Читать книгу: «Curiosities of Puritan Nomenclature», страница 9

That John Bunyan is under debt to the Puritans for many of his characters must be unquestionable; and were he living now, or could we interview him where he is, I do not doubt we could extract from him, good honest man, the ready admission that in the names of the personages that flit before us in his unapproachable allegory, and which have charmed the fancy of old and young for so many generations, he was merely stereotyping the recollections of childhood, and commemorating, so far as sobriquets were concerned, the companionships of earlier years.

VII. The Influence of Puritanism on American Nomenclature

Baptismal nomenclature to-day in the United States, especially in the old settlements, bears stronger impressions of the Puritan epoch than the English. Their ancestors were Puritans, who had fled England for conscience’ sake. Their life, too, in the West was for generations primitive, almost patriarchal, in its simplicity. There was no bantering scorn of a wicked world to face; there was no deliberate effort made by any part of the community to restore the old names. To this day the impress remains. Take up a story of backwood life, such as American female writers affect so much, and it will be inscribed “Faith Gartney’s Girlhood,” or “Prudence Palfrey.” All the children that figure in these tales are “Truth,” or “Patience,” or “Charity,” or “Hope.” The true descendants of the early settlers are, to a man, woman, and child, even now bearers of names either from the abstract Christian graces or the narratives of Holy Scripture. Of course, the constant tide of immigration that has set in has been gradually telling against Puritan traditions. The grotesque in name selection, too, has gone further in some of the more retired and inaccessible districts of the States than the eastern border, or in England generally, where social restraints and the demands of custom are still respected. If we are to believe American authorities, there are localities where humour has certainly become grim, and the solemn rite of baptism somewhat burlesqued by a selection of names which throw into the shade even Puritan eccentricity.

Look at the names of some of the earliest settlers of whom we have any authentic knowledge. We may mention the Mayflower first. In 1620 the emigrants by this vessel founded New Plymouth. This led to the planting of other colonies. Among the passengers were a girl named Desire Minter, a direct translation of Desiderata, which had just become popular in England; William Brewster, the ruling elder; his son Love Brewster, who married, settled, and died there in 1650, leaving four children; and a younger son, Wrestling Brewster. The daughters had evidently been left in England till a comfortable home could be found for them, for next year there arrived at New Plymouth, in the Ann and Little James, Fear Brewster and Patience Brewster. Patience very soon married Thomas Prince, one of the first governors. On this same memorable journey of the Mayflower came also Remember, daughter of Isaac Allerton, first assistant to the new governor; Resolved White, who married and left five children in the colony; and Humility Cooper, who by-and-by returned to England.

A little later on, in the Ann and Little James, again came Manasseh Faunce and Experience Mitchell. In a “List of Living” in Virginia, made February 16, 1623, is Peaceable Sherwood. In a “muster” taken January 30, 1624, occur Revolt Morcock and Amity Waine.

There is a conversation in “The Ordinary” – a drama written in 1634 or 1635, by Cartwright, the man whose “body was as handsome as his soul,” as Langbaine has it – which may be quoted here. Hearsay says —

 
“London air,
Methinks, begins to be too hot for us.
Slicer. There is no longer tarrying here: let’s swear
Fidelity to one another, and
So resolve for New England.
Hearsay. ’Tis but getting
A little pigeon-hole reformed ruff —
Slicer. Forcing our beards into th’ orthodox bent —
Shape. Nosing a little treason ’gainst the king,
Bark something at the bishops, and we shall
Be easily received.”
 

Act iv. sc. 5.

It is interesting to remember that 1635, when this was written, saw the high tide of Puritan emigration. The list of passengers that have come down to us prove it. After that date the names cease to represent the sterner spirit of revolt against episcopacy and the Star Chamber.

