Page:Notes and Queries - Series 10 - Volume 12.djvu/261

 10 s. XIL SEPT. 11, 1909.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

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who are arrived at that high pitch of wicked- ness ought not to breathe the common air with other men.

The treatise itself begins with the state- ment that the present laws are far too favourable to murderers, highwaymen, and housebreakers, and are insufficient even though they extend to death, since the form of death the law enjoins is found unable to deter them. Were it not so, the roads would not be pestered with that wicked generation of men, nor the session papers monthly, and the public press daily, be full of so many relations of robberies and murders ; nor would the pleasure and satisfaction of travelling be destroyed, as it is now by being so dangerous and unsafe. The writer then refers to the frequent interruptions to trade and business caused by the robbery of packets and the inter- ception of letters of correspondence and advice, to say nothing of the insecurity of sending Exchequer and Bank bills by the public conveyances ; and he asks whether it is not fit, since men have grown so much more incorrigible than in their forefathers' days, that good men should grow less merciful to them. He says that if some remedy be not found, people will shortly not dare to travel in England unless, as in the deserts of Arabia, it be in large companies, and armed ; and he argues that if hanging will not restrain the robbers, hanging in chains and starving them, or (if murderers at the same time, or night incendiaries) breaking them on the wheel, or whipping them to death (an old Roman punishment), might do so.

To get over the difficulty that torments so unusual in England may appear un- reasonable, it is suggested that a few ex- amples would be so terrifying that the law would seldom be put in execution. The author lays great stress upon the fact that his design is not that man's blood should be shed, but that it should not, for he verily believes that for five men condemned and executed " now," you would hardly have one then ; and he enforces the maxim of the Civil Law that in criminal cases men should not be condemned unless the evidence be clearer than the mid-day sun.

The author then considers various other modes of punishment, such as sending the offenders to be exchanged for captives in Barbary, branding them on the forehead, condemning them to perpetual slavery at home, or setting them to work in Welsh mines ; but, in spite of the failure of al] these suggestions, the author hardly ventures

to expect that what he offers will convince the world, though he expresses the modest hope that " he may provoke some one to promote somewhat more useful than h& bias done."

GEO. RUTTEB FLETCHER, F.S.A. 22, Causton Road, Highgate.

COCKBUBNSPATH : MAXWELL (10 S. X.

430 ; xi. 72, 212, 335, 436). Knowing SIB HEBBEBT MAXWELL to be an expert and usually accurate Gaelic etymologist, I arn surprised that he thinks Hogshillock must be a hybrid if the first part is Gaelic. No old Gaelic names are really hybrid, though many modern names are, and many look like hybrids. I suppose SIB HEBBEBT does not regard his name as a hybrid. I do not. I think it represents Baile Maigh, farm town in a plain, coming from baile, town, and maigh, genitive of magh, plain. Baile had been corrupted, as often happened, into well, and put last. Then maigh had been put first, as being the qualifying word, in the English way, and, being supposed to be the possessive of a personal name, s had been added to it, thus producing Maighswell,. lapsing into Maxwell.

This is a fair example of what happened in very many cases with Gaelic names. Hogshillock had originally been Tulach Og, little hillock, from tulach, knoll, and og* little. Tulach had been translated and put last, and og had been put first, with s added because it had been regarded as a personal name in the possessive. This produced Ogshillock which had become Hogshillock. The name Ogg means little, as does Hogg, which has nothing to do with sheep, though a Hogg called himself the Ettrick Shepherd, and hogg means a young or small sheep. In Aberdeenshire we have Ogston as th& name of a farm, meaning small town ; and on the coast there is an inlet called Little Yoag's Haven. Yoags is a translation of yoag, for og, small.

SIB HEBBEBT is right in saying that in Gaelic the accent ought to be on the last part, a few short adjectives going first and carrying the accent. This rule had been invariably obeyed in Gaelic times, but it is departed from in several names, the meaning of which has been forgotten. Take for examples the names of a former Premier and our present one. I think Balfour is accented on the first syllable in England, but as a place-name it is on the last in Scotland. It represents baile, farm town, and feoir, genitive of feur, grass. Some- think four represents /war, cold, bleak. I do not, for some places of the name are