Ellrake or Hellrake.
—Can you kindly give me any information respecting the word ell-rake or hell-rake (for I know not which it is), an agricultural implement in frequent use? It is not alluded to in Todd's Johnson's Dictionary, 1818.
VASHTI.
[In Shropshire an ell-rake means a large rake: an ellock-rake, a small rake used for breaking up ant-hills.]
Francis Clerke.
—I have now before me a MS. in small folio on paper, pp. 225., besides index, entitled—
"Pro Curatorium ac Modus postulandi in Curijs et Causis ecclesiasticis Auct'at'e reverendissimi in Christi patris ac D̅mi D̅mi Johannis providentia Divina Cantuariensis Archiepiscopi, totius Anglie Primats et Metropolitani Londoni celebrā que communiter Curie de Arcubus appellantur. Per Franciscum Clerke, Alme Curie de Arcubus procuren' collecta et edita."
Who was Francis Clerke; and was this collection ever published, and when?
S. P. H. T.
[Francis Clerke for about forty years practised the civil law in the Court of Arches, Admiralty, Audience, Prerogative, and Consistorial of the Bishop of London. In 1594, the Oxford University conferred upon him the degree of Bachelor of Civil Law. His principal work, entitled Praxis curiæ Admiralitatis Angliæ, passed through several editions. A short notice of the author will be found in Wood's Athenæ, i. 657. (Bliss), and a list of his other works in Watt's Bibliotheca Britannica.]