Page:Notes and Queries - Series 12 - Volume 3.djvu/83

 128. iii. JAX. 27, WIT.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

77

There is also a brass plate to a Timbrell Little in Bath Abbey. One, if not two of Sophia's brothers were surgeons in the army, and another went to Jamaica, so that later Sophia's daughter claimed a Judge Timbrell of Jamaica as her cousin. My informant remembers seeing a Timbrell at Birmingham in her youth. These indications may enable your correspondent to pursue his inquiries.

lj. L. J.v.

FOLK-TALE : THE KING AND THE FALCON (12 S. iii. 29). From the short analysis given by EMERITUS this tale seems to be the one with the same title contained in the ' Anvari- Suhayli ' or ' Lights of Canopus ' a Persian rendering of the ' Fables of Bidpa'i,' com- posed by Husain Vaiz. A somewhat longer analysis of it is in Clouston's ' Popular Tales and Fictions,' vol. ii. p. 177, n. 1. It is, of course, a variation of the extremely widely diffused tale of ' Canis * in the ' Seven Wise Masters,' the source whence the story of ' Llewellyn and his Dog Gellert ' is derived. For this see Clouston, op. cit., vol. ii. pp. 166- 186.

A very full bibliography of the tale and its analogues, &c., will be found in ' The Seven Sages of Rome,' edited.. by K. Campbell, New York, &c., 1907, pp. Ixxviii to Ixxxii.

A. COLLINGWOOD LEE. Waltham Abbey, Essex.

The folk-tale, of which ' The King and the Falcon ' is a variant, is widely spread among the nations of both East and West. The Welsh legend of Llewellyn and Gelert and the Indian story of the Devotee and the Mangus are examples. The most ornate ancient form of ' The King and the Falcon ' is to be found in the ' Anwar-i-Suhaili ' ( = ' Lights of Canopus'), by Husain Waiz, an elegantly diffuse Persian rendering of the Sanskrit ' Hitopadesa,' commonly called the ' Fables of Pilpay or Bj'dpaf.' An excellent 'literal translation of the ' Anwar-i-Suhaili ' is that by the late Mr. Eastwick. The present writer included a metrical version of the Persian story in a little book published in 1873, called ' Eastern Legends and Stories.' N. POWLETT, Col.

PRONUNCIATION OF " EA " (12 S. ii. 530 5 iii. 58). I am afraid, being a foreigner, of being accused of carrying coals to Newcastle, but I noticed with interest, some time ago, that at the end of the fourteenth centruy the word " dear " seemed to have been pronounced exactly as " der " in "Derby." The unknown author of the so-called 'prophecy (?) of John of Bridlington, having

to translate the latter name into Latin, uses " carus " for the first syllable: "per ex- positionem istorum nominum carus vicus signatur illud nomen Derby."

The well-known Scandinavian suffix " by " is, of course, translated by vicus, which means village or portion of a village.

In the same way as Derby, Herthford is translated by terra vada. If terra, earth, is good for Herth, it may be a proof that the dropping of the h at the beginning of words is not at all a new fancy. It existed, at least among prophets, in the fourteenth century. (But this error is not peculiar to that epoch, for bad spelling and worse pronunciation have characterized not a few of the modern soothsayers whose acquaint- ance I have had the pleasure of making.) PIERRE TURPIN.

A NAVAL RELIC OF CHARLES I. (12 S. ii. 487 ; iii. 36). I am indebted to your correspondent for his interesting reply to my query. The gun he mentions as being in the Rotunda at Woolwich is, without doubt, the same as used to be on the Parade in St. James's Park. John Brown (or Browne) was the " King's gun-founder," and the guns for the Sovereign of the Seas were cast at his new foundry at Brenchley, Kent. The size of the gun in the Rotunda (9 feet) corresponds with those on the half-deck and in the forecastle of the Sovereign of the Seas. They were known as demi-culverin drakes. The weight of each of them, according to Mr. Oppenheim, was 20 cwt. (' Administration of the Royal Navy,' p. 262). G. E. MANWARING.

ENGLISH COLLOQUIAL SIMILES (12 S. iii. 27,50). 18. Chaucer's " As lechorous as is a sparwe " is a simile known to Latin authors. In the ' Priapeia,' xxv., we have : " Uernis passeribus salaciores," upon which passage Scioppius notes :

" Omniauerno temporein Uenerem sunt proniora, maxime uero omnium passeres. Cum Ingolstadii agerem, uidi e regione musaei mei passerem coitum uieies repetentem et inde adeo ad languorem datum, ut auolaturus in terram decideret."

Martial, i. 110, ' De Catella Publii,' writes : " Issa est passere nequior Catulli." " Ne- quior " = " lasciuior."

MONTAGUE SUMMERS, F.R.S.L.

6. "As bad as Jeffries." Debate on the Frame-work Bill in the House of Lords, Feb. 27, 1812, by Lord Byron : " Twelve Butchers for a Jury, and a Jeffries for a Judge " (v. p. 556 of Lake's ' Life of Byron ').

Castle Eden. A - K