vii. J UNE i,i9oi.j NOTES AND QUERIES.
429
desire is gajah. Gadgevraws and gadjefraus,
apparently derived from gajah, were still in
use for the ox-eye daisy in 1887, but I cannot
trace their meaning. MEGAN.
SIR THOMAS COOKE, Alderman of Queen- hithe 1692 till his death in 1709, was (Sheriff of London 1692-3, M.P. for Colchester 1694-5 and 1698-1705, and chairman of the East India Company. He appears to have been a wealthy merchant and goldsmith "at the sign of the Griffin in Change Alley"; was im- prisoned in the Tower for nearly twelve months in 1695-6 for refusing to give answers that were deemed satisfactory before a com- mittee of inquiry in respect to 170,000. said to have been expended by the East India Com- pany in secret service. One of his daughters married Josiah Child, the banker. Is his parentage known? Le Neve describes him as son of " Cook, a Hattmaker in Lam- beth, Surrey," but seems to imply a kinship with a family of the name at Bury St. Edmunds. According to the same authority,
his wife was Elizabeth, dau. of Home, of
Exeter, and lived after her husband's death in Salisbury Court, Fleet Street. Sir Charles Cooke, Alderman of Bassishaw, who received knighthood 21 Jan., 1716/7, and was buried at Hackney 11 Jan., 1720/1, is stated to have been a son of Sir Thomas, but he is not enu- merated in the family of the latter in Le Neve's 4 Knights.' W. D. PINK.
Lowton, Newton-le- Willows, Lancashire.
SIR WILLIAM HANKFORD. In the life which the ' Diet. Nat. Biog.,' vol. xxiv. p. 293, gives of this Chief Justice of the King's Bench (who died in 1422 or 1423) there is no reference to the account (by B. W. G.) of the Hankford family to be found in the Gentle- man's Magazine, 1849, pt. ii. pp. 491-3. Accord- ing to this account, wnich looks like the out- come of a careful investigation, the Chief Justice was father of Richard Hankford, who died in 1419, and grandfather (through that son) of Sir Richard Hankford, whose youngest daughter became Countess of Ormond and was an ancestress of Queen Elizabeth. In the * Dictionary,' however, the Chief Justice appears as being (1) probably younger brother of "Sir" Richard Hankford, who "died in 1419-20," and (2) father of Richard Hankford, the father of the above-mentioned countess. Can any reader say which of these two conflicting views is correct 1 ?
According to B. W. G. (loc. cit.\ the Chief Justice was of " Annery," Monkleigh, as well as of Hankford, Bulk worthy, Devon. In Mr. Kirby's 'Winchester Scholars' I find a Richard Hankford, of " Awnare [sic], Devon,"
admitted 1409; left 1412. Probably " Aw-
nare "=" Annery." Was this youth related
to the Chief Justice 1 H. C.
ASHWOOD FAMILY. Can any of your readers kindly inform me where I can obtain par- ticulars or pedigree of the Ash wood family ] The only one I know of lived at Madeley, in Shropshire, towards the end of the eighteenth century, but I do not find the name in the county history, so conclude the family came from elsewhere. J. HAMILTON.
Broadwater Down, Tunbridge Wells.
HERALDIC: AMERICAN HERALDRY.
(9 th S. vi. 170; vii. 117.)
AT the latter reference your correspondent PENNSYLVANIAN makes the following obser- vations :
"There is no difference between Americans and Europeans so far as the mere bearing of arms goes, but in the manner in which arms are borne by the two kindred peoples there is a total difference.
"In Great Britain and other parts of Europe the bearing of arms is regulated by special laws ; here there are no such laws ; hence arms are borne at the individual will of any citizen of the United States. The consequence is, that while some coats are borne in accordance with the laws of heraldry, others are not ; but, after all, Americans are not singular in that, as everybody knows."
And your, correspondent goes on to say that whilst the national arms of the United States and of the different states and their cities are a matter of distinct legislative enactment,
the existence and recognition of individual or family arms are but matters of custom a custom, however, too ancient and too firmly implanted in Americans to be eradicated."
I have not seen the earlier reference to this matter, as I have not been able to bring out my previous volumes of ' N. & Q.' to this part of the world, but I should like to ask whether it is the custom for Americans to adopt any armorial bearings they like at random ; 'or do they restrict themselves to those borne by persons owning the same patronymic as themselves, whether derived from an English or a foreign source? Of course I do not refer to those lineally descended from English or foreign "armigeri." America being what she is, I am not surprised at seeing the remarks made by your corre- spondent, but I do not think that I am compelled to deduce therefrom that the A.mericans are, as a class, very much worse than their English cousins at the present day, or indeed at any time since the cessa-
