Page:Notes and Queries - Series 10 - Volume 2.djvu/63

 io'" s. ii. JULY 16, low.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

47

est accompagne de la musique byzantine ; un pro- fesseur de musique religieuse d'Athenes en a fait la transcription, et la melodic a de si grandes analogies avec 1'air du God sare the King, qu'en 1'entendant on croirait ou'ir I'hymne anglais. Or, le manuscrit est de 1450. On croyait jusqu'ici que le God save the King etait emprunte a Lulli. Tout finit par se eavoir."

E. S. DODGSON.

ROCKALL. The bibliography of this Flying Dutchman will be found 9 th S. x. 157.

MEDIC ULUS.

FINAL "-ED." In Mr. Henry Bradley 's interesting book 'The Making of English,' 1904, p. 50, writing of the "movement towards monosyllabism continued even into the nineteenth century," the author adds that still usual in the reading of the Bible or the Liturgy to make two syllables of such words as loved and changed, which are now pro- nounced in one syllable." Perhaps Mr. Bradley's church-going has not been much varied, but he ought to know that there are now not a few clergy (old-fashioned, but not necessarily old-aged) who always deliberately make a separate syllable of this final "-ed." To some modern ears it sounds pedantic, but the modern way to them seems slovenly, colloquial, almost irreverent. I shall never forget my astonishment on hearing an educated man speak of " ragg'd schools." It has even been suggested that we might say " when the wick'd man." VV. C. B.
 * ' within the memory of living persons it was

POETICAL CURIOSITY. Wai the r von der Vogelweide, the Middle High German Minne- .singer, was sometimes guilty of playing with the form and the rimes of his verses. For instance, he wrote one poem of five stanzas of seven lines each, in which the rimes of each one of the five stanzas are upon one of the five vowels a, e, i, o, u (cp. Bartsch's edition, pp. 8 and 9). More interesting, how- ever, is another poem of five stanzas (cp. Bartsch, 281 and 282), each of which reads the same both ways, forward or backward. As summing up the good advice of the poem, I quote the last stanza :

Hiietet wol der drier Leider al/e frier : Zungen ougen oren sint Dicke schalchaft, /'eren blint. Dicke schalchaft, z'eren blint Znngen ougen oren sint : Leider alze frier Hiietet wol der drier.

CHARLES BUNDY WILSON. State University of Iowa, Iowa City.

IONA CATHEDRAL. As I have lately been at lona, it may interest readers of * N. & Q.'

to learn that substantial progress has been made with the restoration of the cathedral there. The choir, south aisle, and south transept have been roofed, and the windows glazed, while the square tower has been roofed. We were informed that it is intended to roof the sacristy (on north side of choir), and complete and roof the north transept. With that, however, the work will have to stop, unless additional funds are forthcoming.

The work appears to be done in a plain, substantial manner, and although at first sight the colour of the slates is a little objectionable, this will no doubt tone down in time. On the whole, I think the committee are to be congratulated on the result of their efforts so far, and it is to be hoped that the completion of their task will not be long delayed owing to want of funds.

The island of lona contains a number of interesting remains in the shape of ancient memorial stones, fec. These are valuable both from an artistic and an archaeological point of view, and I think it is a pity they should be left, as at present, exposed to the weather. Surely it would not cost much to erect a shelter of some sort over the large collection of such stones in the churchyard round St. Oran's Chapel. T. F. D.

WE must request correspondents desiring in- formation on family matters of only private interest to affix their names and addresses to their queries, in order that the answers maybe addressed to them direct.

HERTFORD COUNTY BIOGRAPHY. I am desirous of preparing a scheme for a dic- tionary of Hertfordshire biography, taking as a model the * Dictionary of National Bio- graphy.' Can correspondents suggest some elementary rules for compiling this which could be circulated among the workers ?

W. B. GERISH.

Bishop's Stortford, Herts.

THOMAS BUTTON. There lies before me a MS. volume of 264 pages, containing a tran- script of 178 hymns and devotional odes, to each of which are prefixed a date and the name of a place. The dates run from 14 November, 1710, to 6 August, 1712. The series of places begins with Edinburgh ; con- tinues through Corstorphine, Stirling, Kilsy th, Glasgow (in the Tolbooth there 1 to 5 Decem- ber, 1710), Stirling, Edinburgh, Barnes, Dun- dee, Montrose, Aberdeen (12 March to 16 May, 1711, including visits to Pitfichie and Inverurie), Gilybrans, Stonehive, Montrose,