Page:Notes and Queries - Series 2 - Volume 1.djvu/527

 2 od S. N' 1 2G., JUNE 28. '56.]

NOTES AND QUERIES.

519

In attempting to quell the riots it is recorded that one woman was killed, but I find no mention made of any females being left for execution.

W. W.

Malta.

Coal Pits of Durham and Northumberland (2 nd S. i. 293.) An inquiry as to the duration of this coal-field is one of no small interest. Dr. Thomp- son calculates that it may fairly be expected to yield coal for 1000 years, at the annual consump- tion of 2,000,000 chaldrons ; but as we have no data by which to discover how much coal has already been consumed, we cannot tell how much of these 1000 years has already elapsed. Besides this, Dr. Thompson has taken the average annual consumption much too low for the present time. It appears that in this calculation, the area of the coal-field is very much under-estimated, being taken at 180 square miles. Professor Buckland, in his examination before the House of Commons, limits the period of supply to about 400 years. Mr. Bailey, in his Survey of Durham, states the period for the exhaustion of the coal to be about 200 years. Some proprietors of the coal-mines, when examined before the House of Commons, extended the period of exhaustion to 1727 years. They assumed that there are 837 square miles of coal strata in this field, and that only 105 miles had been worked out. WILLIAM BLOOD.

Dublin.

Derivation of the word " Cash" (1 st S. ix. 66.) There can be but little doubt, that the word cash is derived from the Italian cassa, the chest in which Italian merchants kept their money, as do at the present time the Spaniards in their co/a, the Portuguese in their caxa, and the French in their came.

The application of the word cash to money is altogether English, it not having a corresponding term in any other European language.

Cash having been so inconsiderately adopted instead of cassa (chest), entries in the cash-book (it should be chest-book) are made in English counting-houses in this unmeaning way, "Cash D r " and "Cash C r ;" whereas the chest, and not the money, is D r for what is put into it ; and C r for what is taken out.

Great mischief has too often arisen, as is well known in bankrupt courts, from the misuse of the word cash, in which large deficiencies often ap- pear ; and which would not be the case, if the word chest were used as it ought to be. Instead of the cash account in the Ledger, it should be chest account ; but we have yet much to learn in England regarding mercantile book-keeping.

J. B.

Approach of Vessels (2 nd S. i. 418.) Under this heading J. O. speaks of the well-known story

of the English ships being seen by the look-out- man at the Mauritius, as if it were a peculiar gift of sight accorded to that individual. The circum- stance has been often brought forward by lec- turers upon optics ; and I have heard them re- peatedly describe it as an instance of mirage, depending, not upon the peculiar power of the eye, but upon the state of the atmosphere : so that any person in the particular position of the beholder, at that moment, might have seen the refracted objects. I know that some persons have a peculiar extent of vision ; but that has nothing to do with mirage, or seeing the refracted shadows in the air, of objects actually far out of sight. During a seven years' service afloat, at the end of the old war, I repeatedly saw objects from the deck, and reported them, when not another officer in the ship, nor even the man at the mast- head, could get sight of them for a considerable time. It may serve to correct a popular error, as to a far-seeing eye not being lasting, to state that, being now mid-way between sixty and seventy, I retain my long sight to an extraordinary degree.

W. B. C.

Door Inscriptions (2 nd S. i. 481.) The follow- ing inscriptions were common in Queen Elizabeth's reign :

" Would'st have a friend, would'st know what friend is

best, Have God thy friend, which passeth all the rest."

" What better fare, than well content agreeing with thy

wealth,

What better guest than trusty friend in sickness and in health."

Shakspeare's England, ii. 2C8.

At Auchinleck :

" Quod petis, hie est, Est Ulubris : animus si te non deficit aequus."

Hor. 1 Ep. 11. 30.

Over the entrance of the railway station at Rome, with which a Mr. York is connected :

" Qui dove sono era g\h oscuro Teneno, Ora qui sorgo spettacolo amirando, L' esser mio fu vostro volere O York and Co."

MACKENZIE WALCOTT, M.A.

Cheap Literature (2 nd S. i. 451.) As another mode of dealing in printed books, I was amused a few years since by a man, in the square of the Palazzo Vecchio at Florence, who offered to the passenger a selection from a large stock at one paul (5d.) the Roman pound weight. He stood with his scales in his hand, and, by his impressive looks, was very anxious to do business. Having been a little hurried at the moment, I did not examine the collection ; but could see, from the general appearance of the books, that they were the remnants of some old private library, and