Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 1.djvu/163

 ii s. i. FEB. 19, i9io.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

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Scotch printing not found elsewhere. The didactic part is, as the author states in the preface, translated from a celebrated French writer ; this was La Caille, who, in 1869, published his ' Histoire de I'lmprimerie.' "

R. A. PEDDIE. St. Bride Foundation, B.C.

MICHAEL LIVINGSTON (10 S. xii. 490). Michael Livingston of Bantaskine was a kinsman and vassal of Alexander Livingston, Lord Almond, afterwards second Earl of Callendar, to whom M. L. addressed a long poem (1682) entitled ' Patronus Redux. 1 With reference to this poem the following extract is taken from ' The Livingstons of Callendar and their Principal Cadets,* a family history privately printed in 1888 :

" His initials M. L. are only on the title-page, but at the end of the poem are some lines addressed to ' Michael Livingston of P^ntasken upon the Panegyrick on the Earl of Callendar ' by \Villiam Scott, which identifies the author. He is pro- bably the same person as the Michael Livingston of Banteskine who together with one Robert Burn of Falkirk were defendants in an action brought against them by the Earl of Linlithgow in March, 1700. He is also probably the same Michael Livingston who presented a poem en- titled ' Albions Elegit,' &c., to the Duke of York in 1680."

In the same work, among a list of Living- ston documents then in the possession of the Marquis of Bute, is an " Instrument and Protestation by the Earl of Linlithgow and Callendar anent Livingston v. Burn (Michael Livingston of Banteskine v. Robert Burn of Falkirk), 7th and 8th March, 1700. n NOEL B. LIVINGSTON.

Kingston, Jamaica.

AUTHORS OF QUOTATIONS WANTED (US. i. 50, 113). It may be of interest to MB. DE VILLIERS to know that his quotation No. 1 is the first line of a distich used by the Paris printer Felix Balligaut in connexion with his printer's mark, of which a facsimile is aiven facing p. 101, of the Rev. W. Parr Greswell's ' Annals of Parisian Typography,' London, 1818, 8vo. This is reproduced from his ' Ludolphi Vita Christi, 1 printed at Paris, 1497. The lines referred to run as follows :

Felix i|iii-in t'jieiunt aliena pericula cautum i;-t r.'itunatu* felix diuesque beatus.

JOHN HODGKIN.

After giving various forms of the proverb " Tela praevisa minus nocent " (No. 4 among Mr. DE VILLIERS'S quotations), I have come on a passage where it is Nvordrd in what is virtually the same way. Gilbert us Cognatus Nozerenus ( = Gilbert

Cousin of Nozeray) in his ' Enarratiun- culse sivs Explanationes in aliquot Joannis Joviani Pontani Dialogos, ex Charonte,' writes in his notes on dial. viii. : "^Tela enim & mala prseuisa minus iiocent,"' p. 3679 (torn, iv.) of the Basel (1556) ed. of J. J. Pontanus's works. EDWARD BENSLY.

MRS. MAHON, THE " BIRD OF PARADISE " (10 S. ix. 170). No one as yet has been able to tell me the date of the death of this notorious lady, who was the daughter of James Tilson of Pallis, King's County, and Gertrude, Countess of Kerry, and was born 15 April, 1752. In all probability she died later than 1808. The death of her son (who was born 18 Jan., 1771) is thus referred to in Gent. Mag. of February, 1791, p. 186 :

" Lately at Tanjore, Mr. Tilson Malion, of the cavalry in the service of the East India Company, son of Mrs. Mahon and grandson of the late Countess -do wager of Kerry."

HORACE BLEACKLEY.

COWES, ISLE OF WIGHT (11 S. i. 88). I think it most unlikely that the name is Celtic. The ancient Cornish name " Caraclowse- in-Cowse n has nothing to do with it. This " Cowse " represents the Cornish cos, cuz, coys, which are explained in Williams's ' Cornish Dictionary l as being late spellings of Corn, coid, " a wood," which is the same word as Welsh coed, " a wood," and cognate with E. heath. We cannot connect a late Cornish form with ancient British. In a vast number of cases Celtic " origins " of English words and names are utter delusions.

I believe Cowes to be of English origin, though it can hardly be associated with a certain domestic quadruped. As we are not provided with old spellings, I can only give as a mere guess (to be proved or disproved) that it represents the A.-S. Cusan, gen. case of Cusa, a known personal nam?. If this is right, it means " Cusa's place.' 1 There are certainly cases in which a place-name is of this form. For example. Sextons in Beds merely means " Secres tain's place,'-'' as the Domesday Book spelling suggests ; " Secres - tain n being the old form of the word now spelt Sexton. As to the vowel-sound, the A.-S. cu is now cow.

WALTER W. SKEAT.

As a small contribution on the interesting question of the etymology of Cowes raised by Y. T., the following points may be noted. In Jenner's * Handbook of the Cornish Language,' p. 192, cos and coose (wood) are stated to bo used as part of compound place-names.