great tendency in the United States to vary the orthography, and of course, I suppose, the pronunciation of some of their old English patronymics; not from any dislike to them, for the contrary sentiment, I believe, is very prevalent, but the emigrants who carried out the names were ignorant or indifferent as to the true orthography or pronunciation, and in time the departure grows more wide. Instances of this may be also found in the small towns of England, where Mr. Lower will find on the signs frequent deviations from the usual spelling of the commonest as well as of the rarer names.
C.
In glancing through Cole's MSS. in the British Museum, my eye rested on two paragraphs, which perhaps may be unknown to Mr. Lower. In Additional MSS. No. 5805. p. iv., Cole says:
"Before surnames were in use they were forced to distinguish one another by the addition of Fitz or Son, as John Fitz-John, or John the son of John, or John Johnson, as now in use. This was in the first Edward's time: nay, so late as the reign of Queen Elizabeth, in some places in France they had no surnames, but only Christian names, as the learned Monsieur Menage informs us: 'Il y a environ cent ans, à ce que dit M. Baluze, qu'à Tulle on n'avait que des noms propres, et point de surnoms.'—Menagiana, tom. i. p. 116. edit. 1729."
Again, in Cole's MSS., vol. xliii. p. 176., relating to a deed of the Priory of Spalding, Cole says:
"One observes in this deed several particulars: first that the Priory used a seal with an image of the Blessed Virgin, together with one of their arms; if possibly they used one of the latter sort so early as this John the Spaniard's time, in the reign, as I conceive, of King Richard I., when arms for the chief gentry were hardly introduced. Among the witnesses are two Simons, one distinguished by his complexion, and called Simon Blondus, or the Fair; the other had no name as yet to distinguish him by, and therefore only called here 'another Simon.' This occasioned the introduction of sirnames, and shows the necessity of them."
J. Y.
Hoxton.