In the ship Francis, from Ipswich, April 30, 1634, came Just Houlding. In the Elizabeth, landed April 17, 1635, Hope-still Foster and Patience Foster. From the good barque James, July 13, 1635, set foot on shore Remembrance Tybbott. In the Hercules sailed hither, in 1634, Comfort Starre, “chirurgeon.” In 1635 settled Patient White. In a book of entry, dated April 12, 1632, is registered Perseverance Greene, as one who is to be passed on to New England.

Such names as Constant Wood, Temperance Hall, Charity Hickman, Fayth Clearke, or Grace Newell, I simply record and pass on. That these names were perpetuated is clear. The older States teem with them now; American story-books for girls are full of them. Humility Cooper, of 1620, is met by an entry of burial in St. Michael’s, Barbados:

“1678, May 16. Humility Hobbs, from ye almshous.”

The churchwardens of St. James’ Barbados, have entered an account of lands, December 20, 1679, wherein is set down

“Madam Joye Sparks, 12 servants, 150 negroes.”

Increase Mather is a familiar name to students of American history. His father, Richard Mather, was born at Liverpool in 1596. Richard left for New England in 1635, with his four sons, Samuel, Nathaniel, Eleazar, and Increase. Cotton Mather was a grandson. About the same time, Charles Chauncey (of a Hertfordshire family), late Vicar of Ware, who had been imprisoned for refusing to rail in his communion table, settled in New England. Dying there in 1671, as president of Harvard College, he bequeathed, through his children, the following names to the land of his adoption: – Isaac, Ichabod, Sarah, Barnabas, Elnathan, and Nathaniel. Both the Mathers and the Chaunceys, therefore, sent out a Nathaniel. Adding these to the large number of Nathaniels found in the lists of emigrants published by Mr. Hotten, no wonder Nathaniel became for a time the first name on American soil, and that “Nat” should have got instituted into a pet name. Jonathan was not to be compared to it for a moment.

But we have not done with the Chaunceys. One of the most singular accidents that ever befell nomenclature has befallen them. What has happened to Sidney in England, has happened to Chauncey in America, only “more so.” The younger Chaunceys married and begot children. A grandson of Isaac Chauncey died at Boston, in 1787, aged eighty-three. He was a great patriot, preacher, and philanthropist at a critical time in his country’s history. The name had spread, too, and no wonder that it suggested itself to the authoress of “Uncle Tom’s Cabin” as a character name. She, however, placed it in its proper position as a surname. It may be that Mrs. Stowe has given the use of this patronymic as a baptismal name an impulse, but it had been so used long before she herself was born. It was a memorial of Charles Chauncey, of Boston. It has now an average place throughout all the eastern border and the older settlements. I take up the New York Directory for 1878, and at once light upon Chauncey Clark, Chauncey Peck, and Chauncey Quintard; while, to distinguish the great Smith family, there are Chauncey Smith, lawyer, Chauncey Smith, milk-dealer, Chauncey Smith, meat-seller, and Chauncey Smith, junior, likewise engaged in the meat market. Thus, it is popular with all classes. In my London Directory for 1870, there are six Sidney Smiths and one Sydney Smith. Chauncey and Sidney seem likely to run a race in the two countries, but Chauncey has much the best of it at present.

Another circumstance contributed to the formation of Americanisms in nomenclature. The further the Puritan emigrants drew away from the old familiar shores, the more predominant the spirit of liberty grew. It was displayed, amongst other ways, in the names given to children born on board vessel.⁶⁰ It was an outlet for their pent-up enthusiasm. Shakespeare puts into the mouth of Pericles —

 
“We cannot but obey
The powers above us. Could I rage and roar
As doth the sea she lies on, yet the end
Must be as ’tis. My gentle babe, Marina (whom,
For she was born at sea, I’ve named so) here
I charge your charity withal, leaving her
The infant of your care.”
 

Act iii. sc. 3.

