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 9"- s. vii. JDSE s. i9oi.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

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fore interested in records of the past. Any- thing else that could be furnished about him would specially interest the present writer. ALFRED F. ROBBINS.

CO-OPERATIVE TRADING. The first Con- gress of the Co-operative Union held in the new century deserves a note. The meetings commenced on the 27th of May, at Middles- brough, when Mr. Joseph Warwick (the Pre- sident) mentioned some interesting facts as to the growth of the movement. The Union was started in 1844, when twenty -eight men com- bined together; their capital (which they pooled) was 281. Their trade in the first year was 7101. At the close of last year there were in the United Kingdom 1,464 distributing societies, having a membership of 1,709,371, with share capital of 20,586,231^., doing a trade of over fifty millions and handing back to the members 7,747,338^., showing a net saving on the spending power of the con- sumer of 15 per cent. N. S. S.

SYDENHAM WELLS PARK. The dedication of this park to public use for ever is of interest to the antiquary. The name, as readers of 'N. & Q.' will remember, commemorates some mineral springs discovered in 1640, and referred to by Evelyn in his * Diary.' Sy den- ham is also associated with the poet Camp- bell ; there he passed the happiest years of his life, and remained until he became editor of the New Monthly. A. N. Q.

ST. BARNABAS'S DAY, 11 JUNE. May I be allowed to say, with reference to a reply under the heading 'Suffolk Name for Lady- bird,' ante, p. 396, that St. Barnabas's Day is the day on which the sun in his upward course in the zodiac attains such a height that there is no absolute darkness in the midnight sky ? The old saying as preserved in this part of England is Barnaby bright, All day and no night.

The longest day and summer solstice fall on 22 June, when summer begins.

JOHN P. STILWELL. Hilfield, Yateley, Hants.

"MEALIES." This word came into promi- nence, according to the ' Encyclopaedic Dic- tionary/ from being used in newspapers in connexion with the Zulu war of 1879. Its

(derivation is given incorrectly not only in the 'Encyclopaedic,' which assumes it to be from English meal, but even in the 'Century Dictionary,' which calls it South African. It is a Portuguese term, no more originally

South African than assegai or kraal. It is not South African in even the broadest sense, as, although now exclusively associated with the Cape, it was in the seventeenth century current in West Africa, which means that we must have obtained it independently from the Portuguese before we became familiar with the Cape Dutch (ultimately Portuguese) milje, pronounced mealie. In an anonymous work called ' The Golden Coast' (1665) I find on p. 14 a reference to " milly," and on p. 76 " their bread is of millia or mais." Bos man's ' Guinea ' ( L705)distinguishes between "greater milhio " and " lesser milhio," which are evi- dently identical with the "grosse milie " and " kleine milie " of Miiller's ' Gold-Cust '(1673). The French equivalents were " gros mil " and " petit mil." JAS. PLATT, Jun.

HULL SAYING. About twenty-five years ago a popular saying in the Hull dialect was "Ah '11 travis ther," or sometimes in better English it was put "I will travis thee. This saying had almost gone out of use, and has just been mentioned in the local papers on the death of the respected local stipendiary magistrate Mr. Twiss, who tempered justice with mercy. His predecessor Mr. Travis was noted for his severe sentences ; hence the threat of punishment, which carried terror to not a few in the chief town on the Humber. Some years since, I remember, when Sir Albert K. Rollit, M.P., was President of the Hull Literary and Philosophical Society, he lectured on ' Word Phrases,' &c., and the greatest hit he made in his admirable address was " Ah '11 travis ther." His memory was, and I suppose is still, well stored with local lore.

WILLIAM ANDREWS.

Royal Institution, Hull.

" COOST." When Duncan Gray, according to his veracious historian, went a-courting " on blythe Yule-night," the reception he got at the outset of his experiment was not particularly encouraging. On the contrary, Maggie, the young lady whose good opinion he desired to win, " coost her head fu' heich," and Duncan no doubt felt considerably dis- concerted. Grappling with the trying situa- tion, in his "Golden Treasury" volume of k English Lyrics ' (p. 364, ed. 1898) the late Mr. Palgrave annotated "coost" as carried, which gives a very imperfect idea of what actually occurred. Maggie cast or tossed her head, not merely assuming dignified pride, as suggested by Prof. Palgrave's gloss, but indicating supreme contempt. The word is the same as that which occurs in the descrip- tion of the ghostly dance in "Auld kirk Alloway," when the fun grew so fast and