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NOTES AND QUERIES. [9* s. XL MAY ie, IMS.

High German in the form biihre. As to the ultimate etymology, Kluge and Murray give it up. But I do not think we need do so. The ' Brem. Worterbuch ' has buren, a cover ; beds- biiren, a bed-cloth ; kussen-biiren, a cushion- cover ; and adds that buren is also the name of several villages near Bremen, and denoted originally "a hut." That is to say, it is much the same as Eng. byre; from A.-S. bur, a bower. Liibben has Low G. bure, a cover ; and the ' Bremen Worterbuch ' has buur, a bower, a cage. The transference of sense is just the same as in Eng. cot, a cottage, a shelter, a cover, a finger-stall; see 'E.D.D.' So also M. Du. buer, a cottage or shed (Hexham). I think it is a derivative of E. bower, with Kentish long e for A.-S. long y ; and this is why the e is close, as the rimes show. WALTER W. SKEAT.

" MY ORNAMENTS ARE ARMS '' (9 th S. xi. 327) My ornaments are arms, My pastime is in war, &c.,

is Lockhart's free version of an ancient Spanish ballad

Mis arreos son las armas,

Mi descanso el pelear, &c.,

to be found in the ' Romancero ' of Agustin Duran (1859), vol. i. p. 161. They are best known in the original from being quoted in ' Don Quixote,' pt. i. c. xi. Lockhart, as usual, has taken great liberties with the Spanish, investing the simple lay of the wandering knight with a sentiment which did not belong to his age, country, or profession.

H. E. WATTS. [Other replies acknowledged.]

"So MANY GODS," <fec. (9 th S. xi. 187, 318) I thank your correspondent E. B. for his reply to my inquiry. The publishers of the Century Magazine (Macmillan <fe Co ) inform me that they have searched the magazine as far back as 1899, but have been unable to trace it. H. O. DRUMMOND.

POLL -BOOKS (9 th S. xi. 289). MR. CECIL SIMPSON, of Ardennes, Nightingale Lane, S.W., in a communication to 8 th S. vii. 448, stated he had lately come across a printed poll-book for the county of Wilts of 1705. Doubtless he would furnish the required information.

EVERARD HOME COLEMAN.

' SHE STOOPS TO CONQUER ' (9 th S. xi. 249). Probably this allusion to the Corporation of Bedford was owing to the fact that before the Act of the 5th and 6th of William IV. cap. 76, providing for the " Regulation of Municipal Corporations in England and Wales," the government of Bedford was

vested in an unduly large number of officials, whose gastronomic achievements were con- sequently unusually extensive, for the Cor- poration consisted of a mayor, an indefinite number of aldermen, two bailiffs, thirteen common councilmen, a recorder, a deputy- recorder, assisted by a town clerk, two chamberlains, three sergeants-at-mace, and subordinate officers. And no doubt the Joiners' Company had a similar reputation, for there were giants in gastronomy in those days, who, as I heard a prosperous citizen somewhat vulgarly express it a short time ago, " played a very good knife and fork."

J. HOLDEN MACMlCHAEL.

MOTTOES : THEIR ORIGIN (9 th S. xi. 327). 'The Book of Family Crests,' published by Henry Washbourne, 1851, in 2 vols., at p. 31, vol. i., commences an article on mottoes, and has further on a ' Dictionary of Mottoes.' That of Vassall, referred to, is quoted with the explanation that these words, "Every bullet has its billet," were used by the late Col. Vassall, of Milford, in encouraging his men to the assault of Monte Video, where that gallant officer found a soldier's grave.

R. J. FYNMORE.

Sandgate.

Probably 'A Handbook of Mottoes,' by C. N. Elvin, M.A., published by Bell & Daldy, Fleet Street, in 1860, is the work your corre- spondent is in search of. There was, I believe, a second edition of this book published.

WM. JACKSON PIGOTT.

SIR NICHOLAS KEMEYS AND CHEPSTOW CASTLE (9 th S. xi. 327). Mr. John Taylor, chief librarian of the Bristol City Libraries, has written a ' Sketch of Chepstow Castle ' (published by Messrs. William George's Sons, the well-known booksellers of Bristol), which is sold to visitors to the castle, and I have no doubt that the interesting account referred to by your correspondent has been embodied in the newest editions. Why not apply to them? L. L. K.

CHANCELLOR SILVAN EVANS (9 th S. xi. 361). By a slip, which I regret, my paper on the above distinguished Welsh scholar conveys the impression that he had published an original Welsh translation of Grotius's ' De Veritate Religionis Christianse.' What he really did was to re-edit Samuel's eighteenth-

entury Welsh translation of that work. The inference I drew remains undisturbed. I may add that among Evans's contributions, prose and verse, to Y Protestant (a Welsh

hurch monthly newspaper) in the course of 1847, is the commencement of a Welsh trans-