376
NOTES AND QUERIES. [9* s. x. Nov. s, 1902.
PRIME MINISTERS : IRISH AND SCOTCH (9 th
S. x. 302). Why does MR. HOUSDEN cut down
the list of Scottish Prime Ministers by 50 per
cent. ? He has left out Gladstone and Lord
Rosebery. I am aware that some people hold
Gladstone to have been an Englishman,
because he was born in Lancashire ; but his
grandfather, Thomas Gladstones, of Leith,
married a Scotswoman, Helen Neilson, of
Springfield, and his father, John Gladstones*,
who altered his name by ro) 7 al licence in
1835 to Gladstone, and was created a baronet
in 1846, married Anne, daughter of Provost
Andrew Robertson, of Dingwall altogether
a pretty strong Scottish brew. Nobody
would have resented more stoutly any sus-
picion of his nationality than Mr. Gladstone's
brother, the late Sir Thomas Gladstone of
Fasque, Kincardineshire, and, I hope, Mr.
Gladstone's nephew, the present baronet of
Fasque. HERBERT MAXWELL.
Although Mr. Gladstone was born in Liver-
ool, he used to speak of his nationality as cottish, and when he restored the Market Cross of Edinburgh, in 1885, he caused an inscription to be placed on it in which he describes himself as " stirpe oriundus per utramque lineam penitus Scotica." W. S.
WHITE-HEADED BOY (9 th S. x. 229)." White son " and " white boy " were formerly terms of endearment applied to a favourite male child or dependent. An illustration of the use of the term will be found in Green's ' Friar Bacon ' (1594) :
Then ware what is done, For he 'a Henry's white son. Again, in ' The Yorkshire Tragedy ' (1604) :
Oh, what will you do, father? I am your white boy.
Archdeacon Nares in his 'Glossary of the Works of English Authors ' gives the follow- ing examples :
What says my white boy ?
Beaumont and Fletcher (1613). I know, quoth I, 1 am his white boy and will not be
gulled. Ford's ' Tis Pity,' <fec. (1633).
Fie, young gentleman ! will such a brave spark as you, that is your mother's white boy, undoe your hopes 1
' The Two Lancashire Lovers ' (1640).
EVERARD HOME COLEMAN. 71, Brecknock Road.
LUDGERSALL (9 th S. x. 209, 335). It is quite impossible that this place can be named "from the personal name Luitgar, which may be found in the Anglo-Saxon charters." The reason is simple enough viz., that any one who will be at the trouble
to learn the alphabet will discover that ui
is not an Anglo-Saxon diphthong.
The corresponding A.-S. diphthong is eo, so that, if the statement be correct, the A.-S. name was Leodgar. But as a matter of fact the name appears as " Lutegares hale," in the dative case, in Kemble's ' Charters,' vol. iii. p. 363, in charter No. 722. In Thorpe's 'Diplomatarium' this is translated by " Ludgersnall," p. 561. In Earle's 'Land Charters,' p. 226, the spelling is "Lutegares heale," from another MS. Thus the owner's name was certainly spelt Lutegar in the will of ^Ethelstan yEtheling, which exists in fairly good spelling. Whethor this is the same name as Leodgar I leave to others.
At any rate, the suffix was not hall, but hale. This hale is " sb. No. 2 " in the ' New English Dictionary,' and is derived from A.-S. heale (as above), the dat. case of healh, which means a haugh or " nook."
WALTER W. SKEAT.
PRICKET CANDLESTICKS (9 th S. x. 228). Examples of the "pricket" candlestick from Kirkstall Abbey were formerly in the collec- tion of the Society of Arts, London, and two of Limoges enamel are in the British Museum. Perhaps it is as well to state that a " pricket " was a candlestick with a spike in the centre, upon which a candle or taper was fixed. It was invariably, it seems, of ecclesiastical use, and was probably so named from a male deer in its second year, which was called a " pricket " or " spitter," from the resemblance of its horns when they began to grow sharp to a "spit" ; or the deer may have been named from the candlestick. Among other forms in which candlesticks were made was that of horns, says Fosbroke ('Encycl. of Antiq.,' vol. i. p. 278). A "mortar" was a cup-shaped vessel of similar construction, but neither pricket nor mortar was, 1 believe, when the custom of lighted candles was first adopted, placed upon the altar as at present, but round it, a beautiful custom with which it is as difficult to associate superstition as with the lamps of the seven virgins a pious practice, as Mr. Edward Peacock says, alluding to the ancient use of candles in churches, which, though not part of the Church's teaching, is in harm,ony with it (see his 'Lights of a Mediaeval Church' in the Antiquary, vol. xxiii.). An illustration of the pricket will be found in A. W. Pugin's ' Designs for Iron and Brass Work in the Style of the Fifteenth and Sixteenth Centuries,' 1830, plate 24. See also Fairholt's ' Miscellanea Graphica,' where (plate xxi.) coloured illustrations of pricket candlesticks of copper will be found; the Rev. F. G. Lee's ' Glossary of Liturgical and
