96
NOTES AND QUERIES. [9* s. VIL FEB. 2, 1901.
to the Virgin Mary, as the German name
Marienkafer suggests" (Chambers s Jin-
cyclop.,' 1895). We have all, even in this
wilderness of bricks and mortar, heard the
children sing, or chant (to the music, I need
scarcely remark, of " Boys and girls, come out
to play "), the old rime as quoted by several
correspondents of 4 N. & Q.'; but the ladybird,
like the butterfly, has been compelled to
retreat as the modern builder marches for-
ward, and so it is we may now have to go
u a little way out" before we meet with the
insect or hear the familiar rime. That the
ladybird has been sometimes employed as
a messenger between sweethearts can be
proved by reference to the old poets. Says
Gay :
This lady-fly 1 take from off the grass, Whose spotted back might scarlet red surpass ; Fly, lady-bird, north, south, or east, or west, Fly where the man is found that I love best.
'The Shepherd's Week, Thursday.'
HERBERT B. CLAYTON. 39, Renfrew Road, Lower Kennington Lane.
In Cheshire we were taught to say as children :
Ladybird, ladybird, fly away home ; Your house is on fire, your children all gone. All but one, and her name is Ann, And she lies under the frying-pan.
MEGAN.
Apropos of " Ladybird, ladybird, fly away home," the child rime referred to in my reply at the last reference, I may mention the parody by Charles Lamb, called 'Another Version of the Same,' commencing : Lazy bones, lazy bones, wake up and peep ; The cat's in the cupboard, your mother's asleep,
the original MS. of which, on one page quarto, was discovered some years ago, quite acci- dentally, as a wrapping for a lock of William Hazlitt's hair. W. I. R. V.
" Cusha-cow " is used in Selby district " Cushy-cow-lady " in Lancaster district.
LIONEL CRESSWELL. Wood Hall, Calverley, Yorks.
THE ROLL OF GUILD MERCHANTS OF SHREWSBURY, 1231 (9 th S. vi. 508). I pre- sume MR. SNEYD knows what is said as tc these rolls in the tenth appendix to the Fifteenth Report of the Historical M.SS. Com mission (pp. 7-9). Possibly Shirley printer 1231 instead of 1232. O. O. H.
- FIVE O'CLOCK TEA": WHEN INTRODUCED
(9 th S. vi. 446 ; vii. 13). Many years ago, in 1854, at my first curacy, Oakley in Bedford shire, the then Duchess of Bedford, wh( occasionally resided at Oakley House in the
parish, used to give sometimes four or five
o'clock teas, to which I was invited, and I
>elieve that was not the earliest date of their
nstitution. I have been in my present living
twenty-eight years, and have never even seen
a nobleman or an M.P. here, so there is not
much chance of being honoured with such
nvitations. JOHN PICKFORD, M.A.
Newbourne Rectory, Woodbridge.
PASCHAL MOONS (9 th S. vii. 48). Prof. Wurm's table of Paschal new and full moons will be found on p. 407 of Wieseler's
- Chronological Synopsis of the Four Gospels,'
Bell & Daldy, 1864. C. S. TAYLOR.
Banwell Vicarage.
MOON LORE (9 th S. vii. 27). It is indeed news that the C- shaped crescent moon is waxing. It is just the reverse. I have heard the formula,
Luna mendax,
Crescens decrescens,
Decrescens nrescens.
SHERBORNE.
Is there not a strange reversal in the note under the above heading? When the moon is " on the wax " she is in the west, near the sun at its setting. The crescent is then on the sinister side, opening dexter, like the loop of D ; when " on the wane " the crescent is dexter, opening sinister, as in a C in each case the precise opposite of your corre- spondent's reading.
JAMES R. BRAMBLE, F.S.A. [Others write to the same effect.]
DATE WANTED (9 th S. vii. 27). Corpus Christi Day is the Thursday after Trinity Sunday, and is therefore the sixtieth day after Easter Sunday. In 1543 Easter fell on 25 March, and the sixtieth day after it was Thursday, 24 May, or Corpus Christi Day. The morrow after it was Friday, 25 May.
WALTER W. SKEAT.
I find from 'The Chronology of History,' by Sir Harris Nicolas, second edition, p. 65, that Easter Day fell on 25 March, 1543, con- sequently Trinity Sunday would fall on 20 May, and the Fete Dieu (or Corpus Domini or Corpus Christi) would fall on 24 May. A. L. MAYHEW.
[Other replies acknowledged.]
AN UNCLAIMED POEM BY BEN JONSON (9 th S. iv. 491 ; v. 34, 77, 230, 337, 477 ; vi. 96, 430, 477). I confess I was not aware that there were two Sir Henry Goodyers, and I should be obliged to MR. SIMPSON if he would kindly give the authority from which he derives his very precise information. I refer especially
