498
NOTES AND QUERIES. [9*s. ix. JUNE 21, 1902.
round the hat, and so worn till after the
following Sunday. The family inostly.occu-
pied their own seats, and took part in the
service; sometimes, however, the front seat
of the nave was used here they remained
seated, and did not take any part in the
service. It was the custom to toll the bell
(for church people) at intervals during the
day of burial, often starting as early as
eight o'clock in the morning.
T. FORSTER. Kennington.
In the parish from which I write it is the rule that the friends of the deceased who follow the body appear in church on the next Sunday after the funeral. They rise or kneel as the rest of the congregation, and wear only their mourning garments. So persistent is this custom that I freqeuently see persons who do not conform to the Christian Sunday in any respect come to church on these occasions. F. CLAYTON.
Morden, Surrey.
In connexion with this subject it may be pertinent to recall a passage in Canon Atkin- son's ' Forty Years in a Moorland Parish ' (p. 225), in which he tells us that, when he first came to Danby, all the male relatives present at the funeral of a deceased person would sit round the coffin with their hats on during the reading of the Psalm and lesson in church. Shortly before that the vicar of Scarborough had put down the same custom in his parish. ST. SWITHIN.
This custom has been general in Devon- shire for a very long time, probably for more than a century. It seems to be gradually falling into disuse in the towns, at least although I have seen one instance of it in Torquay this year. As in the Isle of Man, the mourners here (and this term includes friends, sometimes to the number of twenty or more) remain seated throughout the service. The custom implies as much respect for the dead as following them to the grave, and, indeed, seems to be the proper complement of it. A. J. DAVY.
Torquay.
In Jersey it is quite the ordinary custom in the country parishes for families, on the death of a relative, to sit together in church the Sunday following the funeral, and not to rise during any part of the service.
C. P. LE CORNU, Colonel.
FOUNTAIN FAMILY (9 th S. ix. 149). In the possibility of its being of some interest to M. HUBERT DE FONTAINES, it may be mentioned
that there was an old family of the name of
Fountain (otherwise Fountains) two centuries
ago in the district known as Craven, in York-
shire. They then held property in the vicinity
of Linton (Wharfedale). B.
RICHARD HAINES (9 th S. ix. 341). There are six tracts by this author in the rich pamphlet collection of the Manchester Free Library, including some of those noted by MR. REGINALD HAINES as unique. Richard Haines is an interesting writer, and may be compared with John Bellers.
WILLIAM E. A. AXON.
Manchester.
SHORTHAND IN THE FOURTH CENTURY (9 th S. ix. 406). MR. AXON will, I am sure, pardon me if I am citing a reference already known to him in drawing his attention to the notarii mentioned more than once by Martial, who died about 104 A.D. That these were true shorthand writers is manifest from book xiv. ep. 208, where one is mentioned as competent to report verbatim the most rapid speaker.
A. GORHAM.
CANTERBURY RECORDS (9 th S. ix. 408). In the Cathedral library at Canterbury are the MS. records of the city, and also some MS. volumes of presentments made at the visita- tions of the Archdeacon of Canterbury, the latter covering the years 1560-1735, but not continuously. These volumes I am going through, and have copies of the East Kent parishes, but as yet not those of Canterbury. Life in rural parishes does not seem to have been very different from what it is in the present day, and complaints made "as the common fame is in our parish" seem in many cases on examination to have origi- nated from what we should call the village gossip, unless the accused perjured himself in the Archdeacon's Court.
If your correspondent will write to me, perhaps some of my notes may be of use to him. ARTHUR HUSSEY.
Tankerton-on-Sea, Kent.
NOTES ON BOOKS, &c.
The Neiv Volumes of the Encyclopaedia Britannica.
Vol. II. (A. & C. Black and the Times.) EXTENDING from Austria-Hungary to Chicacole, a town in British India, the second volume of the complement of the ' Encyclopaedia Britannica,' the twenty-sixth of the entire work, makes considerable
grogress in the alphabet. It opens with ' A General urvey of Recent Political Progress,' from the pen of Edward Dicey, C.B. Among the points on
