Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 6.djvu/188

 154 vi. AUG. 25, urn. NOTES AND QUERIES. and he chooses to ignore the fact that Ead- gyth was an exceedingly common feminine name. His general looseness of method is shown by the way in which he misquotes me. Neither does his concluding paragraph con- cerning ecg merit serious consideration. It is plain to every one but MR. STEVENSON that " poetic" is often merely another word for "archaic." When he innocently asks, " Was not almost every gate a 'hedge-gate'?" he shows that his knowledge of mediaeval English rural conditions is anything but " scientific." The truth of the whole matter is that ME. STEVENSON has found himself in a tight place from which he is unable to extricate himself with anything approaching grace. He may have been studying Teutonic names before I was born for aught that I know, but I still fail to see the wisdom of making a laborious climb to the misty tops of a high mountain to get a few drops of water when a more or less crystal brook purls at one's feet. The most brilliant display of pedantry in the world will not turn a baa case into a good one. I decline to discuss further the name Edgett. HY. HARBISON. " CHINK " (9th S. v. 432, 498).—I am satisfied from an inspection of the two specimens sent to you by SENGA that one is oak and the other Spanish chestnut. His letter, however, left it open to be supposed that the difference in the appearance of the medullary rays is one of degree, they being broader in oak than in chestnut. The fact is that on the cross section the rays form in oak a bright streak, while in chestnut (as in elm, ash, and all ordinary woods, except beech) there is no visible streak at all, nor is there any chink, or flower, when the wood is cut down across the centre, as oak is usually cut for panels which are to exhibit the flower. No land agent or carpenter whe has seen a specimen of Spanish chestnut could afterwards for a moment hesitate to distin- guish it from oak, the threads or vessels which in chestnut do the duty of medullary rays being scattered and too fine to attract notice, pnly one instance of the use oi chestnut in Gothic work is known, and thai has been recorded in ' N. <fe Q.' THOS. BLASHILL. HUISH (9th S. v. 475; vi. 95).—Huish, a common name in Somerset, Wilts, and Devon appears in Domesday as Hewis or Hiwys, anc in A.-S. documents as Hiwisc. This 'is con elusive. The attempt of your contributor al the last reference to derive it from the Irish uisge, " water," belongs to the pre-scientifr school of etymology. Not to speak of phoneti lifficulties, your correspondent should explain low this isolated Irish name arrived in Wessex, and why land was called by a word meaning ' water." If Huish had been a river, and not a village, it would have been more intelligible, >ut in this case we should expect to find a Welsh form, Exe, Axe, or Usk, instead of Huish. ISAAC TAYLOR. Huish is the name of an estate and colliery n the parish of Kilmersdon, Somerset, situated nearly twenty miles from the coast, which fact hardly tallies with your corre- spondent MR. ELWORTHY'S theory of the etymology of the name. H. TWYFORD YEW TREE (9th S. vi. 29).—Which Twyford is it, Berks or Bucks t As one of the reviewers of Dr. J. Lowe's 'Yew Trees of Great Britain and Ireland,' 1897, I think I may advise MR. ANDREWS to get into com- munication with him through his publishers, Messrs. Macmillan. This yew is not men- tioned in the yew book, and is unknown to me. S. L. PETTY. Ulverston. " PINEAPPLE" (9th S. iv.419; v. 402 ; vi. 95). —It seems probable that the fir-cone, which was a conspicuous object in the art of Assyria, was originally accepted as a symbol of vitality, transmitted, stimulated, or hidden, as occasion might require. Perhaps it was with the last signification that the mausoleum of Hadrian was decorated with the famous pine-cone that is still to be seen in the gardens of the Vatican, that huge mass to which Dante compared the face of Nimrod (' Inferno,' xxxi. 58, 59) :— La faccia aua mi parea lunga e grossa Come la pina di San Pietro a Roma. ST. SWITHIN. In Horace Walpole's collection at Straw- berry Hill was a painting of the first pine- apple grown in England being presented to Charles II. at Dorney Court, Bucks, then the residence of the Duchess of Cleveland. This was engraved by J. Cook, and appeared as a frontispiece to Mrs. Stone's 'Chronicles of Fashion,' published in 1845. A little inn in the village of Dorney still bears in com- memoration of the above the sign of " The Pine-Apple." R B. Upton. SHAKESPEARE AND CICERO (9th S. v.288,462; vi. 56).—In the works of some of the great Eoets who have described the sea I nave >und passages showing that they must have seen what they describe. In none of them, with the exception of Shakspeare, do I find passages which cause me to doubt that they