The Puritan did the same. Oceanus Hopkins was born on the high seas in the Mayflower, 1620; Peregrine White came into the world as the same vessel touched at Cape Cod; Sea-born Egginton, whose birth “happened in his berth,” as Hood would say, is set down as owner of some land and a batch of negroes later on (Hotten, p. 453); while the marriage of Sea-mercy Adams with Mary Brett is recorded, in 1686, in Philadelphia (Watson’s “Annals of Philadelphia,” 1. 503). Again, we find the following: —

“1626, Nov. 6. Grant of denization to Bonaventure Browne, born beyond sea, but of English parents.” – C. S. P.

No doubt his parents went over the Atlantic on board the Bonaventure, which was plying then betwixt England and the colonies (vide list of ships in Hotten’s “Emigrants,” pp. vii. and 35).

We have another instance in the “baptismes” of St. George’s, Barbados:

“1678, Oct. 13. Samuel, ye son of Bonaventure Jellfes.”

Allowing the father to be forty years old, his parents would be crossing the water about the time the good ship Bonaventure was plying.

Again, we find the following (Hotten, p. 245): —

“Muster of John Laydon:

“John Laydon, aged 44, in the Swan, 1606.

“Anne Laydon, aged 30, in the Mary Margett, 1608.

“Virginia Laydon (daughter), borne in Virginia.”

All this, as will be readily conceived, has tended to give a marked character to New England nomenclature. The very names of the children born to these religious refugees are one of the most significant tokens to us in the nineteenth century of the sense of liberty they felt in the present, and of the oppression they had undergone in the past.

If we turn from these lists of passengers, found in the archives of English ports, not to mention “musters” already quoted, to records preserved by our Transatlantic cousins, we readily trace the effect of Puritanism on the first generation of native-born Americans.

From Mr. Bowditch’s interesting book on “Suffolk Surnames,” published in the United States, we find the following baptismal names to have been in circulation there: Standfast, Life, Increase, Supply, Donation, Deodat, Given, Free-grace, Experience, Temperance, Prudence, Mercy, Dependance, Deliverance, Hope, Reliance, Hopestill, Fearing, Welcome, Desire, Amity, Comfort, Rejoice, Pardon, Remember, Wealthy, and Consider. Nothing can be more interesting than the analysis of this list. With two exceptions, every name can be proved, from my own collection alone, to have been introduced from the mother country. In many instances, no doubt, Mr. Bowditch was referring to the same individual; in others to their children. The mention of Wealthy reminds us of Wealthy, Riches, and Fortune, already demonstrated to be popular English names. Fortune went out to New England in the person of Fortune Taylor, who appears in a roll of Virginian immigrants, 1623. Settling down there as a name of happy augury for the colonists’ future, both spiritual and material, she reappears, in the person of Fortune the spinster, in the popular New England story entitled “The Wide, Wide World.” Even “Preserved,” known in England in 1640, was to be seen in the New York Directory in 1860; and Consider, which crossed the Atlantic two hundred and fifty years ago, so grew and multiplied as to be represented at this moment in the directory just mentioned, in the form of

“Consider Parish, merchant, Clinton, Brooklyn.”

Mr. Bowditch adds “Search-the-Scriptures” to his list of names that crossed the Atlantic. This tallies with Search-the-Scriptures Moreton, of Salehurst, one of the supposed sham jury already treated of. He quotes also Hate-evil Nutter from a colonial record of 1649.⁶¹ Here again we are reminded of Bunyan’s Diabolonian jury, one of whom was Hate-bad. It is all but certain from the date that Hate-evil went out from the old country. The name might be perfectly familiar to the great dreamer, therefore. Faint-not Wines, Mr. Bowditch says, became a freeman in 1644, so that the popularity of that great Puritan name was not allowed to be limited by the English coast. In this same year settled Faithful Rouse – one more memorial of English nonconformity.

