Putney, Feb. 1. 1851.
[We insert the above, as one of the many explanations which have been
given of this very popular phrase--although we believe the correct
origin to be the right of taking _fire-bote by hook or by crook_. See
NOTES AND QUERIES, Vol. i., pp. 281. and 405.]
_Record of Existing Monuments._--I have some time since read your remarks
in Vol. iii., p. 14. of "NOTES AND QUERIES," on the Rev. J. Hewett's
_Monumentarum_ of Exeter Cathedral, and intend in {117} a short time to
follow the advice you have there given to "superabundant brass-rubbers," of
copying the inscriptions in the churches and churchyards of the hundred of
Manley. The plan I intend to pursue is, to copy in full every inscription
of an earlier date than 1750; also, all more modern ones which are in any
way remarkable as relating to distinguished persons, or containing any
peculiarity worthy of note. The rest I shall reduce into a tabular form.
The inscriptions of each church I shall arrange chronologically, and form
an alphabetical index to each inscription in the hundred.
By this means I flatter myself a great mass of valuable matter may be
accumulated, a transcript of which may not be entirely unworthy of a place
on the shelves of the British Museum.
I have taken the liberty of informing you of my intention, and beg that if
you can suggest to me any plan which is better calculated for the purpose
than the one I have described, you will do so.
Would it not be possible, if a few persons in each county were to begin to
copy the inscriptions on the plan that I have described, that in process of
time a copy of every inscription in every church in England might be ready
for reference in our national library?
Perhaps you will have the goodness, if you know of any one who like myself
is about to undertake the task of copying inscriptions in his own
neighbourhood, to inform me, that I may communicate with him, so that, if
possible, our plans may be in unison.