s in Devonshire called _peeping_.

J. M. (4.)

_Venwell or Venville_ (Vol. iii., p. 38.).--_Venwell_ or _Venville_ appears
to me to be a corruption of the word _fengfield_; and the meaning of it
seems to be, that custom of delivering possession of land to a purchaser by
cutting a piece of turf from the field bought, and delivering it into his
hands.

I well remember, when a boy, accompanying my father to receive possession
of an outlying field, distant from the main estate which he had bought; the
seller's agent, I think, came with us and cut a small piece of turf from
the ground, and delivered it into my father's hands, saying (if I recollect
right), "By this turf I deliver this field into your possession." By this
means my father "_fenged_" (took) the "_field_" into his own hands, and
became the legal proprietor of it.

P.

_Venville._--The peat or black earth of Dartmoor is still called _ven_ or
_fen_. Is it not more probable that the adjoining parishes (or parts of
them) are said to be in Venville or fengfield, from their being within the
peat district, than that an abbreviation of a legal term, _fines
villarum_--_fin. vil._, should become naturalised among the peasantry, as
is the case with the word Venville?

The second part of the word seems akin to the Scottish _fail_, "a turf, or
that clod covered with grass cut off from the rest of the sward."
(Jamieson.)

K.

_Hand-bells at Funerals_ (Vol. ii., p. 478.).--In the _Testamenta
Eboracensia_, p. 163., Johannes Esten de Scardeburgh, le Ankersymth,
bequeaths 2d.--

"Clerico ecclesiae pro pulsacione campanarum, et le belman portand'
campanam per villam excitandum populum ad orandum."

A hand-bell (as I am informed by a Roman Catholic gentleman) often precedes
the Host, when carried in procession to the sick, &c., in order to clear
the way, and remind passengers of the usual reverence paid at such times.

B.

Lincoln.

_Shillings and Sixpences of George III._ (Vol. iii., p. 275.).--R. W. C.
has fallen into a misconception in supposing that these coins present an
erroneous spelling of the Latinized style of the monarch, whilst the
contemporary crowns and half-crowns have the correct orthography. The
spelling of the legend on the sixpences and shillings was intentional, and
with a meaning, being inscribed in an abridged form--GEOR: III. D: G:
BRITT: REX F: D:--the reduplication of the T was designed, after classical
precedent, to represent the