[A gentleman who has resided for the last half century in the Principality, and to whom we submitted our correspondent's Query, has kindly forwarded the following reply:--"I have consulted bards, Welsh scholars, &c., and am sorry that I cannot forward any satisfactory account of the custom alluded to by TREBOR. Some say, we remember the time when the women wore ordinary _felt_ hats manufactured from their own wool: one or two travelling hatters occasionally settled at Bangor, who made and sold _beaver_ hats. We do not think that the women here intended to adopt any particular costume; but retained the hat as agreeing with the peculiar close cap, and _projecting_ border, which it leaves in view, and in _possession of its own uprightness_! The fashion is going out; all our young people adopt the English bonnet with the English language. The flat hat, with a broad brim, is still retained in the mountain regions."] _Pancakes on Shrove Tuesday._--Perhaps some of your readers will kindly inform the Pancake Eating Public as to the period "when," and the reason "why" such a custom grew into existence? I have frequently heard the question mooted upon this anniversary, without ever hearing, or being able to give, a satisfactory elucidation of it; but it is to be hoped that "N. & Q." will supply the desideratum ere long, and confer a favour on A LOVER OF PANCAKES AND AN UPHOLDER OF ANCIENT CUSTOMS. Temple, Shrove Tuesday, 1852. [Fosbrooke, in his _Encyclopædia of Antiquities_, vol. ii. p. 572., informs us that "Pancakes, the Norman _Crispellæ_, are taken from the Fornacalia, on Feb. 18, in memory of the practice in use before the goddess Fornax invented ovens." The Saxons called February "Solmonath," which Dr. Frank Sayers, in his _Disquisitions_, says is explained by Bede "Mensis placentarum," and rendered by Spelman, in an inedited manuscript, "Pancake Month," because in the course of it cakes were offered by the Pagan Saxons to the sun. So much for the "when:" now for the reason "why" the custom was adopted by the Christian church.