I may here notice that an inexcusable error has been committed and repeated in several of the collections of records published by the Parliamentary Commission, who have, in numerous instances, and without any warrant, interpreted Osb. of the MSS. as "Osbert." Thus they have deprived Fitzosborne, Bishop of Exeter (A.D. 1102), of some of his manors, and within his own diocese, and conferred them on Osbert the Bishop, although there never was a bishop of that name in England. I took the liberty of pointing out this error to one of the chief editors concerned in these works; but as he has taken no notice of my observations, I must infer that he thinks it most prudent to excite no farther inquiry.
The Osborns, now so numerous in London, appear to have come from the Danish stem from which the Norman branch was originally derived. Their number, which has increased even beyond the ordinary ratio of the population, may perhaps be dated from the wife of one of them who (temp. Jac. I.) had twenty-four sons, and was interred in old St. Paul's.
I shall be very happy to afford any assistance in my power to the gentleman who has occasioned these remarks.
Omicron.
INSCRIPTIONS ON BELLS.
(Vol. vi., p. 554.; Vol. vii., pp. 454. 603.; Vol. viii., pp. 108. 248.)
Many thanks are due to your correspondent Cuthbert Bede, B.A., for his interesting series of inscriptions on bells. The following are, I think, sufficiently curious to be added to your collection:—
Rouen Cathedral:
"In the steeple of the great church, in the citie of Roane in Normandy, is one great bell with the like inscription." [Like, that is, to the inscription at St. Stephen's, Westminster: see "N. & Q." Vol. viii., p. 108.]