English Puritanism must stand the guilty cause of much modern humour, not to say extravagance, in American name-giving. Puns compounded of baptismal name and surname are more popular there than with us. Robert New has his sons christened Nothing and Something. Price becomes Sterling Price; Carrol, Christmas Carrol; Mixer, Pepper Mixer; Hopper, Opportunity Hopper; Ware, China Ware; Peel, Lemon Peel; Codd, Salt Codd; and Gentle, Always Gentle. It used to be said of the English House of Commons that there were in it two Lemons, with only one Peel, and the Register-General not long since called attention in one of his reports to the existence of Christmas Day. We have, too, Cannon Ball, Dunn Brown, Friend Bottle (London Directory), and River Jordan, not to mention two brothers named Jolly Death and Sudden Death, the former of whom figured in a trial lately as witness. The Times of December 7, 1878, announced the death of Mr. Emperor Adrian, a Local Government Board member. Nevertheless, the practice prevails much more extensively across the water, and the reason is not far to seek.

Mr. Bowditch seems to imagine, we notice, America to be a modern girl’s name. He says administration upon the estate of America Sparrow was granted in 1855, while in 1857 America C. Tabb was sued at law. America and Americus were in use in England four hundred years ago (vide “English Surnames,” 2nd edit., p. 29), and two centuries ago we meet with

“America Baguley, 1669, his halfpeny,”

on a token. Amery was the ordinary English dress.

EPILOGUE.
DOUBLE CHRISTIAN NAMES: THEIR RISE AND PROGRESS

I. Royal Double Names

“But two christian names are rare in England, and I only remember now his Majesty, who was named Charles James, as the Prince his sonne Henry Frederic: and among private men, Thomas Maria Wingfield and Sir Thomas Posthumus Hobby.” – Camden.

If we take this sentence literally, the great antiquary, who knew more of the families and pedigrees of the English aristocracy than any other man of his day, could only recall to his mind four cases of double Christian names. This was in 1614.

At the outset, therefore, there is significance in this statement. Mr. Blunt, in his “Annotated Prayer-Book,” says of “N. or M.” in the Catechism —

“N. was anciently used as the initial of Nomen, and ‘Nomen vel Nomina’ was expressed by ‘N. vel NN.,’ the double N being afterwards corrupted into M.”

If this be a correct explanation, “M.” must refer to cases where more than one child was brought to the priest, N. standing for an occasion where only one infant was presented. In a word, “N. or M.” could not stand for “Thomas or Thomas Henry,” but for “Thomas or Thomas and Henry.” If this be unsatisfactory, then Mr. Blunt’s explanation is unsatisfactory.

Camden’s sentence may be set side by side with Lord Coke’s decision. In his “First Institute” (Coke upon Littleton) he says —

“And regularly it is requisite that the purchaser be named by the name of baptism, and his surname, and that special heed be taken to the name of baptism; for that a man cannot have two names of baptism, as he may have divers surnames.”

Again, he adds —

“If a man be baptized by the name of Thomas, and after, at his confirmation by the bishop, he is named John, he may purchase by the name of his confirmation… And this doth agree with our ancient books, where it is holden that a man may have divers names at divers times, but not divers christian names.”

This is all very plain. Even in James I.’s days thousands of our countrymen had no fixed surnames, and changed them according to caprice or fancy. But the christian name was a fixture, saving in the one case of confirmation. Lord Coke is referring to an old rule laid down by Archbishop Peckham, wherein any child whose baptismal name, by accident or evil thought, had a bad significance is advised, if not compelled, to change it for one of more Christian import.

The chief point of interest, however, in this decision of Lord Coke’s, is the patent fact that no thought of a double christian name is present in his mind. Had it been otherwise, he would never have worded it as he has done. Archbishop Peckham’s rule had evidently been infringed, and Lord Coke upholds the infringement. A child with such an orthodox name as Thomas (a name with no immoral significance) might, he lays it down, become John at confirmation. Even in such a case as this, however, John is not to be added to Thomas; it must take its place, and Thomas cease to be recognized.

Lord Coke, of course, was aware that Charles I.’s queen was Henrietta Maria, the late king Charles James, and his son Henry Frederic. It is possible, nay probable, that he was not ignorant of Thomas Maria Wingfield’s existence, or that of Thomas Posthumus Hobby. But that these double baptismal names should ever become an every-day custom, that the lower and middle classes should ever adopt them, that even the higher orders should ever go beyond the use of “Maria” and “Posthumus,” seems never to have suggested itself to his imagination.

