mes whe they wanted rayne, they would go thither on
procession deuoutely, and offered to the crosse quayles sacrificed, for
to appease the wrath that the god seemed to have agaynste them: and
none was so acceptable a sacrifice, as the bloud of that little birde.
They used to burne certaine sweete gume, to perfume that god withall,
and to besprinkle it with water; and this done, they belieued assuredly
to haue rayne."--P. 41.

EDWARD PEACOCK.

Bottesford Moors, Kirton Lindsey.

_Passage in St. James._--I hope you will not consider the following Query
unsuited to your publication, and in that case I may confidently anticipate
the removal of my difficulty.

In reading yesterday Jeremy Taylor's _Holy Living and Dying_, I came to
this passage (p. 308. Bohn's edition):

"St. James, in his epistle, notes the folly of some men, his
contemporaries, who were so impatient of the event of to-morrow, or the
accidents of next year, or the good or evils of old age, that they
would consult astrologers and witches, oracles and devils, what should
befall them the next calends--what should be the event of such a
voyage--what God had written in his book concerning the success of
battles, the election of emperors, &c.... Against this he opposes his
counsel, that we should not search after forbidden records, much less
by uncertain significations," &c.

Now my Query is, To what epistle of St. James does the eloquent bishop
refer? If to the canonical epistle, to what part? To the words (above
quoted) "forbidden records" there is a foot-note, which contains only the
well-known passage in Horace, lib. i. od. xi., and two others from
Propertius and Catullus.

S. S. S.

_"The Temple of Truth."_--Who was the author of an admirable work entitled
_The Temple of Truth_, published in 1806 by Mawman?

T. B. H.

_Santa Claus._--Reading _The Wide Wide World_ recalled to my mind this
curious custom, which I had remarked when in America. I was then not a
little surprised to find so strange a superstition lingering in puritanical
New England, and which, it is needless to remark, was quite novel to me.
_Santa Claus_ I believe to be a corruption of _Saint Nicholas_, the
tutelary saint of sailors, and consequently a great favourite with the
Dutch. Probably, therefore, the custom was introduced into the western
world by the compatriots of the renowned Knickerbocker.

It is unnecessary to d