on for persons is, indeed, more like that of a dog
than of a cat. It is a half-bred Persian cat, and its eyes are perfectly
blue, with round pupils, not elongated as those of cats usually are. It
occasionally suffers from irritation in the ears, but this has not at all
resulted in deafness.

H.

_Consecrated Roses_ (Vol. vii., pp. 407. 480.; Vol. viii., p. 38.).--From
the communication of P. P. P. it seems that the origin of the consecration
of the rose dates so far back as 1049, and was "en reconnaissance" of a
singular privilege granted to the abbey of St. Croix. Can your
correspondent refer to any account of the origin of the consecration or
blessing of the sword, cap, or keys?

G.

_The Reformed Faith_ (Vol. vii., p. 359.).--I must protest against this
term being applied to the system which Henry VIII. set up on his rejecting
the papal supremacy, which on almost every point but that one was pure
Popery, and for refusing to conform to which he burned Protestants and
Roman Catholics at the same pile. It suited Cobbett (in his _History of the
Reformation_), and those controversialists who use him as their text-book,
to confound this system with the doctrine of the existing Church of
England, but it is to be regretted that any inadvertence should have caused
the use of similar language in your pages.

J. S. WARDEN.

_House-marks_ (Vol. vii., p. 594.).--It appears to me that the
_house-marks_ he alluded to may be traced in what are called _merchants'
marks_, still employed in marking bales of wool, cotton, &c., and which are
found on tombstones in our old churches, _incised_ in the slab during the
sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, and which till lately puzzled the
heralds. They were borne by merchants who had no arms.

E. G. BALLARD.

_Trash_ (Vol. vii., p. 566.).--The late Mr. Scatchard, of Morley, near
Leeds, speaking in Hone's _Table Book_ of the Yorkshire custom of
_trashing_, or throwing an old shoe for luck over a wedding party, says:

"Although it is true that an old shoe is to this day called 'a trash,'
yet it did not, certainly, give the name to the nuisance. To 'trash'
originally signified to clog, encumber, or impede the progress of any
one (see Todd's _Johnson_); and, agreeably to this explanation, we find
the rope tied by sportsmen round the necks of fleet pointers to tire
them well, and check their speed, is hereabouts universally called
'trash cord,' or 'dog trash.