Page:Notes and Queries - Series 10 - Volume 7.djvu/627

 10 s. VIL JUNE 29, 1907.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

515

THE GREAT WHEEL AT EARL'S COURT (10 'S. vii. 406, 473). In the dimensions given of Ferris's Great Wheel at Chicago the diameter of the axle should, of course, read 33 inches, not 33 feet. HARRY HEMS.

COURT ROLL TERMS (10 S. vii. 249, 317). The confusion arising from the similarity of written t and c in old documents is notorious : " 1 dim. ligat. ferri " should doubtless be read : half a band, meaning, perhaps, half a bundle. One could not invoice half a shovel, though ligaculum is correctly denned. H. P. L.

I think the entry dim. ligac. ferri stands for " half a bundle of scrap iron." In Ducange ligacula= fasciculus. N. W. HILL.

Philadelphia.

" BREESE " IN ' HUDIBRAS ' (10 S. vii. 446). DR. SMYTHE PALMER says " obviously the gadfly (A.-S. brimsa)." May I point out that there is no such word as brimsa in Old English (or A.-S.) ? " Breeze " repre- sents O.E. briosa. ' N.E.D.' says that there appears to be no ground for supposing any connexion of " breeze " with the modern English "brimse," a word which is not found before the sixteenth century, and which is identical with Old Norse brims and German bremse (O.H.G. primisa).

A. L. MAYHEW.

The word " breese " could not have been obsolete in the time of Zachary Grey, for in an early edition of Dr. Johnson's dictionary (either the first or the second edition) I find " breese " defined as a gadfly, and derived from the Saxon. Amongst the examples given to explain the word is this very passage from ' Hudibras,' together with others from Shakspeare and Dryden. John- son has not given the following from Spenser: With that the rest the which the castle kept About him flockt, and hard at him did lay ; But he them all from him full lightly swept, As doth a steare, in heat of sommer's day, With his long taile the bryzes brush away. ' Faerie Queene,' Book VI. canto i. stanza 24.

E. YARDLEY.

"'AMEL OP UJDA " (10 S. vii. 325). The sense in which gnamal is used in the later Psalms, Job, and Proverbs is a product of the impress made on our language during the Persian period. Nowhere is that spirit so clear as in the Books of Chronicles. Originally the word meant " sin," and in the verbal form, " suffering." It is interesting to point out how the early Semites in fact, all Oriental races stood towards " labour." In their cosmogany " labour " was a lower

state of perfection than complete sloth : and those who had to work, such as slaves, were compelled to do so for having offended their particular deities.

M. L. R. BRESLAR.

"PICCANINNY": ITS ORIGIN (10 S. iv. 27, 128, 255, 317). The Athenceum of 30 March, in a review of the Baroness Suzette van Zuylen van Nyevelt's ' Court Life in the Dutch Republic, 1638-1689,' supplies a striking reference in the statement that

"to English readers the most interesting part of her story will be that which deals with the child- hood and early career of the great man who after- wards became William III. of England. Com- paratively little is known in this country of the boyhood of this piccaninny ' Picuineno ' was his mother's pet name for the future sovereign."

ALFRED F. ROBBINS.

CURTAIN LECTURES (10 S. vii. 226). An early use of these words occurs in Con- greve's * Double-Dealer,' Act II. sc. iv. :

" Lady Ply ant. Tis in vain to talk to you : but remember I have a cur tain -lecture for you, you disobedient, headstrong brute." The date of the play is 1693. T. M. W.

WADS WORTH AS A YORKSHIRE NAME (10 S. vii. 308). There is a village named Wadsworth, near Hebden Bridge, in York- shire, from which, I presume, the family bearing the name originally sprang.

C. C. B.

SCOTT'S 'BLACK DWARF' (10 S. vii. 168, 295). In the Tite Sale at Sotheby's, May, 1874,

" Lot 2693. Scott (Sir Walter), Tales of my Land- lord, Vol. I. (containing ' The Black Dwarf). The original manuscript in the author's autograph, red morocco extra, broad borders of gold," sold for 181. (Ellis & White).

The best summary of the prices obtained at the various sales of Scott's MSS. is con- tained in the Catalogue of the Scott Exhib- tion held at Edinburgh, 1871 (?). 'Book- Prices Current ' might be referred to with every probability of further information being obtained. ALECK ABRAHAMS.

39, Hillmartoii Road, N.

FIFTH-MONARCHY MEN (10 S. vii. 290, 334). Rugge's MS. Diary, 1659-72, vol. i. p. 256, gives

" the names of those who were hanged in London for the late rebellion by the fifth monarchy men : Thonias Venner [here follows a list of thirteen]. Their heads set upon the gate on London Bridge."

See also Reresby's ' Memoirs,' London, 1735, pp. 8, 9. R. S. B.