Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 8.djvu/457

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vm. NOV. so, 1901.] NOTES AND QUERIES.


449


name, and in Sir Harris Nicoias's useful 1 Chronology of History ' there is an alpha- betical calendar of saints' days, in which Alice is set down for 24 August ; Alice or Adelaide, empress, for 16 December ; and Alice, virgin and abbess, for 5 February. There is a short biography of the last, as Adelaide, in 'Annals of Virgin Saints' (pp. 276-9), by a priest of the Church of England, who was, I believe, none other than Dr. Neale. She was born of noble parents in the tenth century, and became a religious at Cologne. Her father and mother founded a sisterhood at " Willich (or Bellich)," and selected her to preside over it. In course of time she adopted the rule of St. Benedict, and, having given sure proof of her piety and ability, was appointed abbess of St. Mary's Convent at Cologne by the archbishop, St. Heribert. Adelaide never forgot her first charge at Willich, and when she died in 1015 the mourning sisters pleaded with the arch- bishop for the gift of her corpse. He yielded it, sorely against his will :

' ' God be my witness, 5 he said, ' that were the body of IS. Agatha, whose feast we this day celebrate, laid before me, I would riot prefer it to these remains, for in the sight of the Lord the soul that even now tenanted them was of great price.'"

I find no mention here of the primrose as an attribute. In this latitude 5 February would scarcely furnish one, but I know not what it might be able to do at Cologne.

ST. SWITHIN.

St. Alice, virgin, was abbess of Bellinch, near Bonn, and died in 1015 abbess of " Our Lady's " at Cologne. See Alban Butler, under 5 February. ALFRED HALL.

BRICKS (9 th S. viii. 404). Some very early bricks of peculiar size will be noticed in the churchyard wall of Horton the village associated with the earlier poems of Milton. Those used for the construction of the college buildings of Eton were made near Slough in 1442. During the following century, despite the difficulty of water carriage in small vessels, a considerable quantity of bricks appear to have been imported from Holland.

The great monopolist during the reign of Charles I., Sir Nicholas Crisp, is credited with their rein trod uction into this country, and with having perfected their manufac- ture after many costly experiments. Their size was regulated by an Act passed in 1625.

A tablet in Iver Church (the church described by E. A. Freeman in 1850) is deserving of mention in connexion with brickmaking :


" Beneath this place lyes interred the body of Venturus Mandey,* of the parish of St. Giles in the Fields in the County of Middlesex, Bricklayer, son of Michael Mandey, Bricklayer, and grandson to Venturus Mandey of this parish, Bricklayer, who had ye honour of being Bricklayer to the Honble. Society of Lincoln's inn from the year of our Lord 1667 to the day of his death. He was studious in the mathematics, and wrote and published three books for Public Good ; one entituled ' Mellificivm Mensionis or The Marrow of Measuring,' another of ' Mechanical Powers or The Mystery of Nature and Art Unvayled,' the third ' An Universal Mathematical Synopsis.' He also translated into English ' Directorivm Generale Uranqmetricum,' and ' Trigonometria Plana et

Spherica, Linearis et Logarithmica ' and some

other tracts which he designed to have printed if Death had not prevented him. He died the 26th day of July, A.D. 1701, aged 56 years and upwards. He also gave Five pounds to the poor of this parish."

A truly learned "bricklayer"! Surely at least a clerk of the works.

From 1784 to 1850 bricks were subject to special taxation. In the early part of the last reign machinery was introduced for the making of bricks. R. B.

Upton.

ANTHONY FORTESCUE (9 th S. vii. 327, 435 ; viii. 73). "Jeffery Poole," the Winchester scholar from Lordington, was a younger brother of Katherine Pole. He was a legatee under his mother's will in 1570, and the following year Mary Cufawde appointed him (" my brother Jeffery Poole ") one of the over- seers of her will. Henry Henslowe, of Boar- hunt, was the second son of Ralph Henslowe (will of Emmott Henslowe, 1551, P.C.C. 14 Bucke). *' Stephen Hensloe " was pro- bably Ralph's nephew, for his brothers John and Peter had each a son of that name (ibid.). J ohn Fortescue evidently married his mother's stepdaughter (will of Henry Henslowe, 1598, P.C.C. 23 Kidd).

It should not be forgotten that the two families of Pole and Fortescue were closely connected, and a few notes thereon may be of assistance.

The act of attainder which condemned Sir Adrian Fortescue included the Countess of Salisbury, Cardinal Pole, and Sir Thomas Pole.

Sir Adrian Fortescue's first wife was second cousin of the Countess of Salisbury (Burke's ' Extinct Peerage,' third edition, 388, 390).

Sir Anthony Windsor, a younger brother of Andrews, first Lord Windsor, lived at

  • Lipscomb, in the ' History of Bucks,' gives the

name as Venterus Mandey. Another curious epitaph in connexion with brickmaking is to be found in Farnham Royal churchyard, on a tomb to one Dodd.