Lady High Sheriff.—Can any of your Herefordshire readers inform me who the lady was who served the office of high sheriff for that county, somewhere about the years 1769 or 1770?
Her husband had been appointed, but dying shortly afterwards, his widow took his place, and attended the judges with the javelin-men, dressed in deep mourning. If any one could give me any
information about this lady, I should be much obliged: I should be glad to know whether there is another instance of a lady high sheriff on record?
W. M.
Major-General Lambert, the first president of Cromwell's council, after the Restoration was exiled to Guernsey, where he remained for thirty years a prisoner. Noble, in his House of Cromwell, vol. i. p. 369., says, Mrs. Lambert has been supposed to have been partial to the Protector; "that her name was Fra., an elegant and accomplished woman. She had a daughter, married to a Welsh judge, whom she survived, and died in January, 1736-7." Any of your correspondents who may be able, will oblige by informing me who Mrs. Lambert was, when she and the general died, and to whom the daughter was married. Noble evidently had not been able to ascertain who the accomplished woman was.
G.
Hoyle, Meaning of; and Hoyle Family.—What is the English to the Celtic word Hoyle; and was there any family of the name of Hoyle previous to the year 1600? If so, can you give me any history of them, or say where same may be found? Also, what is the arms, crest, and motto of that family?
F. K.
Robert Dodsley.—In all the biographies, this amiable and worthy man is said to have been born at Mansfield in Nottinghamshire. Does he anywhere state this himself? If not, what is the evidence in favour of such statement? Not the parish register of Mansfield certainly. I have often thought that a Life of Dodsley in extenso might be made an interesting vehicle for illustrating the progress of an individual from the humble rank of a livery servant to the influential position of a first-class London bookseller in the Augustan age of English literature; including, of course, all the reflex influences of the society of that period. There is plenty of matter; and I think a well-known correspondent of "N. & Q." and Gent's Mag., whose initials are P. C., would know where to find and how to use it.
N. D.