g*s. VIIL AUG. si, MM.] NOTES AND QUERIES.
195
archaeologist he has traced the district with which
he deals mile by mile we had almost said foot by
foot and has left nothing unrecorded in which it
is possible to feel an interest. When we read
his proffered appeal to our indulgence for the
extent of his labours we can only wish that
antiquaries and historians as competent and as
zealous would treat other parts of the United
Kingdom with the same thoroughness. The chief
difficulty in dealing with this book springs from
the magnitude of its claim. There is scarcely a
department of archaeology that does not demand
attention. After a glance at the district in late
Saxon times, when most of the conceptions we form
are guesswork, our author proceeds to condense
the information concerning the manors supplied in
Domesday Book, which, however, does not enable
him to prepare rough or approximately true plans.
No ancient rolls of the manors are known to
exist. Of the growth of the population but
rough ideas can be formed until the period is
reached of the census returns, and even the ravages
wrought by the Black Death, from which Somerset-
shire was naturally not exempt, can scarcely be
traced. The first accurate information as to popula-
tion is obtained from the return of those who adopted
the Protestation of 1641, according to which the
male population of the district over eighteen years
of age was 488. The highest point the population
reached, according to the census, was in 1841,
when it was 2,154 ; in 1891 it had declined to 1,719.
Valuable information as to mediaeval farming is
given, and many interesting particulars are fur-
nished concerning smuggling, which was prevalent
in the seventeenth, eighteenth, and nineteenth cen-
turies. Smuggling was, indeed, in the penultimate
century a " huge business." Old customs are fast
fading. The " neck " or " knack," a harvest custom
described by Brand, is dead, though scarcely out
of mind. "Wassailing" the apple-tree is still
practised ; people run when they first hear the
cuckoo, lest they should pass an idle year ; and a
bride on her way from church is occasionally
chained at the church gate or elsewhere. A pre-
sentation of a "neck" is among the illustrations.
Picturesque and romantic crimes animate the
records. One such, which might form the basis of
a tragic melodrama, is narrated in connexion with
the manor of Porlock. Robert de Mohun, younger
son of John de Mohun, of Dunster, was murdered
about 1331-2 under circumstances casting grave
suspicion of complicity in the crime upon Elizabeth,
his wife. She escaped all penalty, and afterwards
married Sir Robert de Stockhey of Santon, who
was assessed at 20.9. towards the " aid " for knighting
the Black Prince in 1346. She appears to have been
stimulated to the crime by her mother, who was a
Tracy. A quarrelsome and turbulent people seems
to have been the peasantry of the district. " Rus-
tics drew their knives and fought to the death in
the taverns of Doverhay. Even clerks in holy
orders now and then beat out men's lives with
cudgels, for the Church ordained that no clerk
should shed blood." The last-named ordinance had
to be observed even in the case of surgery. Rabelais,
when released from a portion of his vows and
allowed to practise medicine, was forbidden to
bleed or cauterize. Abundant matter of unending
interest is crowded into the volume, and the author
shows a modesty excessive, if becoming, when he
sums up by saying that others may raise the curtain
he drops ; " and if the pages of this book will help to
show them something of the life, busy and hum-
drum, of the past, the Dryasdust who penned them
will not have worked in vain." The illustrations
constitute a specially pleasing and valuable feature,
the pedigrees are numerous and abundant, and the
appendices brim over with matter in which the
antiquary will delight. A. piece of more thorough
workmanship has seldom been supplied. A portrait
3y Holbein of Frances, Marchioness of Dorset, now
n Windsor Castle, reproduced by permission of the
K.ing, forms a frontispiece. Fine portraits by
K.neller at Dyrham Park have also been reproduced.
There is a good map of West Somerset. Attention
should be drawn to the especially elaborate pedigrees
of Arundel of Trerice, Byam and Wood, Aciand,
&c., issued separate from the text.
A Dictionary of English and Welsh Surnames, with Special American Instances. By the late Charles Wareing Bardsley, M.A. Revised by his Widow. (Frowde.)
ANON BARDSLEY whose 'English Surnames' is a work of established authority, and whose ' Curio- sities of Puritan Nomenclature ' and other writings have obtained favourable acknowledgment has not lived to see through the press the ' Dictionary of English and Welsh Surnames,' which must be regarded as his highest accomplishment. On his death in October, 1898, the task of dealing with the materials collected was undertaken by his widow, and the work is now issued with a dedica- tion to the President of the United States and a prefatory memoir of the author by his eldest brother. Few particulars of special interest are preserved concerning a domestic anoT uneventful life. It is none the less satisfactory to possess these biographical details, and the book itself is in all respects a useful possession. In a few opening words Canon Bardsley acknowledges that his intro- duction is unscientific in arrangement, adding, " I am not scientific ; 1 had not the chance." His divisions of names have, however, been accepted, and his ' Dictionary,' though it may be augmented, will not soon be supplanted. Names (foreign names apart) are arranged oy him under five heads local, baptismal, occupative, official, and nicknames another category receiving the names of doubtful origin, about one-eighteenth of the whole. This divi- sion is satisfactory. The feature of most importance in the book, and that in which the labour has been the most remunerative, consists in the dated extracts from calendars, rolls, writs, fines, and marriage licences, giving the first recorded appearance of the name, its varying forms, &c. Few studies are more in- teresting than that of surnames. A reference to the work now issued will save many superfluous appli- cations to our columns. The book is not complete does not, indeed, pretend to completeness. It forms, however, an indispensable basis to future labours in the same direction ; and the issue by the publisher of a few interleaved copies is to be counselled. Philologists will accept the volume with much gratitude, and some will, it is to be hoped, carry the labour to its legitimate and awaited issue.
An Essay on Western Civilization in its Economic Aspects (Mediaeval and Modern Times). By William Cunningham, D.D. (Cambridge, Uni- versity Press.)
THIS is an important essay in more than one respect.
In the first place it is based on a very wide know-
