“Stab the babe, and make it cry,
  And that will bring her down.”

Which being done, they murder the unhappy lady.  Shortly after, Lord Weirie comes home, and has the “fause nourrice” burnt at the stake.  From the circumstance that the name of the husband of the murdered lady was Weirie, it is conjectured that this tragedy took place at Balwearie Castle, in Fife, and the old people about there constantly affirm that it really occurred.  I am not aware that there exists any connection between the hero of this story and the nursery rhyme; for, as I before stated, I think Lonkin a corruption of Lammilsin.

H.H.C.

Rowley Powley (Vol. ii., p. 74.).—­Andre Valladier, who died about the middle of the sixteenth century, was a popular preacher and the king’s almoner.  He gained great applause for his funeral oration on Henry IV.  In his sermon for the second Sunday in Lent (Rouen, 1628), he says;—­

“Le paon est gentil et miste, bien que par la parfaite beaute de sa houppe, par la rarete et noblesse de sa teste, par la gentilesse et nettete de son cou, par l’ornement de ses pennes et par la majeste de tout le reste de son corps, il ravit tous ceux qui le contemplent attentivement; toutefois au rencontre de sa femelle, pour l’attirer a son amour, il deploye sa pompe, fait montrer et parade de son plumage bizarre, et RIOLLE PIOLLE se presente a elle avec piafe, et luy donne la plus belle visee de sa roue.  De mesme ce Dieu admirable, amoreux des hommes, pour nous ravir d’amour a soy, desploye le lustre de ses plus accomplies beautez, et comme un amant transporte de sa bienaimee se {252} montre pour nous allecher a cetter transformation de nous en luy, de nostre misere en sa gloire.”—­Ap. Predicatoriuna p. 132-3:  Dijon, 1841.

H.B.C.

Guy’s Armour (Vol. ii., pp. 55. 187.).—­With respect to the armour said to have belonged to Guy, Earl of Warwick, your correspondent NASO is referred to Grose’s Military Antiquities, vol. ii. pl. 42., where he will find an engraving of a bascinet of the fourteenth century, much dilapidated, but having still a fragment of the moveable vizor adhering to the pivot on which it worked.  Whether this interesting relic is still at Warwick Castle or not, I cannot pretend to say, as I was unfortunately prevented joining the British Archaeological Association at the Warwick congress in 1847, and have never visited that part of the country; but the bascinet which was there in Grose’s time was at least of the date of Guido de Beauchamp, Earl of Warwick, the builder of Guy’s Tower, who died in 1315, and who has always been confounded with the fabulous Guy:  and if it has disappeared, we have to regret the loss of the only specimen of an English bascinet of that period that I am aware of in this country.

J.R.  PLANCHE