314
NOTES AND QUERIES. [9 th s. xn. OCT. 17, 1903.
and utters her spells ; whereupon the goat-
skins, which are filled with wine, are gifted
with motion, and come to her house. The
superstition survives in a very degraded form
in Essex. E. YARDLEY.
MARRIAGE IN A SHEET (9 th S. xii. 146, 214). The enclosed is a reprint from the original report of the marriage in December, 1842, in one of the local papers, arid was published in a recent number of the Gedney Parish Magazine :
"Within the past month I have had more than one inquiry made about a strange wedding that took place in our parish sixty years ago. One corre- spondent asks if it was a revival of ' godly disci- pline,' another if any special record was made of the event in the parish register. As the event is now almost forgotten, no doubt many a parishioner will be interested in hearing the true facts of the case. The wedding is duly entered in the ordinary way, and pinned to it is a sheet of foolscap in the then vicar's writing, containing the following ex- tract from the Stamford Mercury of the following week : ' There was never certainly such a place as Gedney for worthy as well as unworthy characters, but more particularly for supplying tit-bits of news for the papers. The heroine this week was a widow with four children, who, wishing once more to enjoy the pleasures of wedlock, and thinking that herself and family would be sufficient incumbrances to the poor man as times are hard, was told that if she was married covered only by a sheet any previous debts she had contracted during her widowhood would be cleared off; and having a few of those back-reckonings on her mind, they were actually married on Friday morning last, December 2nd, 1842, at the parish church of Gedney, widow Far- ram to David Wilkinson, the former going to church covered by nothing but a sheet, which was stitched up like a bag with slits at the side for the bare arms, and in that way she was betrothed, standing with bare feet at the altar ! If so many ridiculous old laws were not kept on the statute book (to say nothing of the new ones), how is it possible that such notions as these could ever enter the minds of the people, and be believed by even the most ignorant ! 'Fro in the Stamford Mercury, Decem- ber, 1842."
C. S. JERRAM.
134, Walton Street, Oxford.
HATBANDS (9 th S. xi. 429). One cannot, of course, say whether there is any connexion between the entries, but in the Privy Purse expenses of Henry VII. there occur three items, the first of which relates to the burial expenses of Sir William Stanley, of Holt, K.G., the King's Chamberlain. Stanley's services at Bosworth Field, it is thought, should have placed him beyond the royal suspicion, but he was one of those accused by Sir Robert Clifford of being engaged in favour of W'arbeck. The utmost proved against him was his having said that, "if the young man was the undoubted son of Edward the Fourth, he would never bear
arms against him." He was, however, tried,
condemned, and beheaded on Tower Hill,
and was buried at the king's charge at Sion.
The first item is: 27 Feb., 1495, "For Sir
William Stanley buryall at Syon, 15/. 19s.";
and the second, 7 April, 1495, "To Simon
Digby in full payment for the buriall of Sir
William Stanley, 2^."; and on 15 May of the
same year : " For the Kinges hatt bande of
silke, 4s." Now it is highly improbable that
this was a renewal of. a worn-out hatband,
so that one is justified in adopting the alter-
native conclusion that it was a token of
mourning worn by the king out of respect
for his late chamberlain. See 'Excerpta
Historica,' edited by Samuel Bentley, 1831,
pp. 101-2. J. HOLDEN MACMlCHAEL.
See a long extract from 'The Tippets of the Canons Ecclesiastical,' by Gilbert J. French, London, 1850, given in ' N. & Q.,' 4 th S. iii. 336, 395.
EVERARD HOME COLEMAN.
71, Brecknock Road.
THE REBELLION OF 1745 (9 th S. xii. 169). Allow me to refer your correspondent MR. JERROLD, who writes on Prince Charles Edward marching through Macclesfield in 1745, to the 'Ancient Parish of Prestbury,' by my friend Frank Renaud, M.D., pp. 178- 184, one of the Chethain Society Publica- tions, issued in 1876.
A letter is printed in it as the production of Mr. John Stafford, an attorney living in Jordangate. He was an alderman of the borough (of Macclesfield), and gave so much trouble to the Corporation that they passed a law which continued for many years in force
forbidding any lawyer to become a member of their body in future (p. 178).
Mr. Stafford describes the prince as a very handsome person in Highland dress, with a blue waistcoat trimmed with silver, and wearing a blue Highland cap, and mentions his having walked on foot from Manchester, as he is said to have done all the way from Carlisle (p. 181). " Endeavours were used to
- ive him a peal of bells, for fear of insult [i.e.,
rom the rebels], but four ringers were all that could be got, and they rang the bells backwards, not with design, but through con- fusion " (p. 181).
The letter is said to have been in the pos- session of David Browne, once Town Clerk of Macclesfield. JOHN PICKFORD, M.A.
Newbourne Rectory, Woodbridge.
SHAKESPEARES AT ROMFORD, ESSEX, 1637- 1689 (9 th S. xii. 205). DR. FURNIVALL'S note reminds me of the occurrence of the name Simon Sakesper as one of the verderers of
