Page:Notes and Queries - Series 10 - Volume 7.djvu/630

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NOTES AND QUERIES, no s. VIL JUNE 29, 1907.

spirit of philology (as I conceive it), to reduce all our spelling to the particular canons of which he may happen tio approve. I trust that it will be long before President Roosevelt assumes the editorial chair !

Can any one imagine that the spelling rime, that we now see so frequently used by so many contributors to ' N. & Q.', is put there by themselves ! If I spell badly in the ordinary sense, the compositor or proof- reader will, I hope, soon put me straight ; but if I spell a word in the way in which it has commonly been spelt by the best writers and authors for well nigh upon 350 years, then I would respectfully ask that Mr. Editor should not correct it against my wish. It seems a pity that anything should tend to destroy that individuality which is so marked a feature amongst the contributors of, I suppose, the most original of all our journals. J. S. UDAL, F.S.A.

Antigua, W.I.

[Our correspondent's former protest was at 9 S. xii. 491. PROF. SKEAT had contributed at 9 S. i. 344 a long note advocating the spelling rime. See also 9 S. i. 404 ; iv. 20. As a matter of practical convenience, every newspaper spells any particular word in one way only. That way is decided by the editor, who is, or should be, a person of special competence, chosen for his ability to settle such matters. No editor can please everybody, but writers of most consequence are generally the first to recognize as expedient any alterations which proceed from the editorial department. They know that no one has the same opportunities as an editor of viewing the paper as a whole, and the separate and often conflicting opinions which make that whole. A paper without such a guiding hand and discretionary powers would soon become impossible. A benevolent despot is necessary. Our corre- spondent's communication shows it.]

" ULIDIA " (10 S. vii. 289, 356). The REV. G. T. JOHNSTON on 13 April asked for an explanation of " Ulidia." Two days later, by a strange coincidence, appeared my ' Submerged Cities,' in The Celtic Review (Edinburgh, Macleod), where the Ulidians' dispersion is mentioned in a fairly long quotation from Standish O'Grady's ' Silva Gadelica,' ii. 265 seqq. Here I do but resume rapidly :

" Eachaid, son of Mairid, had left a woman to watch the ' flap ' of a well ; the woman had not shut it one day, and ' the bramble bush water ' rose, drowning Eachaid and his children, except two, and the 'half-wit.' One child, Liban, ranged the sea for 300 years, with her (otter) lap-dog, until caught by Beoan, son of Innle, to whom Liban told her fortunes. ' This, then, was what most con- tributed to disperse the Ulidians throughout Ire- land, the eruption of Loch n Echach or Loch Neauh, namely.' " The above is from the ' Book of the Dun

(Cow),' a folio vellum MS. in the R.I, Academy, Dawson Street, Dublin, and the earliest non-ecclesiastical codex in Ireland,, being written by Maelmuire mac Conn na mbocht O'Ceilechar, murdered in 1106, by a gang of plunderers, in Clanmacnoise great church. In my ' Cities ' I refer to Verg.,. ' Georg.,' i. 404 ; ' Chris,' 538-41 ; Horn., ' Odyss.,' iv. 365, 385, &c. But MR. JOHNSTON should read not me, but O'Grady.

H. H. JOHNSON. Rennes University.

LANCELOT SHAKPE (10 S. vii. 424). There is a good notice of him in vol. iii. (col. 522), of Boase's ' Modern English Biography.' RALPH THOMAS.

NOTES ON BOOKS, &o.

Halduytus Posthumus ; or, Purcha* His Pilyrimes..

By Samuel Purchas, B.D. Vol. XX. (Glasgow,.

MacLehose & Sons.)

THE volume before us completes the work, and is in every way a satisfactory conclusion to a scheme conceived in the generous style we have now learnt to associate with Messrs. MacLehose. Natural anxiety had been felt concerning the index, a feature often committed to feeble hands, or even entirely neglected. In this case the index, pre- pared by Madame Marie Michon, occupies more than 270 pages, and has, so far as we have tested it,, fully answered our expectations. The whole is thus a worthy tribute to the spirited records of a time when England was every way great. When Messrs. MacLehose began to announce their Hak- luyt, there were some murmurs of opposition, as if such records of navigation should be accessible to a few only. However, the publishers received support from those who were able to view the scheme in a proper spirit, and they must by now be well assured of the success and deserved success of their venture. Their voyaging so far has been fair, and we look forward to further notable travels which the expert labours of printer and editor will' make easy for us.

The present volume contains the 'Voyage to Cadiz' (1596); the 'Voyage to the lies of Azores'

remarks concerning King James and his care for Virginia, Abundant material for comment is to hand in the pages dealing with these exploits. At the side of the page is a summary of its contents, which in its brief pungency reminds us of the similar additions to ' The Pilgrim's Progress.' It might be supposed that these mundane voyagers would have the brutal, danger-loving, triumphant tone which affects the plays of the period. But there is edification in these chroniclers. They turn aside to rebuke the wearers of fine clothes which are not suited to the climate and tend to vain dis- play. This passage is summarized as "Advice to Gallants," other brief side - notes being " Greedi-