Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 8.djvu/495

 9*s. vm. DEO. 14, ion.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

487

light? Death was represented by the ancients as the genius with the turned-down torch the Noras sit at Nornagest's cradle and pro claim that his life will last only as long aj the candle burning there lasts. When a bishop pronounced the anathema on an offender, the assistant priests threw down the tapers they had been burning in their hands during the solemnity, and extinguishec them with their feet. We have a phrase, slightly ironical, for doing away with some one, to wit, " Einem das Lebenslicht aus- blasen," known already to Wolfram von Eschenbach (Willehalm, 416, 14) : " Bi lichter sun lien da verlasch Manegem Sarrazin sin licht." And do not the English as well as the French say of a man who lives very fast, " He is burning his candle at both ends " ; " II brule la chandelle par les deux bouts " 1

G. KEUEGER. Berlin.

My son, who is at present staying in a pension in Germany, says that on his birth- day a short time since a similar cake was presented to him ; but in addition to the candles showing his age there was a longer one, called a *' life candle." In this case, too, nobody could explain how the custom arose, or precisely what it signifies. C. C. B.

A cake is festal fare, a lighted candle is .symbolical of life, and the eighteen of different hues marked the number of the changeful years that the young girl had successfully achieved. When I was a little child my age was notified by the number of plum puddings made in celebration of my birthday. They were boiled in small cups ; but, as a matter of course, I had not seen many summers before the pious observance was abandoned at the bidding of domestic convenience. ST. SWITHIN.

"ELECTROCUTE" (9 th S. yiii. 420). If the coiner of this term considered it etymo- logically identical with electro-execute, or a simplification of it, your correspondent has clearly pointed out that it was founded upon a false analogy, and could not claim to be inserted in a future supplement to our great 'Oxford Historical Dictionary.' Remembering, however, that we have, for instance, a Latin verb percutio, percutere, meaning to kill, the formation of the new verb electro-cute, to kill by an electric stroke, does not appear to be so barbarous or con- trary to all rules as is asserted nay, it may be justified. As to the matter itself, I may perhaps add that an American friend tells me that electrocution, as a new way of execution,

is at present confined by legislation to the State of New York, whereas in the other United States criminals condemned to death are usually hanged. As I learn from the same source, it nas recently been proposed in several of the United States to entirely abolish capital punishment. H. KREBS. Oxford.

ST. KILDA (9 th S. viii. 324). The origin of this name has been the subject of much speculation, which is summed up in Seton's book on St. Kilda. Martin thinks the island derives its name from one Kilder who lived there, and Macaulay not the historian indulges in amusing lamentations because Martin gives us no information about this individual. He also mentions that there was a female St. Kilda, who founded the Abbey of Whitley and fought hard for the liberties of the ancient British Church ; but her con- nexion with the island seems improbable. A third suggestion is that the name is derived from the Culdees, one of whom at least may have gone from lona to live an ascetic life upon the lonely rock. Such, at any rate, is the view of Mr. James Wilson, who adds :

k The Celtic term 'kil,' or rather 'cille,' is applied to a place of sepulture, or it may be also (like the Latin cella) to the cell or chapel of a devotee ;. and then, by a kind of misty and imagina- tive personification, the prefix ' Saint is added, thus investing with something of a spiritual character the wild and rocky region of the fulmar and the gannet."

T. P. ARMSTRONG.

The writer of the article on St. Kilda in " probably of Columban origin." He refers bo authorities dating from the sixteenth to the nineteenth century. THOMAS BAYNE.
 * Chambers's Encyclopaedia ' says the name is

St. Kilda is named by Fordun (1370) Irte ; Speed in his map, 1672, gives St. Kilder. Sir Herbert Maxwell in his 'Scottish Land- ^"ames ' explains it thus :

1 St. Kilda must be a corruption of the Gaelic : ihere never was a saint of that name, which pro- bably represents Oilean ceii De, isle of the servants f God, or holy Culdees."

JOHN RADCLIFFE.

ARCHITECT'S NAME WANTED (9 th S. viii. 384). The name of the soldier-architect re- erred to was Moore. He was a corporal in
 * he 15th Foot (my old regiment), which was

stationed in Ceylon from 1846 to 1855. Pre- ious to enlistment he had been apprenticed o a'carpenter and builder. In 1852 he built ^he church at Newera Ellia, which he had limself designed; and soon afterwards he was employed in superintending the building and wood-fitting of the college chapel at