Page:Notes and Queries - Series 10 - Volume 1.djvu/14

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NOTES AND QUERIES. [io s. i. JAN. 2, 1901.

Legion, in memory of its incomparable deeds, which, in conjunction with Bliicher and the Prussians, rescued the English army from destruction at Waterloo."

RICHARD EDGCUMBE. 33, Tedworth Square, Chelsea.

"Coup DE JARNAC." This expression is used by M. Jorevin, a French traveller, in a Description of the "Bergiardin " (Bear Garden) in "Sodoark" (Southwark), published in 1672, and reprinted in the Antiquarian Repertory (ed. 1806), vol. iv. p. 549.

JOHN HEBB.

SOMERSET DIALECT. Here are two choice specimens. " It do vibrate through," account- ing for the oil dropped from the lamp. A trail of creeper for decorating the church would look so nice "wrangling round the Communion." FREDERIC C. SKEY.

Weare Vicarage.

TACITUS AND THE 'GESTA ROMANORUM.' The eighteenth tale in the ' Gesta Romano- rum' is very like the story of CEdipus. In it the man who unwittingly slew his father is a soldier named Julian. The resemblance of his name to that of the soldier in the excerpt from Tacitus given 9 th S. xii. 105 is remark- able. JOHN B. WAINEWRIGHT.

" LOMBARD." Loftie, in his ' London,' vol. i. p. 158, notes that in the Hundred Rolls, 2 Edward I., several persons are cited as Lombards who were unquestionably of Eng- lish birth and parentage. Among the number is Gregory de Rokesle, Mayor of London. Loftie adds, "A Lombard was probably by this time a money-lender, not a native of Lombardy." M. D. DAVIS.

"RINGING FOR GOFER." The Daily Mail of 5 November, 1903, is responsible for the following :

"On six successive Sunday evenings, commencing twelve Sundays before Christmas, the church bells are rung at Newark-upon-Trent for one hour at a time, in compliance with the terms of a bequest left by a merchant named Gofer. Two centuries ago trofer lost his way in Sherwood Forest, then in- fested by men of the baser sort. Just as he was giving himself up for dead, he heard the bells of Newark, and, guided by their sound, regained his road. In memory of his deliverance he left a sum ot money to be expended in ' ringing for Gofer.' " I do not find that this ancient custom has been recorded in 'N. & Q.,'and I therefore think it should appear therein.

EVERARD HOME COLEMAN.

" MAGSMAN." The following cutting from the Daily Express of 30 November, 1903, may be worth preserving in 'N. & Q.' :

"With the close of the racing season the card- sharper takes to confidence tricks. ' Confidence men ' are called ' magsmen ' in the vernacular of the police. The derivation of the term is interesting and instructive. In thieves' slang ' to mag ' is to talk in a specious, oily manner. Hence the mags- man is a swindler, who persuades gullible persons out of their possessions. His happy hunting-ground is the vicinity of the large railway stations where passengers book for long journeys."

W. CURZON YEO. Richmond, Surrey.

[' Slang and its Analogues,' by Farmer and Henley, gives the same derivation.]

SHAKESPEARE ALLUSION. In 'A Mid- summer Night's Dream,' I. i. 207-8, is this couplet :

What graces in my love do dwell That he hath turn'd a heaven into a hell.

Marston, in the ' Malcontent,' I. ii. 43-4, has reversed the lines and given a garbled quo- tation: Your smiles have been my heaven, vour frowns my

hell: 0, pity then grace should with beauty dwell.

Maquerelle undoubtedly recognized the allu- sion at once, for she immediately retorts : - Reasonable perfect, by 'r Lady.

CIIAS. A. HEEPICH.

RAILWAY RELIC. The following, from the Liverpool Daily Post, is worth a corner in 'N. &Q.':

" Seventy years have elapsed since the trials took place of three locomotives, constructed as the result of a competition promoted by the then Liverpool and Manchester Railway Company. The last of these, the Novelty, has just been discovered at Kainhill. The three engines which took part in the 1830 trials were the Rocket, constructed by Stephenson ; the Sanspareil, by Hackworth ; and the Novelty, by Braithwaite and Ericson. The Rocket obtained the premium of 50W. as the most suitable locomotive to run on the line, having attained a speed of twenty-nine miles per hour. The greatest speed of the Sanspareil was less than twenty-three miles, and the Novelty had only covered three miles when the joints of the boiler gave way. At that time the Rainhill Gas and Water Company's premises, which adjoin the rail- way at Rainhill Station, were occupied bv Mr. Melling as engineering works, Ericson and Melling being friends. The former left the Novelty there after its failure to gain the prize. The R_ocket and the Sanspareil are both in South Kensington Museum, but the whereabouts of the Novelty could not be traced until recently, when it was found still working as a stationary engine, the wheels having been removed. This interesting relic will in all probability be placed side by side with its contem- poraries at South Kensington."

W. D. PINK.

GREEN : ITS SIGNIFICANCE. (See 7 th S. viii. 464 ; x. 141, 258 ; 9 th S. viii. 121, 192 ; ix. 234, 490; x. 32, 133, 353; xi. 32, 254.) Rafaello