Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 6.djvu/229

 9*s. vi. SEPT. s, 1900.] NOTES AND QUERIES. 187 readers of 'N. & Q.' will be able to „...„ some light from contemporary literatur upon the history of these phrases. DUNHEVED. " Cocco ": " EDDOES."—These two botanica terms, well known in the West Indies and i our_West African colonies, are synonyms fo a kind of yam or esculent tuber. They appea in all the best dictionaries (such as Ogilvie the ' Century,' the ' H.E.D.'), but have neve been treated satisfactorily. In the first place the spelling which the dictionaries hav adopted for one of them, cocco, is old-fashionec and practically obsolete. All modern travel lers (Sir R. F. Burton, Commander Cameron the Rev. Dennis Kemp, <fec.) prefer to write koko. This scientific orthography, incredible as it may appear, is mentioned by none o our lexicographers. Secondly, none of them gives the derivation of the term. It is an Ashantee word (Christaller, 'Dictionary of the Ashantee Language,' 1881), and it also occurs in the Akra tongue (Zimmermann Vocabulary of the Akra Language,' 1858) With regard to eddoes, seventy years ago the ' Penny Cyclopaedia' stated that it originated among the " blacks of the Gold Coast," and every dictionary in turn has been content to copy this, down to the 'Century,' which ascribes it to the " negroes of the Gold Coast,' and the ' H.E.D.,' which says it is " from the language of the Gold Coast." There are several languages spoken on the Gold Coast. The word is from the Fantee edwo. The Ashantee dialectic forms (ode, odee, odie) are not so near the English. JAMES PLATT, Jun. PENANCE OF A MARRIED PRIEST IN LON- DON, A.D. 1554.—MS., Canterbury Cathedral Library, Register N, leaf 151 :— " Penaunce enyoynid to Sir John Tumour, Prest, late Parson of Saincte Leonardo in Estchepe of the Citie of London'/ which is, That, vppon Monday next, viz. the xiiij"1 of May, 1554, in the parrishe Church of Saincte Leonardos aforesaid, when the most number of people shalbe their present/ the same S»r John Tumour, havinge a waxe taper buruinge in his hand/ and standing in the body of the Churche, before the face of the people, shall openly and dis- tinctly, with a lowde voice, saye and declare vnto them as followith/ "Good People, I am comme hither at this pre- sent tyme, to declare vnto you my sorowfull and penitent harte/ for that, being a prest, [IJ haue presumi.i to marry one Ainye Fermen, widowe/ and.^vnder pretence of that matrimony, contrary to the Canons and Custome of the vniuersall Church, haue kepte her as my wief/ and lyvid contrary to the Cannons and ordinaunce* of the Church/ and to the evill example of good Christen people/ wherby, nowe being ashamid of my former wickid lyving, here I aake almightie God mercie and forgevenes, and the hole Church/ And am sory and penitent even from the [leaf 152] bottome of my harte ther- fore/ And in token herof, I am here (as you see) to declare and shewe vnto you this my repentaunce, that before God on the later day you may testifie with me of the same/ And I most hartely and humbly praye and desire you all whonie, by this evill example doing, I haue greatly offended, Bemember me in your praiers, that Goa may geve me grace, that hereafter 1 may leve a continent lief, accord- ing to his lawe and the godly ordinaunce« of our mother, the holly catholike Church, thorough and by his grace/ I do here, before you all, openly pro- misse for to do during my lief." F. J. FURNIVALL. THE LATE GEOROE GUSTAVUS ZERFFY.—We are told in the ' Diet, of National Biography ' that " he was also for some time Kossutn's private secretary, and in 1851 published a translation into German of his collected works preceded by a biographical memoir." Our biographer lias evidently not taken the trouble to refer to that book, although there is a copy of it in the British Museum. Had he peeped into it he would have made the discovery that the preface was dated from London, April, 1850, and signed by "Zerffy Gabor" which is the Hungarian equivalent For " Gabriel," but certainly not for " George Gustavus " Zerffy. This mysterious Gabriel certainly calls him- self Kossuth's private secretary on the title- sage ; but when Kossuth's attention was drawn n 1877 to this alleged German translation of lis own collected works, he stamped at least one of the articles "an unmistakable forgery," and the whole collection in three volumes "a wretched literary catchpenny transaction," indertaken without his permission, or even mowledge, during his absence in Turkish captivity. To Zerffy, the editor, the lie was _iven by Kossuth for calling himself his )rivate secretary, as he had only seen him once twice in his life, and the man was neither lis private secretary nor his "anything else." These and a good many other uncompli- mentary things may be read in Kossuth's etter to the Szdzadok (volume for 1877), a opy of which is also in the British Museum. L. L. K. " DEVON." (See ante, p. 139.) — In your .otes on the ' English Dialect Dictionary' ou refer to the omission from it of the word devon," a treble - milled cloth, largely used >r coachmen's coats. Would not the reason of lis omission be that it may not be a dia- ectical but geographical name, taken from the ounty of Devon, the full name of the cloth >eing Devon kersey ? These cloths were, ad still are, largely made in the west I England, although Yorkshire has in late