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NOTES AND QUERIES. [12 8 . HI. MARCH 3, 1917.

date, which of the volumes were written by the " few friends " ? Miss Cornwallis wrote Nos. 1, 4, 12, 17, 18, 19-22 ; No. 16 was written by David Power of Lincoln's Inn ; and No. 15, ' Thoughts and Opinions of a Statesman,' refers to Wilhelm von Hum- boldt. Who wrote the remainder ?

ARCHIBALD SPABKE.

" NOSEY PARKEB." This phrase is under- stood to mean an inquisitive person. " Nosey " is a term one has heard of before, but when and under what circumstances did " Parker " become associated with it ?

A. M.

ENGLISH COLLOQUIAL SIMILES. (See ante, pp. 28, 50.)

41. As mad as a weaver (1609). Is it known later, and why is the weaver taken as a type of madness ?

42. As mad as a hatter. Instance earlier than 1863 ?

43. As mad as May butter. Are there any references to (May) butter madness after the middle of eighteenth century ?

44. As mad as a tithe pig. Explanation ?

45. As crazy as loons (Thornton). Known in England ?

46. As crazy as a (Kalamazoo) bed-bug (Bartlett, Thornton). Explanation ? Used in England ?

47. As fond as a besom ; as drunk as a besom. Only North Country ? Why is a besom taken as a type of foolishness and drunkenness ?

48. As fond as a brush. Explanation ?

49. As fond as a cart (Yorkshire). Current elsewhere ? Is this applied to silly persons who have no will of their own, and, without thinking, follow anybody or anything that will drag them on, just as the cart follows the horse ?

50. As fond as a horn. Explanation ?

51. As knowing as Kate Mullet, and she was hanged for a fool (Wright, ' Rustic Speech '). Anything known about this person ?

52. As stupid as an owl. How old ?

53. As stupid as an ox (mentioned by an American writer). Is such a phrase known in England ?

54. As witty as a haddock (1520). Known later ?

55. As dull as a whetstone (Heath, 1650). What does this refer to ? "As blue as a whet- stone " is better known.

56. As dull as dun in the mire (Bay). What does " dun in the mire " refer to ? The game, or the log used in it, or any actual dun horse ?

57. As dull as a bachelor beaver (Bartlett). Known elsewhere ?

58. As dull as ditch-water. Known before 1800 ?

59. As melancholy as a new set-up school- master (Dekker). Known elsewhere ?

60. As melancholy as a mantle-tre (' N.E.D.,' 1606, twice). Other instances known ? Ex- planation ?

T. HlLDING SVARTENGREN. Vasters, Sweden.

(To "be continued.)

" TATTERING A KIP." What is the mean- ing of this expression, which will be found in chap. 20, paragraph 13, of Goldsmith's ' Vicar of Wakefield ' ? J. MAKEHAM.

[Under Kip sb. 3, slang, the 'N.E.D.' gives the first meaning (now obsolete) as "A house of ill- fame, a brothel," with this quotation from Gold- smith, and adds in brackets : "S. Baldwin. Note, Tattering a kip : we have never heard this expres- sion in England, but are told that it is frequent among the young men in Ireland. It signifies, beat- ing up the quarters of women of ill-fame."]

' THE MAYOR OF QUINBOROTTGH.' In Pepys's ' Diary,' under date June 16, 1666, appears this entry : " To Woolwich and Deptford, all the way down and up, reading of ' The Mayor of Quinborough,' a simple play."

About that time the harbour of Queen- borough was a station of the fleet engaged in the Dutch War. Is anything known of this play ? PERCY F. HOGG, Lieut. R.G.A.

Minster-in-Sheppey.

[By Thomas Middleton, printed in 1661. It will be found in vol. ii. of Havelock Ellis's edition of Middleton's best plays in the " Mermaid Series " (Fisher Unwin).]

THE CAPITAL CITY OF THE U.S.A. How long was New York the capital city of the United States of America, and when, and for what reason, did it cease to remain so ? J. LANDFEAR LUCAS.

Glendora, Hindhead, Surrey.

BULL-FIGHTING IN SPAIN AND PORTUGAL.

(12 S. ii. 447; iii. 15.)

IN Wilkinson's ' Manners and Customs of the Ancient Egyptians ' it is shown that combats of men and bulls were known to the Pharaohs " of the earliest period." He gives four drawings proving this, taken from tombs at Thebes and Beni Hassan. In Spain the bull-fight is often associated with the games and sacrifices of pagans. During a plague in Rome under Adrian VI. Demetrius, a Greek, killed a bull in the Colosseum, and, the malady chancing to cease, the people gave credit to the pagan panacea. In the ancient taurobolia, the priest was placed in an excavation beneath a grating on which a bull was killed, whose blood dropping or raining on him washed away the sins of the people. The bull- fighters of Spain are pre-eminently super- stitious. They spring, like our prize- fighters, from the common people. Their