Weaver-Bird, The Sociable, 440 Wedding, A, A Hundred Years Ago, 640 Weight, Reducing, 85 Whipping Prisoners, 175 Whitehall, Ceiling of, 121 Whitsuntide, at Durham Cathedral, 8 Why a Man Measures more in the Morning than in the Evening, 75 Wife, Diving for a, 479 Wigs, 17, 31 Will, Eccentric, 209 William the Conqueror, Courtship of, 555 Willow, Weeping, Introduction of the, 148 Wind Mills, The First, 577 Witch-Testing, at Newcastle, in 1649, 21 Wolves in England, 441 Woman, The Hairy, of Burmah, 677 Woman's Cleverness, 260 Women of England, The, 159 ---- in Former Times, 127 Wonderful Escape, 215, 300 Wren's (Sir Christopher) Cost of Churches, 171 ---- ---- ---- Report, 183 Writing Materials, 481 Writings, Terra Cotta, 466 Yorkshire Tike, The, 24 Yorkshire in the Last Century, 283 TEN THOUSAND WONDERFUL THINGS. PUNISHMENTS IN PROVINCIAL TOWNS IN THE OLDEN TIME. The instruments most in vogue with our ancestors were three--the cucking-stool, the brank, and the tumbrel. The Cucking-stool was used by the pond in many village greens about one hundred years ago or little more, and then deemed the best corrective of a scolding woman. [Illustration: The Cucking-stool.] By the sea, the quay offered a convenient spot. The barbican, at Plymouth, was a locality, doubtless terrible to offenders, however careless of committing their wordy nuisance of scolding. Two pounds were paid for a cucking-stool at Leicester in 1768. Since that it has been placed at the door of a notorious scold as a warning. Upon admission to the House of Correction at Liverpool, a woman had to undergo the severity of the cucking-stool till a little before the year 1803, when Mr. James Neild wrote to Dr. Lettsom. The pump in the men's court was the whipping-post for females, which discipline continued, though not weekly. _Kingston-upon-Thames._ _s._ _d._