496
NOTES AND QUERIES. [io s. VIL JUNE 22, 1907.
SPRING-HEELED JACK (10 S. vii. 206, 256,
394). More than thirty years ago jumping
pranks were played many nights on the
sentry over the magazine by the canal near
the South Camp at Aldershot. It was a
lonely post at some distance from the guard-
room. Jack used to spring across the canal
while the sentry, pacing his beat, was walk-
ing away from it, and then on to the
man's shoulders, sorely frightening him, and
usually disarming him by carrying off his
rifle. The pranks were popularly attri-
buted to a lively officer of Rifles ; he
certainly was not convicted of them, and
I do not know that he ever acknowledged
himself to be spring-heeled Jack.
ALFRED C. E. WELBY.
" LYING BISHOP " : MILES or VARYING LENGTH (10 S. vii. 449). I cannot answer MR. J. W. BROWN'S query, but I wish to ask another question on the same subject. Seeing that the two supposed errors on the milestone in question are very nearly exactly proportionate to one another, I desire to seek information whether the fact may not be that the milestone indicates miles of a different length viz., about 2,640 yards from that of the standard English mile.
This leads me to ask a further question. Do any of your readers know of the exist- ence of any stones I cannot say milestones which still continue to record obsolete measures of length ?
When motoring last year along the high road between Madrid and Toledo, I noticed that there were still several stones left which gave distances not in kilometers, but in leagues. This is an interesting link with the past ; but I have myself not noticed any- thing of the sort elsewhere.
R. JOHNSON WALKER.
Little Holland House, Kensington, W.
Though not directly relevant to MR. BROWN'S query, there is one detail of his communication to which I should like to refer. His citation of the old and the new mileage computations, whereby 16 miles have been corrected to 23, and 10 miles to 15, would lead the ordinary reader to suppose that the original inscription blundered grossly. If, however (as I assume to be the case), the latter was a century or so old, the discrepancy is open to logical explana- tion. I think such as have any experience of old-time mileage computations will bear me out that English miles used to be much longer than at present I believe about half as long again and that this variation
aetween the old and the modern style will
3e found to account for the discrepancy
aetween the inscriptions of the two periods,.
[ may mention that an old local historian
alls it 12 miles from Nottingham to Newark,
whereas we now call it 20.
A. STAPLETON. 158, Noel Street, Nottingham.
To " bishop " a horse is to make an old one look young, or a bad one a good one. A milestone is therefore said to be "bishoped," probably, when it underrates distance, as n the case of that between Clitheroe and Lancaster.^! J. HOLD EN MACMICHAEL.
If the ' Slang Dictionary ' (Farmer and Henley) is correct in saying that the word to " bishop " a horse's teeth arises from the- name of the man who invented the " fake," it is an easy transition to other senses, as in the case quoted. Compare to " burke," &c. H. P. L.
[The length of the English mile was discussed at 9 S. iv. 497 ; v. 133, 498 ; vi. 94.]
CROOKED PINS (10 S. vii. 447). I can remember that it was lucky to find a crooked pin some fifty odd years ago. Pins were then dear, and better looked after than now. No one thought of leaving a pin lying on the ground when it was seen, and our mothers used to say :
Who see a pin arid pick it up,
All the day will be in luck ;
Who see a pin and let it lie
May come to want before they die. Or " want a pin before they die." Crooked pins were straightened out, and again used. The luck in a pin, whether crooked or not,, may be because one is an odd number.
THOS. RATCLIFFE. Worksop.
PINCUSHIONS (10 S. vii. 447). As pins were made in England in the time of Henry IV., the use of cushions for holding and preserving pins may be fairly old. When I was a lad pins were prized much more than they are now, for they were- dearer. I remember that in most houses there were large pincushions, some stuffed with waste bits of rags, others filled with sand. Nearly every woman wore a stock of pins on her dress over the left breast a pincushion, certainly. The large cushions were also stuck with pins and needles, but the pins on the breast were handier when sewing was going on ; and as all the women did their own needlework except perhaps dressmaking there was always a deal of
