Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 12.djvu/414

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NOTES AND QUERIES. [9< s. xn. NOV. 21, 1903

second, and fifth letters of the Ogham alphabet.

Now the first five letters of Ogham are h I, /, s, n, and it seems to me that Bethluisnior stands for all five, and is a modified form o1 the five names of these letters. In its con tracted trisyllabic form it yet shows elements of the five : beth = b, 1=1, u=v=f, is=s, nion= n. The capacity for interchange between / and v and between v and u is well known, and with / softening down to u we might expect the loss of a vowel in front of the second letter I. This etymology of fie.th- luisnion may have been advanced before : if so, well and good ; if not, it may perchance be serviceable. J. H. ROWE, M.B.

THE ALPINE CLUB : ITS FOUNDERS. On the occasion of the lamented death of Mr. B. St. John Attwood-Mathews, of Pontrilas Court, Herefordshire, it is most opportune to place on record the names of the original founders of the famous Alpine Club, which was established on November, 1857. It was first seriously considered at a dinner- party at the house of the late Mr. Attwood- Mathews's father, the Leasowes, Hereford, at which were present Mr. William Mathews ; his son Mr. B. St. John Attwood-Mathews ; Mr. William Mathews, jun., cousin ; Mr. Kennedy, who was afterwards the first pre- sident of the Club; and Mr. Charles E. Mathews, the second president, and the present Clerk of the Peace for Warwick- shire. All present at the dinner - party were enthusiastic Alpine climbers, and had made several difficult ascents. The idea of an Alpine Club was fully discussed, and lists made of gentlemen likely to join it, chiefly Cambridge men. The next day Mr. Attwood- Mathews and his cousin Mr. William Mathews, jun., started off for London and at once founded the Club, which is now one of the most popular in Europe. To the various members of the Mathews family belongs un- questionably the honour of first putting forward the idea of the Alpine Club.

It is also interesting to know that a cousin of the late Mr. Attwood-Mathews, Mr. Harold Freeman, is president of the Davos Toboggan Club, and has just made a visit to Davos and carefully examined the road of the proposed new toboggan run, with a fall of about 1,200 feet, from Laret station to Klosters.

JOHN ROBINSON.

Delaval House, Sunderland.

" NUMBER ELEVEN." That is, to me, a new name for the friend in need that Frenchmen call a ''Robinson." Number Eleven ! Why it is only by favour and connivance that a

person can manage to make it shelter two. It has been suggested to me that there is a rough phonic resemblance between "number eleven" and "umbrella." I think there is, perhaps, just a little more than between "Little Mary" and "Oh dear I must say it 'Stomach.'" ST. SWITHIN.

THE FISH A SYMBOL OF CHRIST. (See ante, pp. 63, 290, 390.) It would appear that your correspondent MR. HARLAND-OXLEY is correct in his note on p. 63, and that the earliest use of the fish as a Christian symbol was of Christ, and secondarily of baptism. For authorities references may be made to Miss Twining's 'Christian Symbols and Emblems,' p. 33 (plate 13) and p. 141 (plate 65); Tyrwhitt's 'Art Teaching of the Primi- tive Church,' p. 330 ; Lord Lindsay's ' History of Christian Art ; (second edition, 1885), p. 8 ; and Lundy's ' Monumental Christianity ' (New York, 1876), where on p. 130 is a valuable chapter on ' Christ as the Fish and the Fisherman.' See also With row's ' Cata- combs of Rome ' (p. 252). In Maitland's ' Church in the Catacombs ' (second edition, 1847) is this note as to the fish having been secondarily a symbol of baptism (p. 213) :

"The Greek for fish contained the initials of Jesus Christ, Son of God, the Saviour. Moreover, the phonetic sign of this word, the actual fish, was not intelligible to the uninitiated, an important point with those who were surrounded by foes ready to ridicule and blaspheme whatever signs of Christianity they could detect. Nor did the appropriateness of the symbol stop here. The fish, rertullian thought, was a fit emblem of Him whose children are born of water in baptism."

F. M. J.

TACAMAIIACA.": ITS ORIGIN. This is the ame of a resin used for incense and to make Blasters. Our dictionaries have failed to trace its origin. The ' Encyclopedic ' calls it 'native name." The 'Century' guesses it o be "South American," a very unfortunate

guess. To get at the facts we must go back

^ee centuries. Monardes, the first physician
 * o write upon the medicines of the New

World, in the Latin version of his book, published 1579, describes it as "ex Nova -lispania ...... ab Indis tacamahaca vocatum."

Phis is confirmed, and fuller details given, by 3r. F. Hernandez, the naturalist sent by D hilip II. to Mexico to study its plants,

animals, and minerals. In "his 'Cuatro

.

de la Naturaleza,' 1615, p. 16, in a hapter headed ' De la Planta que produze la Joma que llamamos Thecornahaca,' he tells us that this was a Spanish corruption from he Aztec name tecomahiyac. These refer- ences should interest the editors of the