Page:Notes and Queries - Series 10 - Volume 10.djvu/169

 10 s. x. AUG. 15, loos.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

137

Both the carrion crow and the rook are popularly supposed to foretell the coming of rain, not only by an unusual hoarseness in their note, but by a peculiar sliding move- ment in their flight. With regard to the latter, see Dr. Jenner's well-known weather- lore verses, quoted in Chambers's * Book of Days.' C. C. B.

" Against " in the sense of " before " is used habitually in this district, where one constantly hears such expressions as " I '11 get it done agen' night," or " They did ought to be put in agen' the fall " (planted just before autumn).

The disturbing effect of impending rain on the nervous organization of many crea- tures besides crows and parrots is very noticeable, as exemplified in the well- known lines :

Loud quack the ducks, the peacocks cry, The distant hills are seeming nigh. How restless are the snorting swine ! The busy flies disturb the kine.

CHARLES GILLMAN. Church Fields, Salisbury.

[H. I. B. and MR. R. WELFORD thanked for replies.]

"BUCCADO" (10 S. x. 87). This is pro- bably only an alternative spelling of the Spanish " bocado " (Italian boccata), meaning & " mouthful " or " morsel." As it has never been naturalized to the extent, e.g., of bonne-bouche, one could hardly expect to find it even in the ' N.E.D.' (Bonne- bouche, with its meaning, is given in so small a dictionary as Nut-tail's.)

C. S. HARRIS.

In Spanish bocado means a mouthful. The plural bocados means slices of quinces, apples, &c., made up into conserves (F. Corona Bustamente's ' Sp. and Eng. Dic- tionary,' 1882). U. V. W.

[Many other correspondents agree that it is Spanish.]

BUDGEE, A KIND OF APE (10 S. x. 89). Can this be the creature mentioned in (" Adventure Series," 1890) ? " I saw a great many different kinds of monkeys, baboons, and virjees," &c. The editor, the late Capt. Oliver, in a foot-note quotes the following from Ogilby (in 1666, from De Flacourt's description of the island) :
 * Robert Drury's Journal in Madagascar '

" Monkies or Baboons are of several sorts A

third, and the most common, called Varii (Virgis), are gray and long nosed with great shaggy tails. These may be tamed without difficulty if taken young."

In the index we find : " Virjees or Varii, a species of lemur." As the letters b and v are easily interchangeable, " budgee " may stand for " virjee."

In Madagascar and the adjacent islands it is not an uncommon sight to see a black man or a French soklier walk about with a creature with a long bushy tail a kind of lemur, and not a true ape sitting on his shoulder. They are very tame and most affectionate when young, but get quarrel- some and bad-tempered with old age. We brought several of them with us to Mar- seilles on the French steamer. The local name of the animal is " mac " ; and when I first saw one, I was told that it was not a monkey, nor even a macaco, but a " mac."

L. L. K.

Would not this be an ape or " jackanapes " (i.e., a monkey) possessing a furry coat suggestive of budge, the dressed fur or wool of either the lamb or young kid, a not un- common characteristic of some species of the Simiadse ?

J. HOLDEN MACMlCHAEL.

"SINEWS OF WAR" (10 S. ix. 470). In. Sir Henry Savile's translation of Tacitus' s ' Histories,' the first edition of which ap- peared in 1581, the words in Book II. chap. 84,

" Sed nihil seque fatigabat quam pecuniarum con- quisitio : eos esse belli civilis neryos dictitans Mucianus non ius aut verum in cognitionibus, scd solum magnitudinem opum spectabat,"

are rendered :

" but the greatest difficulty was to get money : which Mutianus affirming to bee the sinewes of ciuill warre, respected not law or equity in iudgemerits, but onely what way to procure masses of money."

EDWARD BENSLY. University College, Aberystwyth.

COUNTING BRINGING ILL-LUCK (10 S. ix. 108). A friend of mine received an illus- tration of this superstition when visiting the Standing Stones at Callernish, in the Lewis. He asked a peasant boy how many stones there were in the monument, but was told that no one knew, for it was unlucky to count them. The lad looked as if he expected the ground to open when my friend replied that he had just counted them, and knew the exact number.

ALEX. RUSSELL.

Stromness, Orkney.

HENRY ELLISON (10 S. x. 8, 95). I am under a great debt to the several contribu- tors who have helped me to rescue from oblivion one of the literary glories of the