JOHN MARTIN.
Downpatrick.
74. Murderers buried in Cross Roads.
—Though the lines of Hood's,
"So they buried him where the cross roads met
With a stake in his inside."
occur in one of his comic poems, I have often heard it gravely stated that it was formerly the custom to bury murderers with a stake driven through the body, where cross roads meet. Was this ever a custom, and when was "formerly?" Are there many such tragic spots in England and can I find them enumerated anywhere?
P. M. M.
75. Wyle Cop.
—This is the name of a street, or rather bank in Shrewsbury, leading from the English Bridge to High Street. It has always struck me as being a curious name; and I should feel obliged to any of your readers who could inform me what is the origin of the place being so called, or if there is any meaning in the words beyond being the name of a place.