Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 1.djvu/299

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S. I. APRIL 9, '98.]

NOTES AND QUERIES.

291

vidence or probability. Even if it had done o, the meaning would not be, as G. T. says 3 is, conclusively indicated, the parish of the ! )ale. Dalmakerran or, as it is now written Dalquharran is good Gaelic for the lane ortion of St. Ciaran (dot mo Chiarain), just is Kilkerran, Sir James Fergusson's mansion n the parish of Dailly, represents cill Jiarain, the cell or chapel of Ciaran. The Gaelic dal, though etymologically the same as the Norse dalr and our " dale," nevei ignifies a dale or valley. The sense o: eparation sharing out which the Norse nan applied to a dale, as separated from th( urrounding land by hills, caused the Gae o apply it to a separate portion of lane appropriated to an individual or family i,ven so we, retaining the sense of share or eparation, talk of a "deal " at cards, a great deal " i. e., share, and even of " deal," a plank, i.e., the separation of a trunk into planks (Skeat's 'Dictionary'). G. T. may rest assured that Dailly and Dalmakerran (or Dalquharran) are two entirely distinct names. HERBERT MAXWELL.

THE GLACIAL EPOCH AND THE EARTH'S ROTATION (8 th S. xii. 429, 494). MR. LYNN'S letter (it cannot be called an answer to mine) on the above subject is patronizing, but it does not help me in my difficulty. Major- General Drayson has thrown down a distinct challenge, which no astronomer that I have seen has taken up. Why 3 Even the wild theories of the earth flatteners have been met with argument. Even the supporters of the Baconian authorship of Shakspere's works have been thought worthy of being reasoned with. As to your correspondent's sneer about my knowledge being derived solely from some popular book, I can assure him that I have as great a contempt for popular works on astronomy and other sub- jects as he himself can have. My statement about the Astronomer Eoyal is supported by his own words, 14 Oct., 1846, when he says m a letter to Leverrier, "You are to be recognized without doubt as the real pre- dicter of the planet's place."

C. R. HAINES. Uppingham.

LORD RANCLIFFE (9 th S. i. 248). George Augustus Henry Anne Parkyns, born on 10 June, 1785, succeeded his father as second Baron Rancliffe in the peerage of Ireland on 17 Nov., 1800. On the death of his grand- father on 17 March, 1806, he succeeded to the baronetcy created on 18 May, 1681. He was some time an officer in the 10th Hussars, and served as equerry to his godfather, the Prince

of Wales. He represented Minehead in the House of Commons from 1806 to 1807, and Nottingham from 1812 to 1820 and 1826 to 1830. He married, on 15 Oct., 1807, Lady Elizabeth Mary Forbes, eldest daugnter of George, sixth Earl of Granard, by whom he had no issue. He died at Bunnv Park, Nottinghamshire, on 1 Nov., 1850, when the peerage became extinct, while the baronetcy devolved on his cousin Sir Thomas George Augustus Parkyns. G. F. R. B.

'THE BAILIFF'S DAUGHTER OF ISLINGTON' (9 th S. i. 229). The old ballad itself bears evidence, I think, of the identity of Islington near London ; for the fair maid, leaving her merry companions, and in "mean attire," came " straightway to London," meeting her true love as she passed along. Presumably she walked all the way; and from near King's Lynn is a far cry, nearly a hundred miles. W. CROUCH.

Wanstead.

It is sometimes asserted, as MR. JERRAM says, that the Islington of the ballad is not the metropolitan place of that name, but a country village. In the late Dr. E. C. Brewer's 'Reader's Handbook' we are told that the place referred to is "in Norfolk," and certainly the paraphrase of the ballad which Dr. Brewer gives leads to the conclu- sion that it cannot be the Islington of London that is meant.

Some reference is made to this ballad in Mr. George Rose Emerson's ' London : How the Great City Grew' (18621 In dealing with the district of North London he casually refers to the well-known ballad :

'There is a ballad of 'The Reve's Daughter of Islington,' or more familiarly 'The BaylifPs Daughter,' apparently of considerable antiquity, Kit which some black-letter collectors are dis- posed to refer to Islington, a village near Lynn, in Norfolk."

C. P. HALE.

SKELTON (8 th S. xii. 487). The quotation s from ' Colyn Cloute,' 1. 53, &c. :

For though my ryme be ragged, Tattered and lagged,

Rudely rayne beaten, Rusty and moughte eaten, If ye take well therwith, It hath in it some pyth.

Boston, Lincolnshire.

R. R.

"DOWN TO THE GROUND" (9 th S. i. 145). iVith due submission, I scarcely think that his modern colloquialism (or "slang," as frollope has it) has anything to do with the ame expression in the book of Judges