: Notes and Queries Number 193 July 9 1853 A Medium of Inter-communication for Literary Men Artists Antiquaries Genealogists etc. by Various Bell George Editor - Questions and answers Periodicals Notes and Queries

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Augustus Hope on John Crump, payable to George Wood; the second for a similar bill for 30l.; and the third for counterfeiting Colonel Hope's handwriting to defraud the Post-office.

The Cumberland jury did not "declare their unwillingness to hang him for forging a frank," that not being a capital offence. I infer, also, that it was one for which he was not tried. He was convicted on the first indictment; the court rose immediately after the jury had given their verdict; and the prisoner was called up for judgment at eight the next morning. Trying a man under sentence of death for a transportable felony, is contrary to all practice. Hatfield was executed at Carlisle on September 3, 1803.

Mary's misfortunes induced the sympathising public to convert her into a minor heroine. She seems to have been a common-place person, with small claims to the title of "The Beauty of Buttermere." A cotemporary account says, "she is rather gap-toothed and somewhat pock-marked." And Mr. De Quincey, after noticing her good figure, says, "the expression of her countenance was often disagreeable."

"A lady, not very scrupulous in her embellishment of facts, used to tell an anecdote of her which I hope was exaggerated. Some friend of hers, as she affirmed, in company with a large party, visited Buttermere a day or two after that on which Hatfield suffered; and she protested that Mary threw on the table, with an emphatic gesture, the Carlisle paper containing an elaborate account of the execution."--P. 204.

Considering the treatment she had received, it is not unlikely that her love, if she ever had any for a fat man of forty-five, was turned into hatred; and it was not to be expected that her taste would keep down the manifestation of such feeling. When Hatfield was examined at Bow Street, Sir Richard Ford, the chief magistrate, ordered the clerk to read aloud a letter which he received from her. It was:

"Sir,--The man whom I had the misfortune to marry, and who has ruined me and my aged and unhappy parents, always told me that he was the Hon. Colonel Hope, the next brother to the Earl of Hopetoun.

"Your grateful and unfortunate servant, "MARY ROBINSON."

I do not blame Mr. De Quincey, having no doubt that he believed what he was told; but I have put together these facts and discrepancies, to show how careful we should be in accepting traditions, when a man of very high ability, with the best opportunities of getting at the truth, was so egregiously misled.

H. B. C.

U. U. Club.

NOTES UPON THE NAMES OF SOME OF THE EARLY INHABITANTS OF HELLAS.

J. H. J.

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