There is no doubt the custom came from France in the first instance. There, as in England, it was confined to the royal and aristocratic circles. The second son of Catharine de’ Medici was baptized Edward Alexander in 1551. Mary Stuart followed the new fashion in the names of her son Charles James. The higher nobility of England slowly copied the practice, but within most carefully prescribed limits.

One limitation was, the double name must be one already patronized by royalty.

Henrietta Maria found her title repeated in Henrietta Maria Stanley, daughter of the ill-fated James, Earl of Derby, who for his determined loyalty was beheaded at Bolton, in Lancashire, in 1651. She was born on the 17th of November, 1630, and was buried in York Minster on the 13th of January, 1685. Sir Peter Ball, attorney to the queen of Charles I., baptized his seventeenth child by the name of his royal mistress, Henrietta Maria. He followed her fortunes after as before the king’s execution (Polwhel’s “Devon,” p. 157). These must both have been considered remarkable cases in their day. The loyalty of the act would be its sanction in the eyes of their friends.

But while some copied the double name of the queen (also the name of the queen’s mother), other nobles who had boys to christen mimicked the royal nursery of James I. Henry Frederick, Earl of Arundel, was born in 1608, and Henry Frederick Thynne, brother of Lord Weymouth, was created a baronet in 1641. No one need doubt the origin of these double forms. Again loyalty would be their answer against objections.

But side by side with these went “Maria” (used for either sex) and “Posthumus,” or Posthuma – the only two instances recalled by Camden as in use among “private men.” There seems good reason to believe that, for two or three generations at least, these were deemed, by some unwritten code, the only permissible second names outside the royal list.

The case of Wingfield is curious. Three generations, at least, bore a second name “Maria,” all males. The first was Edward Maria, of Kimbolton, who received the female title in honour of, and from, the Princess Mary, daughter of Henry VIII., his godmother; the second was Thomas Maria, adduced by Camden; and the third is referred to in the following document:

“1639, April. Bill of complaint relative to the sale of the manor of Keyston, Hunts, by Edward Maria Wingfield.” – C. S. P., 1639.

Maria had long been common in Italy, France, and Spain, as a second name, and still is, whether for a boy or girl, the child being thereby specially committed to the protection of the Virgin. The earliest instances in England, however, were directly given in honour of two royal godmothers, who happened to be Mary in one case, and Henrietta Maria in the other. Hence the seeming transference of the foreign second name Maria to our own shores. Thus introduced, Maria began to circulate in society generally as an allowed second name:

“1610, July 10. Baptized Charles Maria, sonne of Charles Chute, Esquire.” – St. Dunstan-in-the-West.

“1640, – . Died Gulielma Maria Posthuma Springett.” – Tablet, Ringmer, Lewes, Sussex.

This last was a bold procedure, three names being an unheard-of event. But the sponsor might reply that he was only placing together the two recognized second names, Maria and Posthuma. Later on, Maria is again found in the same family. In the year 1672, William Penn, the Quaker, married Gulielma Maria, daughter of Sir William Springett.

Posthuma (as in the above instance), or Posthumus, is still more remarkable. The idea of styling a child by this name, thus connecting its birth with the father’s antecedent death, seems to have touched a sympathetic chord, and the practice began widely to prevail. The first example I have seen stands as a single name. Thus, in the Canterbury Cathedral register, is recorded:

“1572, Feb. 10. Christened Posthumus, the sonne of Robert Pownoll.”

The following is the father’s entry of burial:

“1571, June 8. Buried Robert Pownoll.”

This is the earliest instance I have seen. Very soon it was deemed right to make it a second name:

“1632, Sept. 18. Baptized Henry Postumus, son of James Gamble.” – Doncaster.

