Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 1.djvu/236

 NOTES AND QUERIES. tn s. i. MAR. 19, 1910.

It was recently announced in the press that Canon Greenwell's collections had been presented to the nation. Where are they now ? and has a catalogue of them been printed ? Details will oblige.

T. CANN HUGHES, M.A., F.S.A. Lancaster.

SCOTT-CHRISTIE DUEL. Can any one tell me where I can find the full particulars of the duel between Mr. John Scott and Jonathan Christie (who took the place of Lockhart), from the result of which Mr. Scott died, about 1821 ?

JOHN LANGLEY.

HAVERING MANOR, 1389. Hanging on the pedestal in the Museum of the Public Record Office is a letter (No. 5) from King Richard II. to -the Chancellor. The letter is dated at Havering Manor, under the signet of the Queen in the absence of the King's own signet, .15 Nov., 1389. The manor of that name with which I am acquainted is " Havering,' ? sometimes called " Haverings Holy," and sometimes called ' ' a moiety of the manor of Stopsley " in Luton, Beds.

The manor of Havering was held by the Havering family, of the royal manor of Luton. The last of the Haverings who held it was Richard de Havering, who in 1348 received a Charter of Free Warren in his demesne of Stopsley (vide 'Viet. Hist. Beds,' vol. ii. p. 350). Some time between the years 1348 and 1402 the manor passed to William Butler. There was a con- siderable mansion at Havering, standing about half a mile beyond Nether Crawley in Litton, the ancient seat of the Crawleys. In 1568 the manor was purchased by John Crawley, ancestor of Mr. Francis Crawley of Stockwood, Luton, in whose possession it is at the present time. The house was pulled down in the eighteenth century.

There is one other place, and I believe only one, of a similar name, ' ' Havering- atte-Bower " in Essex. Can any one tell me which of these places was the " Havering Manor n whence the Queen dated her letter of 15 Nov., 1389 ? WILLIAM AUSTIN.

Rye Hill, Luton.

THE BURNING OF Moscow. Count Tolstoi in his ' War and Peace ? utterly discredits the story that Moscow was set on fire designedly by the Russians. He has also, I believe, produced elsewhere overwhelming proof of his contention in the shape of letters from Rostopchin and others denying any com-

plicity on the part of the Russian authorities. Where are these to be seen ? I can find no allusion to them in the complete edition (24 vols.) of Tolstoi's works translated into- English. PERTINAX.

" SASTRUGI " IN SNOW. The above word, meaning wind furrows, is of constant occur- rence in Sir E. Shackleton's ' Heart of the Antarctic.' Of what tongue is it, and what is its etymon ?

The author once gives sastrugus as an apparent singular. H. P. L.

" DERRY " AND " DOWN." - Under ' Derry ' the ' N.E.D.* says " a meaningless word in the refrains of popular songs. n Under * Down,' vi. 26, we read " used in ballad refrains without appreciable mean- ing.' 1 In E. David's ' Etudes historiques sur la Poesie et la Musique dans la Cambrie,' Paris, 1884, p. 173, occurs the following passage :

" Au dire des harpistes gallois, cette melodie [i.e., the well-known Welsh air ' Hob y deri dan- do '], qui est v entablement tres vieille, renion- terait au temps des druides. On comprend ce qu'une telle supposition a d'outre" et d'impossible. Selon eux, cet air serait celui d'un chant druidique dont se servaient les bardes et les ovates, pour appeler le peuple a leurs assemblies religieuses dans les forets. Hai down ir deri danno signifie : ' Viens, courons au bosquet de chene ' : mais Hob y derri danno veut dire lite"ralement : ' Le pore sous les chenes.' J'ai deja dit qu'autrefois le pore 6tait 1'embleme du peuple kymro. II est probable que le vieux refrain anglais Hie down derry down provient de la meme source."

I do not know of what " harpistes gal- lois " David was thinking, but one of them may be Edw. Jones, who in his ' Musical and Poetical Relicks of the Welsh Bards, ? 2nd ed., London, 1794, p. 128, writes :

" There is another very ancient Tune that bears a similar name to the above ; a Rhapsody of it, as formerly used with the cowydd Pedwar, concludes each stanza as follows :

Nawdd Mair a nawdd y gr6g

Hai down ir deri danno. The Protection of Mary and protection of the

Cross ; Come let us hasten to the Oaken-Grove.

Which is the burden of an old song of the Druids, sung by the Bards and Vades, to call the people to their religious assemblies in the Groves."

He then goes on to quote " Hie down, down derry down."

I should like to know whether philologists attach any importance to this suggested etymology of down and derry. Any mention of Druids in connexion with Wales should put us on our guard, and of course the talk