Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 4.djvu/102

96 NOTES AND QUERIES. [n s. iv. JULY 29, 1911. Columbine" (needless to say, in long skirts). Nevertheless this pantomime has escaped enumeration by all the writers who have compiled lists of plays.

(11 S. iv. 29.)—I think the following are the words of the song asked for by D. K. T. They are as sung by a late brother-officer nearly 40 years ago:—

(11 S. iv. 28).—Agaso is the Latin for a groom, found in Livy, Persius, and Horace. Buggy' is the nearest a groom can get to biga" is the meaning of 's quotation.

Agasonic is formed from the Latin agāso, groom, ostler, muleteer, and in itself would not seem to be any more "weird" than "thrasonical." The Latin word appears to have left no representative in Romance languages with the possible exception of the Sardinian basone, cited in a note of Meyer-Lübke's in the 'Thesaurus Linguæ Latinse,' s.v. agāso.

(11 S. iii. 487; iv. 35).—I note that states that Palgrave renders this as "Hurry," and asks where is the place. 'Cassell's Gazetteer,' 1896, gives "Hurry, hamlet, parish of Ronaldkirk, North Riding of Yorks, 6½ miles N.W. of Barnard Castle."

(11 S. iii. 449; iv. 13).—The following lines from 'The Ingoldsby Legends' apparently indicate the pronunciation of this now unfamiliar word:—

F. A. W.

(11 S. iii, 486; iv. 30, 75).—I should like to refer those as interested as myself in this mysterious bird to a charming book on the subject by Dr. Japp (London, Burleigh), which gives more information as to the habits of the bird than I have been able to obtain elsewhere. From this it appears that the female is polygamous, and is generally attended by six "cavaliers." The male bird only cries "cuckoo"; the female emits a curious bubbling or gurgling sound, generally from a thicket when about to lay an egg.

In conclusion, may I ask if any readers of 'N. & Q.' have ever heard its familiar note out of Europe?

I should like to add my testimony to that of. At the end of last April I was crossing an open field between Winchmore Hill and Edmonton (Middlesex) and heard a cuckoo in the immediate neighbourhood. Directly afterwards a pair of these birds flew overhead, one only uttering the call three times, in quick succession, a short pause following. The "cuckoo"-ing continued in this way until the birds were out of sight and hearing.

(11 S. iii. 465; iv. 31).— will find the legend of the cuckoo being released annually at Heathfield in Sussex recorded in 'Highways and Byways in Sussex,' by Mr. E. V. Lucas; in the same author's preface to 'Heathfield Memorials,' 1910 (A. L. Humphreys), and in the body of that work; and in the Sussex Archæological Collections, vol. xiii. p. 210. It is also the subject of a poem by Mr. Rudyard Kipling