Sir Thomas Posthumus Hoby, Knight, lord of the manor of Hackness, died in 1641. He bequeathed the greater portion of his estates to “his dearly beloved and esteemed cozen John Sydenham,” of Brimpton, Somerset, who, being baroneted in July, 1641, died in 1642, and was succeeded by his son Sir John Posthumus Sydenham. Posthumus, possibly, in this case was commemorative of Sir Thomas, and not of Sir John. William Ball, son of Sir Peter Ball, already mentioned, married Maria Posthuma Hussey. This must have occurred before the Commonwealth, but I have not the exact date.

The character of all these names is sufficient proof of their rarity. All belong, with one exception, to the higher ranks of society. All were called after the children in the royal nursery, or Maria or Posthuma was the second component. Several formed the double name with both. It seems certain that at first it was expected that, if people in high life were to give encouragement to the new fashion, they must do so within certain carefully defined limits. As for any lower class, it was never imagined that they would dream of aspiring to such a daring innovation. The earliest instance of this class, I find, still has Mary for its second component, and commemorates two English queens:

“1667, Jan. 12. Baptized Elizabeth Mary, being of the age of 18 and upwards, daughter to John Allen, and Emm his wife, both of them being pro-baptists.” – Cant. Cath.

Even to the close of the seventeenth century, if a middle-class man gave his child a double name, it must be to commemorate royalty:

“1696, June 4. Baptized William Henry, son of Mr. Jacob Janeway, and Francis his wife.” – Cant. Cath.

William III. was christened William Henry.

Speaking of Mary’s husband, we may add that two of the most familiar conjunctions of the present day among the middle and lower classes, that of Anna Maria or Mary Ann, arose similarly. In Italy and France the two went together a hundred years earlier, in connection with the Virgin and her mother. In England they are only found since 1700, being used as commemorative of the sisters Anne and Mary, both queens. Like William Henry, the combination has been popular ever since:

“1717, Feb. 15. Christened Anne-Mary, d. of James Hebert, mercer.

“1729, March 30. Christened Anna-Maria, d. of Thomas and Mary Hoare, pewterer.” – St. Dionis Backchurch.

The clerk of Finchley Church could not understand this conjunction – not to add that his education seems to have been slightly neglected:

“1715, Feb. 26. Baptized Anammeriah, d. of Thomas and Eliz. Biby.

“1716, Mch. 17. Baptized Anameriah, d. of Richard and Sarah Bell.”

These are the first double names to be found in this register.

The Latin form represents the then prevailing fashion. There was not a girl’s name in use that was not Latinized. Goldsmith took off the custom in his “Vicar of Wakefield,” in the names of Sophia, Olivia, and Carolina Wilhelmina Amelia Skeggs. The latter hit at the new rage for double and treble baptismal names also; for the day came when two names were not enough. In 1738 George III. was christened George William Frederic. Gilly Williams, writing to George Selwyn, December 12, 1764, says —

“Lord Downe’s child is to be christened this evening. The sponsors I know not, but his three names made me laugh not a little – John Christopher Burton. I wish to God, when he arrives at the years of puberty, he may marry Mary Josephina Antonietta Bentley.” – “Memoirs of George Selwyn,” by Jesse, quoted by Mr. Waters in “Parish Registers,” p. 31.

I need scarcely add that three do not nearly satisfy the craving of many people in the nineteenth century, nor did they everybody in the eighteenth:

“1781, April 29. Bapt. Charles Caractacus Ostorius Maximilian Gustavus Adolphus, son of Charles Stone, tailor.” – Burbage, Wilts.

In Beccles Church occurs the following:

“1804, Oct. 14. Bapt. Zaphnaphpaaneah Isaiah Obededom Nicodemus Francis Edward, son of Henry and Sarah Clarke.”

Only Francis Edward could be got in the ordinary place, so the rest had to be furnished in a note at the foot of the page.

“On Oct. 8th, 1876, in the revision of the parliamentary list at Preston, a claimant appeared bearing the name of Thomas Hill Joseph Napoleon Horatio Bonaparte Swindlehurst Nelson. The vote was allowed, and the revising barrister ordered the full name to be inserted on the register.” —Manchester Evening News, October 11, 1876.

