‘Fillpot’ as well as ‘Fillip’ are both found in mediæval registers in the cases of ‘Roger Fylpot’ and ‘Walter Felip.’ An old song, quoted in ‘Political Poems’ (i. 60), says of the defeated soldiers at Halidon Hill:— On Filip Valas fast cri they, There for to dwell, and him avaunce. The ‘Fillpots’ of our present directories may therefore have thus spelt their names for four or five hundred years. Anyhow they have precedent for the form. ‘Matthew the Publican’ seems to have been a favourite alike in England and France. ‘Matt’ was the homely appellative, and thus besides ‘Mathews’ and ‘Mathewson,’ we meet with ‘Matts,’ ‘Matson,’ ‘Mattison,’ and ‘Mattinson.’ Our ‘Mayhews’ represent the foreign dress, and can refer their origin to such personages as ‘Adam fil. Maheu,’ or ‘Mayeu de Basingbourne.’ ‘Bartholomew,’ for what reason I can scarcely say, was a prime favourite with our forefathers, and has left innumerable proofs of the same. ‘Batt’ or ‘Bett’ seems to have been the favourite curtailment. The author of ‘Piers Plowman’ speaks of ‘Bette the Bocher’ (Butcher), ‘Bette the Bedel,’ and makes Reason bid Bette kutte A bough outher tweye, And bete Beton therewith. ‘Batty,’ ‘Bates,’ ‘Batson,’ ‘Batcock,’ ‘Badcock,’ ‘Batkins,’ ‘Badkins,’ ‘Betson,’ ‘Bedson,’ and ‘Betty’ are relics of this. ‘Bartle,’ and the Norman-French ‘Bartelot,’ found in such entries as ‘Bartel Frobisher,’ ‘John fil. Bertol,’ ‘Bartelot Govi,’ or ‘Edward Barttlette,’ at once bespeak the origin of our ‘Bartles’ and ‘Bartletts.’[86] Nor was this all. Another favourite sobriquet for this same name was ‘Toly’ or ‘Tholy,’ hence such registrations as ‘Tholy Oldcorn,’ or ‘Robert Toly,’ or ‘William fil. Tholy.’ Our ‘Tolleys,’ ‘Tollys’ and ‘Tolsons’[87] are thus explained. None of these could have been the offspring of any old ‘Ladye Betty,’ as Mr. Lower seems to imagine, since that name, as I have shown, did not exist in England at this time, nor in fact can it be said to have been known till rendered fashionable by Elizabeth Woodville, the bride of Edward IV. What an influence a single individual may wield over our personal nomenclature may be thus seen, when we remember the enormous preponderance of this latter name during the two centuries that followed the reign of the imperious but ‘good Queen Bess,’ and the glorious scattering of the Spanish Armada. This, too, escaping the withering influences of the Puritan era, continued through all, and now holds the fourth place in English esteem. In the poem I have just quoted, Reason Called Caton his knave Curteis of speche, And also Tomme Trewe-tonge.