Page:Notes and Queries - Series 10 - Volume 5.djvu/167

 io* s. v. FEB. 17, 1900.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

135

particuia or particulus. That mistaken belief is apparently held by the calendarei of the Charter Rolls (1903). Finding the wore jriijktle in abstracts of documents of 1238 anc 1239 in the ' Calendar ' (233, 246), I looked up the originals, and found in the first case 4J cum particulo prati qui iacet ex austral parte eiusdem molendini," and in the second "particuli prati." A reference to the how small an area tho word is now used, although formerly common from Lancashire and Yorkshire southwards. The Rev. Andrew Clark tells me that in the part o1 Essex that he knows a piyhtle is (a) a smal" (b) enclosed (c) pasture (d} close to a house and universally called pikle.
 * English Dialect Dictionary ' will show in

ROBERT J. WHITWELL. Oxford.

iv. 204, 332, 512; v. 35, 92). I am sorry to prolong this correspondence, but I really must protest against the foolish piece ol " popular etymology " quoted at the last reference from Keane's * Boer States.' The initial sound of sjambok varies in differenl Dutch dialects one meets with at least three forms, sjambok, tjambok, sambokbnt the final k is never absent, so it cannot possibly be evolved from samba. Its real history is perfectly well known. The three Dutch spellings given above correspond almost exactly with the Malayan tjapuk, Javanese sambuk, &c., and these Mai ay o- Javanese equivalents do not mean "buffalo," but have the same sense as their Dutch derivatives, i.e., * whip." How can one doubt ? I need only add that the Malayo- Javanese etymology is that which has received the hall-mark of Prof. Skeat's approval. JAS. PLATT, Jun.
 * SJAMBOK": ITS PRONUNCIATION (10 th S

"JAMES" UNIVERSITY (10 th S. v. 47, 92). Another claimant to this designation might be "King James's College at Chelsey," of which there is a long account, with an illus- tration, in Faulkner's * History of Chelsea,' ed. 1829, ii. 218-34, This institution was projected by Dr. Matthew Sutcliffe, Dean of Exeter (of whom there is a memoir in 'D.N.B.'), in the early part of the reign of King James I., and was intended as a College for the study of polemical divinity. The King laid the first stone of the edifice 8 May, 1609, and the charter of incorporation was gran ted ^on the same day in the following year. Notwithstanding royal and episcopal patronage, it did not prove a success, and it gradually died of inanition. In 1676 the building was granted to the Royal Society,

which never made use of it ; and five years later it was again transferred to the Crown, and the Royal Hospital was partially erected on the site. W. F. PRIDEAUX.

WILLIAM BLAKE AND S. T. COLERIDGE (10 th S. v. 89). MR. DOBELL will find in an interesting letter to Miss Wordsworth, printed in H. Crabb Robinson's 'Diary' (vol. ii. p. 325), a statement by the diarist that " Coleridge has visited Blake, and I am told talks finely about him."

Not having read the article to which reference is made, I may be thought hazardous in risking an opinion as to its authorship ; but as Crabb Robinson was intimately connected with University College, and had previously in 1810 -written a paper on Blake for a German magazine, it is just possible that the article in question, in The London University Magazine, may have been contributed by him. S. BUTTERWORTH.

HAIR- POWDERING CLOSETS (10 th S. iv. 349, 417, 453 ; v. 57, 95). The replies kindly made to my query have not, except in one in- stance, touched the arrangement attributed to the closet in Kew Palace. The closets said by correspondents to have been used for powdering appear to have been simply dress- ing-rooms such as at the present day accom- pany bedrooms in houses of even moderate capacity ; or perhaps the old closets referred to were peculiar only in their diminutive- ness. It is not shown that there was any method of powdering the hair while at the same time the dress was protected from the powder, excepting the arrangement described at the second reference, where the head was thrust out between curtains, behind which was placed the subject of the toilet.

At Kew, however, it is told that a small sash-window set in a solid partition was used, the operator at one side, the operated on at the other, the head, or rather the neck, being laid on the sill (the height convenient) in the manner suggestive of the guillotine. The efficacy or comfort of such an arrangement appearing very doubtful, small credit can be $iven to the reputed use of the little window, ts probable purpose being simply to trans- mit borrowed light to the closet, the tra- ditional service of which is fully creditable.

W. L. RUTTON.

An inventory, made in 1790, of the man- ion at Benhall, Suffolk, mentions the "ladies' aowdering room." Edward Duke, the first 3aronet of his house, built this seat, called Benhall Lodge, in 1638. It passed succes- ively to the Tyrells and the Rushes, and