CHRISTIAN NAMES
SIR,—The article by Strix on Christian names has emphasised the point that Mr. Leaver's researches are conducted in a rather small world—the world of those people whose relations and friends like and can afford The Times. It would be more interesting if a nation-wide survey could be carried out. I gather from Mr. Lauwerys's letter in the same issue that the students at the University of London Institute of Education are prepared to collate obscure and valueless data. Could not one of them be sent to Somerset House? A volume entitled 'The British Christian Name, 1900-57,' would be of the greatest assistance to future historians who, no doubt, will want to compare the number of girls called Zeppelina during the First World War with the num- ber of boys—I assume only boys—who are now being christened Sputnik. That such a survey should be nation-wide is really essential, for we in the counties scorn the common Janes and Michaels so beloved by the Haleyburians. Here in Cornwall, for example, I know people who rejoice in—or perhaps it would be safer to say who are distinguished by —such unusual and delightful Christian names as Pharaoh, Moses, Garfield, Fernleigh, Berwyn, Lenthorn, Piper, Escallonia (called after a warship, not the shrub), Cressida, Balmoral and Britomarte.
Priory Meadow, Tregony, Cornwall
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