Baptismal Custom.—In many country parishes the child is invariably called by the name of the saint on whose day he happens to have been born.
I know one called Valentine, because he appeared in the world upon the 14th of February; and lately baptized a child myself by the name of Benjamin Simon Jude. Subsequently, on expressing some surprise at the strange conjunction, I was informed that he was born on the festival of SS. Simon and Jude, and that it was always very unlucky to take the day from a child.
Rt.
Warmington.
Subterranean Bells.—Hone, in his Year-Book, gives a letter from a correspondent in relation to a tradition in Raleigh, Nottinghamshire, which states that many centuries since the church and a whole village were swallowed up by an earthquake. Many villages and towns have certainly shared a similar fate, and we have never heard of them more.
"The times have been
When the brains were out the man would die,
That there an end."
But at Raleigh, they say, the old church-bells still ring at Christmas time, deep, deep in earth; and that it was a Christmas-morning custom for the people to go out into the valley, and put their ears to the ground to listen to the mysterious chimes of the subterranean temple. Is this a tradition peculiar to this locality? I fancy not, and seem to have a faint remembrance of a similar belief in other parts. Can any of your correspondents favour "N. & Q." with information hereon?
J. J. S.