Note 307.1 — THE PASTON LETTERS Edward IV. (continued 5)
Reading edition
[From Fenn, ii. 256.] It is curious that after so much negotiation for the marriage of John Paston and Margery Brews, we have no record in these letters when it actually took place; but probably it was in August 1477, the last reference to it as an event not yet accomplished being on the 7th of that month (No. 916). In January 1478, John Paston talks of taking his wife to her father’s house on account of her situation, and their first child was born in the course of the following summer. This letter seems to have been written in December. Fenn remarks that St. Thomas’s Day might mean the Translation of St. Thomas à Becket, 7th July 1478, and ‘Our Lady’s Day’ might be the Visitation of the Virgin, 2nd July preceding. But this is simply impossible, because the letter is dated Thursday before St. Thomas’s Day, which would in that case be the very same date as the Visitation of Our Lady, viz. the 2nd July 1478. Besides, if the first child of John Paston and Margery was not actually born before July, the latter was certainly much nearer to her confinement then than this letter would imply. See No. 936 in vol. vi.
A facsimile of this letter was published in the European Magazine for March 1787, and we have carefully compared the text with this facsimile.
307.2 A kind of grey woollen cloth.
307.3 Fenn suggests Grenouilliere or frog-colour, but I find no authority for such a word
308.1 This word commonly signifies neat or elegant, and seems to be used here ironically.
308.2 Conception of Our Lady, 8th of December.—F.
308.3 21st December, the day of St. Thomas Apostle, or perhaps 29th December, the day of St. Thomas (à Becket) the Martyr.