Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 12.djvu/195

 ii s. xii. SEPT. 4, 1915.3 NOTES AND QUERIES. 187

Comet is that at its nearest approach to the earth it spread right across the sky, and, before the end of the tail had set on one side of the horizon, the head reappeared on the other side. Maturely considered, this seems to me impossible, but it is what I distinctly remember ; so give it for what it is worth as a very small child's impression. My ma- ternal grandmother could not be roused to -enthusiasm for Donati's Comet : she thought it a second-rate affair in comparison with one she remembered in her youth, which, when she was at the top of Southwold Hill, he could distinctly hear fizzing ! Reverting to this statement some years later, I ques- tioned its accuracy ; she, however, adhered to it, with an assurance that she couldn't be mistaken, as she was then a big girl of

14. E. RlMBATJLT DlBDIN.

64, Huskisson Street, Liverpool,

An engraving of the comet referred to by MB. PENRY LEWIS appeared in The Graphic of 14 Oct., 1882. It was produced from a sketch made by an officer of the P. and O. steamer Assam, on 26 Sept., at 5.5 A.M. an the Mediterranean. In describing the comet the sender of the sketch said :

" The nucleus was of a pale yellowish colour, and equal in brightness to Sirius. The south edge of the tail was very clearly denned with a .slight curve upwards. The upper or northern edge was straight, but not so clearly denned. It was illuminated by a misty reflected light. The whole of the tail faded gradually towards the end."

The sketch was made in lat. 37 36' N., long. 9 14' E. JOHN T. PAGE.

AUTHORS OF FRENCH QUOTATIONS WANTED {\\ S. xii. 68). 2. " Qu'est-ce qu'une grande vie ? C'est un reve de jeunesse realise dans Tage mur." A few days after the death of Alfred de Vigny (17 Sept., 1863), his friend Louis Ratisbonne wrote an article on him in the Journal des Debats (4 Oct. ) which ended thus :

" II est tine de ces pense"es de toi, 6 mon cher >u litre, que je veux recueillir au moment ou je iii'- penche sur ta mmoire. Elle est poe"tique, r'< herche'e dans son tour, mais exquise : je 1'aime parcequ'elle te ressemble. " Qu'est-ce qu'une ur.-iude vie? C'est un reve de jeunesse re'alise' <lans 1'age mur.' Ces beaux reves de jeunesse, lu Ics as faits, 6 mon cher maitre ; ton age miir Incorruptible les a r^alisds."

5. " Je ne suis pas la rose, mais j'ai vecu pres d'elle." Sadi, the Persian poet, in one of his songs represents a lump of clay accounting for the perfume still clinging to it by the fact of its having lain among some fallen petals at the foot of a rose-tree.

DE V. PAYEN-PAYNE.

FOLK-SPEECH (WORCESTERSHIRE) : " PLAIN " (11 S. xii. 137). The word "plain "was much in use in Ulster some fifty years ago, and is probably still to be heard on the lips of country-folk. I can recall how little such a description delighted us as children used to. the kindly flattery of the poor folk around us when we met them on our daily walks.

Meeting a civil tenant from a bogland farm, we were somewhat affronted to hear her remark rapturously to our nurse, after we had " behaved like quality," as that nurse required of us : " Fegs ! and ar'nt the wee ladies plain." Our nurse's reply equally enthusiastic was just as little pleasing to us : " And so are their father and their mother plain ! God be good to them ! "

Later we learnt that " plain "meaning kindly, friendly, and pleasant was used in contrast to "proud," a word which only referred in Ulster folk-speech to a haughty demeanour or an air of conceit.

A " plain " chairman of guardians, clergy- man, or magistrate was loved and trusted by the poor with a warmth of gratitude that was not without some suggestion of pathos.

I wonder if " pride " means, in any other place now, the same thing as it then did to the Ulsterman. It is thus used by at least one famous Irishman in poetry, for Gold- smith speaks of the Briton with Pride in his port, Defiance in his eye ; and there are Biblical phrases where we see its old use.

There was no redeeming feature about pride in old Ulster. It was merely a vice, and that any "proper" form of it could exist did not enter into the ideas of the peasantry of those days. Y. T.

The word "plain" is always used in Essex in the same sense as in Worcestershire, among natives of the Eastern Counties. To be "plain" does not imply clearness of utterance, or unloveliness of feature, but the moral and social qualities of kindliness and courtesy, with an utter absence of what schoolboys call " side on." A " plain " person's manners are always simple and refined, alike in hall or cottage, and set every one at his ease. It is a high compl 1 ' ment if it can be said of any person, man 0** woman, that he or she is " wonnerf ul plain.' 1

Bayue, Essex. E ' VAUOHAN.

It is probable that MR. STAPLETON MAR- TIN'S gardener knew the significance of "plain" better than he did that of the words by which he tried to define it. It