Page:Notes and Queries - Series 10 - Volume 7.djvu/315

 10 S. VII. MARCH 30, 1907.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

Wood is, in fact, so expensive in these local- ities that the ordinary fuel throughout the country consists of dried oxdung.

When in Natal for a short visit I was informed that the reason the natives (at that time wearing the scantiest of clothing were so immune from snake bite, when traversing the dense tropical jungle in the south of the colony, was that they were far keener-sighted than Europeans, and that they always had their knobkerrie along with them in case of need.

As to what I said of the python in Bechu- analand devouring oxen, I should have mentioned that it was only hearsay ; but coming as it did to me on several occasions from transport riders, I had no cause to doubt its accuracy. A fact which may explain this better is to be found, perhaps in the size of the Mashona breed, which from the specimens I saw were decidedly smaller than either Highland or Kerry cattle, and certainly no larger than some of the well- grown antelopes that are known to fall victims to these formidable creatures.

N. W. HILL. Philadelphia.

"TAPING SHOOS" (10 S. vii. 206). MB. HEMS' s note must not be uncontradicted, for the sake of future readers. The parish church of St. Stephen at Treleigh, Corn- wall, is not of fifteenth - century date. The parish (which was not even a chapelry before) was formed in 1846 out of Redruth (London Gazette, 9 Jan., 1846). The founda- tion stone of this " fifteenth-century parish church " was laid in 1865, and the building consecrated 26 Sept., 1866. It contains no such chest or document as that referred to.

I may say that a cobbler in Redruth draws a distinction between " tapping " and ' ' soleing. ' ' The former means adding leather over the whole or part of the surface of a worn sole ; the latter, replacing the worn sole by a new one. YGREC.

I remember this expression as the ordinary term for getting shoes mended not as soleing only, but mending in all parts, perhaps more particularly " capping " the toe-end of shoes, most children wearing this portion down sooner than any other part. Mending bits on the soles and heels were often called " taps." There were heel-taps, toe-taps, sole-taps, and toe-caps.

THOS. RATCLIFFE.

Worksop.

I am personally indebted to MR. HEMS for enlightenment upon the word " tapper," which means, in the language of my particular

industry, " a laster." Bristol and Kings- wood are big shoe centres, and in the old days, prior to the invention of machine- sewn boots and shoes, the soles were

riveted " on with brass or iron nails or rivets : hence the " tapping." To a certain extent tapping " forms part of the necessary operations of " lasting " shoes to-day, when lasting is done by hand, and not by machinery.

M. L. R. BBESLAR. ^ In and about Neath, Glamorganshire

tapping, if not universally, is much more generally used than "soleing," except in the expression " soleing and heeling."

W. L.

NOTES ON BOOKS, &o.

The Poetical Work's of William Strode (1600-1645> < ow first collected from Manuscript and Printed' Sources. To which is added 'The Floating Island: a Tragi-Comedy,' now first reprinted Edited by Bertram Dobell. (Dobell.) FOR the first time William Strode takes the place to which he is entitled in the hierarchy of the English poets. Of him it cannot be said, as of Ihomas Traherne, that his editor is also his dis coyerer. To Mr. Dobell is due, if not proo of s . existence, at least his accessibility. Traces of his work are to be found in such repositories as- N. & Q. and The Gentleman's Mayazine, and his claim to literary recognition is accorded him not only by Anthony a Wood and in the ' Biographia Dramatica ' ot Baker, Reed, and Jones, buffi an established authority such as the 'Dictionary of National Biography/ where he receives a consider- able measure of space. Few as are at the present moment those to whom his work is known they are numerous indeed compared to what they would have been without Mr Dobell's republication Ihat Strode should be best known as a dramatist rather than as a lyrist is in the nature of things Apart from his academic distinction, the period of the appearance of 'The Floating Island' and the conditions under which it was avowedly written were such as to attract to it a large amount of public attention. Among the places in which references to it are found is not only FTeay's 'History of the Stage,' in which it is given am on* - University plays in English, but also the tentE volume of Genest's ' Some Account of the English Stage. Wherever it is mentioned, it is accompanied by the statement-also recorded, with something almost like a protest, by Mr. Dobell-that it is on the whole, though parts are well written, very dull The dramatis persona depose Prudentius, their lawftil king, and institute Fancy as their queen

1 \ h Wev r er ' as a lyrist that Strode is chiefly

loticeablc. His poems are mostly hidden in mis

cellames of the first half of the seventeeTith

century -'Wit Restored,' 'Musarum DeliciaT'

Parnassus Biceps,; and the like. From these, and

r ?i m JS* 1"$ lIa1 2P ns t he y have been assiduously

collected by Mr. Dobell, one of whose tasks has

)een judging of the value of their ascription to

>cle. l his is sometimes a serious matter, since, if