Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 5.djvu/536

 g. v. JUNE 30, 1900.

one species. The bones that have been found among the remains of the prehistoric races are nearly all about the same size, and repre- sent, it is said, a type about the size of the modern beagle. At the time of the Roman occupation, however, there were five distinct species, most of which can with certainty be identified with those of the present day. There were the house-dog, the greyhound, the bulldog, the terrier, and the slow -hound. The description by Gratius of the British bulldog leaves no doubt on the mind of the reader as to its identity with the animal now known by that name. It has been translated thus :

But can vou waft across the British tide, And land undangered on the other side, O, what great gains will certainly redound From a free traffic in the British hound ! Mind not the badness of their forms or face ; That the sole blemish of the generous race : When the bold game turns back upon the spear, And all the furies wait upon the war, First in the race the whelps of Britain shine, And snatch, Epirus, all the palm from thine.

The description of the greyhound is perhaps even more striking : Swift as the wing that sails adown the wind, Swift as the wish that darts along the mind, The Celtic greyhound sweeps the level lea, Eyes as he strains, and stops the flying prey. But should the game elude his watchful eyes, No nose sagacious tells him where it lies.

The character is as true to life now as it was then. Another trait is undoubtedly referred to by Martial :

Canis vertagus Non sibi, sed domino, venator vertagus acer,

Illsesum leporem qui tibi dente feret. (For thee alone the greyhound hunts the prey, And brings to thee th' untasted hare away.)

Claudian, too, clearly refers to the bulldog when he speaks of

The British hound

That wings the bull's big forehead to the ground. The "British dogs are said to have been in great demand in Rome both for hunting and for the sports of the amphitheatre.

J. FOSTER PALMER. 8, Royal Avenue, S.W.

VAUTROLLIER, PRINTER (9 th S. v. 436). By the following extract from Timperley's ' Dic- tionary of Printers and Printing' (1839), the printer at London and Edinburgh bearing the name of Vautrollier was one and the same person :

" Thomas Vautrollier was a scholar and printer from Paris or Roan, came into England about the beginning of Queen Elizabeth's reign and first com- menced business in Blackfriars. On June 19, 1574, he received a patent or licence from the queen to print the New Testament, which he often inserted

at the end. In 1584 he printed Jordanus Brunus, for which he fled, and the next year being in Edin- burgh, he first taught that nation the use of doing their work in a masterly manner : where he con- tinued until, by the intercession of friends, he pro- cvired his pardon : as appears from a dedication of his to the right worshipful Thomas Randolph, esq., where he returns him thanks for his great favour

and for assisting him in his great distress He

r>rinted seventy-eight works, most of which were in Latin."

The title and dedication of the first work printed by Vautrollier in 1570 will be found in 4 K & Q.,' 2 nd S. iv. 84.

EVERARD HOME COLEMAN. 71, Brecknock Road.

The "two printers" were one. Thomas Vautrollier ^having had a press in Edinburgh as well as in London. See the memoir of Vautrollier in the 'D.KB.,' vol. Iviii.

F. ADAMS. 115, Albany Road, Camberwell.

"BTJMMEL" (9 th S. v. 4&$\Bwmmeln, in German, means to do a thing in a feeble, bungling, aimless manner, as we say to potter or to fumble. Bummler is a loafer. ' Three Men on the Bummel' is equivalent to the older slang, "Three men loafing around."

M. N. G.

When I was a lad in Saxony fmmmeln meant, for us, to loaf or loiter about aimlessly, without any fixed nrogramme in our heads. Mr. Jerome no doubt had this definition in view when he employed the word in the title of his amusing book. A hummel is almost as difficult to render into English satisfactorily as that expressive chic of our lively neigh- bours across the Channel. CECIL CLARKE.

Authors' Club, S.W.

ARMS OF MERIONETH (9 th S. v. 377). It is stated in the ' Book of Public Arms ' that the seal of the County Council displays three goats rampant, two and one ; from the dexter base the sun in his splendour issuant.

J. B. P.

c THE THREE WISE MEN OF GOTHAM ' (9 th S. v. 169, 293. 465). The story of the fools of Gotham, who tried to drown an eel, brings to mind one of the merry tales told at the ex- pense of the wiseacres of Anteuil (DoubsX In M. Charles Beauquier's 'Blason Popu- laire de Franche-Comte,' p. 34 (1897), among manv seemly and unseemly simpleton stories, the following passage occurs :

" Here is another anecdote which is told of the inhabitants of Auteuil and other places. A mole, without respect for the anointed of the Lord, had laid waste the rurffi garden. There did not remain to the poor priest even a leek to put in his pot, an feu! Great commotion in the village at the narra-