II. Conjoined Names

Returning to the first half of the seventeenth century, we find strong testimony of the rarity of these double names, and a feeling that there was something akin to illegality in their use, from our registers, wherein an attempt was made to glue two names together as one, without a hyphen or a second capital letter. Take the following, all registered within a generation or two of Camden’s remark:

“1602, May 24. Baptized Fannasibilla, d. of Thomas Temple.” – Sibbesdon, Leicestershire.

Here is a palpable attempt to unite Francis (Fanny) and Sybil.

“1648, Jan. 25. Baptized Aberycusgentylis, son of Richard Balthropp, gent.” – Iver, Buckingham.

Here the father has been anxious to commemorate the great Oxford professor, the father of international law, Dr. Abericus Gentilis. He has avoided a breach of supposed national law by writing the two names in one.

“1614, Aprill 16. Buried Jockaminshaw Butler, wife of James Butler, potter, in Bishopsgate Street.” – St. Peter, Cornhill.

The surname of “Shaw” has done service hundreds of times since then as a second baptismal name.

“1640, May 7. Baptized Johnamaria, ye son of Frances Ansloe, and Clare his wife.” – Cant. Cath.

Here again is the inevitable Maria, but so inwoven with John, that Lord Coke’s legal maxim could not touch the case. It is the same in the following example: —

“1632, – . Married John Pell to Ithamaria, d. of Henry Reynolles, of London.” – Lower, “Worthies of Sussex,” p. 178.

One of the most strange samples of conjoined names is this:

“1595, April 3. Joane, whome we maye call Yorkkooppe, because she was ye basterd daughter, as yt is comonlye reported, of one John York and Anne Cooper.” – Landbeach.

Here is a double conjunction; John and Anne forming Jo-ane, and York and Cooper, Yorkkooppe. The first is neat, the second clumsy: but, doubtless, the clerk who wielded the goose-quill deemed both a masterpiece of ingenuity.

The following is interesting: —

“1616, July 13, being Satterday, about half an hour before 10 of the clocke in the forenoon, was born the Lady Georgi-Anna, daughter to the Right Hon. Lady Frances, Countess of Exeter; and the same Ladie Georgi-Anna was baptized 30th July, 1616, being Tuesday, Queen Anne and the Earl of Worcester, Lord Privie Seal, being witnesses: and the Lorde Bishop of London administered the baptism.” —Vide R. E. C. Waters, “Parish Registers.” 1870.

III. Hyphened Names

It will be noticed that so far the two names were both (saving in the case of Aberycusgentylis and Jockaminshaw) from the recognized list of baptismal names. About the reign of Anne the idea of a patronymic for a second name seems to have occurred. To meet the supposed legal exigencies the two names were simply hyphened. We will confine our instances to the register of Canterbury Cathedral:

“1721, Jan. 20. Baptized Howe-Lee, son of Lee Warner, Esquire, and Mary his wife.

“1728, July 4. Baptized Francis-Gunsby, son of Dr. William Ayerst, prebendary of this church.

“1746, Sep. 28. Baptized James-Smith, son of James Horne, and Mary his wife.”

I need not say that at first these children bore the name in common parlance of Howe-Lee, or Francis-Gunsby, or James-Smith. The two were never separated, but treated as one name. To this day traces of this eighteenth-century habit are to be found. I know an old gentleman and his wife, people of the old school, dwelling somewhat out of the world, who address a child invariably by all its baptismal titles. The effect is very quaint. In all formal and legal processes the two or three names have to be employed, and clergymen who only recite the first in the marriage service, as I have heard some do, are in reality guilty of misdemeanour.

How odd all these contrivances to modern eyes! We take up a directory, and every other registration we look on is made up of three names. The poorer classes are even more particular than the aristocracy upon the point. The lady-help, describing her own superior merit, says —