Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 10.djvu/46

 NOTES AND QUERIES. 9* s. x. JULY 12, 1902.

tions. I have letters, charters, &c. , for a long way back, and the signature has been, almost without exception, ' Argyll,' with the double I."

W. S.

The following extract from the 'Legend of Montrose ' may prove interesting and illustrative :

" His dark complexion, furrowed forehead, and downcast look, gave him the appearance of one frequently engaged in the consideration of important affairs, and who has acquired by long habit an air of gravity and mystery, which he cannot shake off even when there is nothing to be concealed. The cast with his eyes, which had procured him in the Highlands the nickname of Gillespie Grumach, or the grim, was less perceptible when he looked downward, which perhaps was one cause of his having adopted the habit." Chap. xii.

The probable date of the story is 1644, and the Marquess is Archibald, eighth Earl and first Marquess of Argyll.

JOHN PICKFORD, M.A.

Newbourne Rectory, Woodbridge.

OLD SONGS (9 th S. ix. 388, 492). The march- ing tune of the old Royal South Lincoln Militia was ' The Lincolnshire Poacher.' The regiment trained in the spring, and the beat of this air wafted across the fields seemed to have as much relation to the season as haw- thorn bloom, lilac blossom, and the call of the cuckoo. I have been trying to reproduce the tum-tum-tum in my solitude, but it does not tally with the metre of the lines quoted by MR. PEACOCK. These are a pleasant gift, though manifestly incomplete, and I should be glad if some other Lincolnshire corre- spondent could give me a complete version of the song in a measure that would fit the melody which is now vibrating in my mind.

ST. SWITHIN.

WILLIAM BAXTER, OF AUSTRALIA (9 th S. ix. 486). Doubtless my writing was responsible for the name of Findo-Gask (co. Perth) appearing as Findo-Gash in this query. The last information concerning William Baxter was a letter written by him dated 5 March, 1841, and containing the words, " I intend leaving this country on the 2nd April in the ship England for Australia." Is it possible at this distance of years to obtain any particulars about the voyage, the exact destination and safe arrival of the vessel, and the names of the passengers ? RONALD DIXON.

46, Maryborough Avenue, Hull.

"KNIFE" (9 th S. ix. 468). A knife, i.e., a dagger, was formerly a customary item of an Englishman's accoutrement. Beckmann, writing towards the close of the eighteenth century, says that even then, in taverns, in many countries, particularly in some towns

in France, knives were not placed on the table, because it was expected that each person should have one of his own : a custom which the French seem to have retained from old Gauls. Hence, perhaps, the saying " to have one's knife in " a person. In political slang, to " knife" any one is to endeavour to defeat a candidate of one's own party in a secret or underhand way. " Knife " has always been synonymous for sword or dagger. Spen- ser (' Faerie Queene,' iii. iv. 24) uses " knife " for a sword

And after all his war to rest hia wearie knife ; and Shakespeare certainly alludes to the dagger when he says, in ' Macbeth,' I. v.,

That my keen knife sees not the wound it makes. The reply of the heroic General Palafox, when summoned by the French to surrender Saragossa in 1808, "War even to the knife !" would certainly not allude to what is to-day understood by the implement so named, but to close quarters with the dagger a entrance. To " get one's knife " in a person has appa- rently given birth to the word *' kniferism," a facetious form of an aphorism in allusion to the cutting character of an anecdote, saying, &c. e.g., "Stories of the Don whose verbal lapses may be called ' Spoonerisms ' or ' Kniferisms,' as you please, are numerous in clerical circles and keenly appreciated " (M.A.P., 18 Feb., 1899, p. 153).

J. HOLDEN MAcMlCHAEL.

PORTRAITS OF FEMALE FIGHTERS (9 th S. ix. 68, 156, 334). Auguste Kriiger was promoted in 1813 to the rank of sergeant (Unterofficier) in the Kolberg infantry regiment, and in the issue of 17 December, 1816, of the Hande und Spenersche Zeitung, a Berlin newspaper, the following announcement was read :

"Notification of birth. It will not be unwelcome to the protectors and benefactors of Auguste Kriiger, who has become known as a heroic maiden, to read that she has presented her good husband, the lancer- sergeant (Uhlanen- Unterofficier) Karl Kohler, on the 13th inst., with a healthy daughter, and that as a happy wife and mother she still remembers with emotion the benefits bestowed on her. Berlin, the 16th December, 1816. By the wish of the happy couple." Extract from the ' Unterhaltungsbeilage" of the Berliner LokaJ-Anzeiyer, 30 April, 1902.

The name of the maiden of Liineburg was Johanna Stegen, not Staegemann, as I gave it erroneously at the last reference.

G. KRUEGER. Berlin.

" UPWARDS OF " (9 th S. ix. 446, 516). This phrase, here in the West, is very commonly used in the sense of almost, or nearly, perhaps not quite, in point of numbers, and by no means certainly to imply more than