Page:Notes and Queries - Series 12 - Volume 2.djvu/416

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NOTES AND QUERIES. [12 s. n. NOV. is, wie.

with a heavy moustache ; and in an Eng- lish colony I had a chokrah to look after "my personal comforts, but never heard the name " batman." Is it in ' Hobson- Jobson ' ? I,. L. K.

[Batman is in the ' N.E.1).,' the first quotation being from Wellington's dispatches in 1809.]

THE SIGHT OF SAVAGES. Is it a fact that in savages the sense of sight is exceptionally keen ? What accounts of the matter are the best to refer to ?

ALFRED S. E. ACKERMANN

THE NINTH WAVE. Is it still believed that the ninth wave is always the largest, and is there any scientific reason for the belief ? I have been told that it is referred to in Tennyson's ' Holy Grail ' and in Virgil's ' ^Eneid/ but cannot find the quotations. Will some reader kindly give me the exact references ? Apparently it is also in Ovid's ' Tristia,' Bk. I., but again I have failed to find it, though I well remember reading the statement in one of the well- known Latin authors.

ALFRED S. E. ACKERMANN.

[The allusion to the ninth wave in Tennyson occurs in ' The Coming of Arthur 'in Bellicent's story of the naked babe cast upon the shore by the ninth wave,

gathering half the deep And full of voices.

See also the discussion at 10 S. x. 445, 511 ; xi. 58. At the second reference DB, MAIDLOW supplied the lines in the ' Tristia, 1 I. Eleg ii. 49-50.]

PORDAGE, A PRIEST, 1685. On Jan. 27 and 28 in this year Evelyn heard this man sing, after dinner, at the houses of Lord Sunderland and of Lord Arundel of .Wardour. He was then " newly come from Rome," and Evelyn says : " Pordage is a priest, as Mr. Bernard Howard told me in private."

What was his Christian name, and what is known of him ? Was he one of Samuel Pordage's brothers ?

JOHN B. WAINEWRIGHT.

COLLA DA CHRIOCH. In Joyce's ' Irish Names of Places ' we are told that Colla da Chrioch was one of the three Collas (brothers) who in A.D. 332 conquered the King of Ulster, and formed a new kingdom called in later times " Uriel," comprising the modern counties of Armagh, Louth, and Monaghan. Joyce says the name " Colla- da-Chrioch " means in Irish Colla of the Two Territories, and that many noble families in Ireland and Scotland reckon their descent from him. Can any of your readers supply information on the following points I

1. The names and situation of the two territories which formed his surname.

2. Did he at any time reign as King of Uriel ?

3. When did he die, and where was he buried ?

4. When and how did his descendant MacUidhir become the possessor of the county Fermanagh ?

R. M. MAGUIRE. Bolckow Street, Middlesbrough.

CONSTABLE FAMILY. Can any reader kindly send me a pedigree of the Constable family of Essex ? John Maurice Constable, born in 1766-7, died at Wix in that county in 1843, his wife Mary having predeceased him in 1822. Their son, John Maurice, who died at an early age, is commemorated by a marble tablet in the ehurch at Wix ; and in the same churchyard is buried their daughter Mary, who married John Deane of Harwich in 1816. Probably these Constables are connected with John Constable, the artist, born in 1775, within a few miles of Wix. H. R. LINGWOOD.

15 Richmond Road, Ipswich.

BISHOP, PRIVATE SECRETARY TO GEORGE III. Can any reader supply, or suggest means of obtaining, the following particulars relating to a Private Secretary of George III. whose name was Bishop ? -

1. The date of his death.

2. Where he died.

3. His Christian name.

4. His birthplace.

5. The names of his father and mother, and where they resided.

6. Any information relating to his family.

H. L. H. B.

OPERAS PERFORMED IN THE PROVINCES. It was advertised in The Flying Post of Jan. 20/3, 1700 :

" On the 17th of January the Opera Dioclesian, was acted at Norwich, by Mr. Dogget's Company, the Duke of Norfolk's Servants, with great Ap- plause, being the first that ever was attempted out of London."

Is there any evidence to show that this claim was ill-founded ? A. F. R.

' SIR GAMMER VATJS.' I have for a long time been acquainted with fragments of an old nonsense story which goes under the above name. It is made up of all manner of absurdities, and to the best of my recollection opened like this : " T'other night, Saturday morning about four o'clock in the afternoon a little before sunrise," and goes on in the same strain of contradiction. Are any of