones originally form the principal 



material for the fire, and give it the name it 

 bears ? II. C. 



[Whatever may have been the nature of John Dale's 

 contribution, there can be no doubt that the word Bon in 

 Bonfire is from the Danish Bann, a beacon. See Finn 

 Jlagnusen's Essay on the Danish Calendar, Den forsie 

 November og den forsie August, in which he speaks con- 

 tinually offesllige Bauner, for Festal Bonfires. Dr. Rich- 

 ardson in his Dictionary adopts that of Skinner: Ignis 

 bonus q. d. bonus, vel bene ominatus.^ 



l^eplte^. 



coo, THE SPY. 



(2"" S. vi. 344.) 



E. H. KiNGSLEY has evidently taken so much 

 pains with the letter to Chief Justice Popham, 

 that it will, I fear, seem uncourteous even to sus- 

 pect an inaccuracy in his transcript ; but I hope 

 he will excuse me if I inquire whether he is quite 

 certain as to the signature ? Is the Christian name 

 JH. or TH. ? 



I will explain the origin of my doubt. 



There are in the State Paper Office three let- 

 ters, one signed "Thoma Coo," and the others 

 " Tho. Coo," besides another from the same per- 

 son unsigned, all which agree in character with 

 the letter published by Mk. Kingsley. Three 

 of the State Paper letters were evidently written 

 by a spy, and two of them from prisons ? Can it 

 be possible that two such persons, and such writers, 

 could have existed of one surname at the same 

 time? 



The first letter, in point of time, is without 

 date ; but it is addressed to Robert Cecil, Earl of 

 Salisbury, Lord Treasurer, which fixes it as, in 

 all probability, written before the 24th May, 1612, 

 when Salisbury died. It is endorsed by the writer 

 as containing "the most humble thanksgiving of 

 Thomas Coo, M"' of Arte, for his late enlargement 

 out of the Fleet, being under the commaund [of] 

 the Lord Chancellor." In this smooth epistle the 

 writer, besides flattery of Salisbury, and thanks 

 for his release after many months' imprisonment, 

 entreats the earl again to receive him into his pro- 

 tection. This is now, he asserts, his alone refuge, 

 without which he cannot stand, but flying bis 

 native country, he must be forced to leave his 

 poor motherless children comfortless : such have 

 been his disgraces imposed upon him by the Lord 

 Chancellor within the University of Cambridge. 



The second letter is dated from Newgate, Oct. 

 6, 1618 ; and is addressed to Sir Julius Cssar and 

 Sir Fulke Greville. It inquires whether affliction 

 added to oppression, in rites of state, be holden a 

 meritorious reward for a voluntary service ? Must 

 dose imprisonment in a dungeon of contagion be 

 a recompeiice for a loyal subject for seeking to 

 preserve the life of his sovereign? But seeing 

 their wisdoms have thus resolved to dissolve his 

 discovery of " this London insurrection," he de- 



