Page:Notes and Queries - Series 12 - Volume 9.djvu/292

 238 NOTES AND QUERIES. ri2s.tx.SBPr. 17, 1921. argutus as epithet of a bard) and their framo grew attenuated, were thus undergoing trans- formation into swans. Hence the soul of Orpheus (Plato, Republic x. 620A), in passing into a new existence, is said to have chosen the life and form of a swan. The earliest trace of the associa- tion of the Song of the Swan with the season of death, is found in the Orphic or Pythagorean Aeschylus, where he speaks of the prophetess Cassandra as having sung her own funeral song. (Agamemnon, 1444.) After pointing out that, with the exception of Aristotle (Hist. An. ix. 13, 2), " the majo- rity of ancient authorities is against the reality of the death-song of the Swan," Geddes observes that among the Naturalists of modern times, while there is considerable dubiety as to the death- song [Oken and Erman are cited for the clear notes of the wounded swan], there is abundant evidence as to the musical power of the Wild Swan (Cycnus Musicus), which in our time chiefly inhabits the more solitary parts of the northern latitudes of the temperate zone. Accounts of this bird from ancient travel- lers probably countenanced, he thinks, the belief of the latent music in the swan. EDWARD BENSLY. TBEWTHE FAMILY (12 S. ix. 170, 215). I think Trethewey is intended ; a family of this name anciently resided at Treneague, in the parish of St. Stephen -in-Brannel, Cornwall. John Trethewey was living in the county before the time of Henry V., and his grandson Thomas was M.P. for the county in 1467. Arms : Vert a chevron between three goats argent. Trethewey is still a common name in the neighbourhood. T. R. LANJETH. St. Austen. PETTY FRANCE (12 S. viii. 407. 452, 477 ; ix. 95, 197). In the coloured plan which I think is a scarce one- issued by Kitchen and Parker in 1771, called ' An Improved Plan of the Cities of London and Westminster, and Borough of South- wark,' the street marked as Petty France begins in the west at a point opposite to the angle formed by James Street and Cattle Lane, and ends east at Broad Way. HERBERT SOUTHAM. THE INGOLDSBY LEGENDS' (12 S. viii. 392, 434, 473; ix. 97, 158). Von Morrison is, of course, the German counterpart of the British inventor of Morrison's pills to whom some grateful consumers of his pills have erected a monument in the Euston Road, London. L. L. K. " A BOLD PEASANTRY, THEIR COUNTRY'S PRIDE" (12 S. ix. 189). There are two things to be said about this query, or note. The first, which will not be news to most of the readers of ' N. & Q.,' is that the four lines, quoted correctly (except for " may '* instead of " can " in line 2), by Bewick, and of which the first, with the substitution of ' Then ' for ' But,' is adopted by Sala in his burlesque, were from Goldsmith's ' Deserted Village ' (Works, ed. P. Cunning- ham, 1854, i. 41). The other is that" lift " is hardly the term to apply to the use of a familiar phrase or hackneyed quotation by a parodist or jocose writer. It is one of his usual tricks, and enhances the pleasure or amusement of the reader when he re- members the original and probably more serious use of the words. JOHN R. MAGRATH. It is very unlikely this was a coincidence : the MS. may have given the line as a quo- tation. Anent ' Wat Tyler, M.P.,' it had an extremely short run at the Gaiety Theatre. Sala himself admitted that his only effort at burlesque-writing was a failure. CECIL CLARKE. Junior Athenaenum Club. SCHOOL MAGAZINES (12 S. viii. 325 ; ix. 54, 96, 175,217). The Red TasselJournal, 1873- 76, was merged into The Leamingtonian in after years. I still have the sixpenny numbers for which I subscribed as they came out at spasmodic intervals during the eighties. As the College possessed no coat of arms it adopted the Worcester diocesan arms, and an engraving thereof appeared over the title. Like most school journals it suffered from continuous change of editorship. The feature that varied least, perhaps, was the usual apology for delay. Some of its early editors have since achieved distinction in their professional careers. W. JAGGARD, Capt. BABYLONIAN ASTRONOMY (12 S. ix. 109). Some information on this subject, princi- pally in its astrological relations, will be found in Jastrow's ' The Civilization of Baby- lonia and Assyria,' published in 1915 by the J. B. Lippincott Company. If your corre- spondent reads German, it will be worth while to consult ' Die Kosmologie der Baby- lonier,' by Jensen (Leipzig, 1891), a work which is probably in the British Museum. HENRY LEFFMANN.