5 APRIL 1890, Page 17

" HOLY-STONES."

[To THE EDITOR OF THE " SPECTATOR."] SIB.,—In the review of Mr. J. J. Hissey's " Tour in a Phaeton," in the Spectator for March 22nd, you quote his statement from some old book that "holy-stones" were so called from sailors at the time of the Commonwealth having used fragments of Yarmouth gravestones to scrub the decks of their vessels; adding : " But we have a strong impression that the friable sandstones thus used were called holy' because sailors are on their knees when they use them."

I believe you will find the correct spelling to be " holey," the stones used by preference being full of holes, like a sponge, and that any derivations of the name holy" were simply inventions to account for what sounded a remarkable name.—