Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 9.djvu/139

 ,9^ 8. IX. FEB. 15, 1902.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

131

"WYRALL" (9 th S. ix. 109). Cotgrave has French virole, "an iron ring put about tht end of a staffe, &c., to strengthen it, anc keep it from riving." Just because it was often made of iron, the corresponding E. wore was "derived" from Latin ferrum, and is now spelt ferrule. See * Ferrule ' in H.E.D., or in any dictionary that is at hand.

CELER.

GEE FAMILY (9 th S. ix. 10). William Gee was Mayor of Hull in 1573. He left money to build almshouses in that city, and in 1575 at his own expense he replaced the great east window of Holy Trinity Church, which had been damaged by a mob. A half life- size portrait of him on wood is or was in the Hull Grammar School, and on this appears his coat of arms. His will is reprinted in ' Hullinia,' a work written by Alderman John Symonds, and published in 1872. It begins :

" Whereas, in the Scriptures, the great God has willed, by the Prophet, to say to Hezekiah, to make his will and put things in order, for that he must die, so I do now pray, and humbly beseech the great God, to confound and destroy all those men, lawyers, and others whosoever, to the Devil, in the Pit of Hell, which do, or shall do, or take upon them to alter this my will. Amen. Good Lord, Amen!" &c.

This will gives "to my son William Gee, 2,000/. ; my son Walter, 200," &c.

William Gee the younger seems to have lived at Bishop Burton in the East Riding of Yorkshire, and to have had a wife named Mary, but possibly this was his mother's name. By deed these two agreed to fulfil the wishes of the elder William Gee.

The Gees appear to have been connected with Hull for generations, and one of the nine divisions of the west window of Holy Trinity Church is a memorial to Joseph Gee, "of Hull, merchant, who died in I860.

RONALD DIXON.

46, Marlborough Avenue, Hull.

An early instance of this farnity name occurs in the charter of the Company of Stationers, dated 4 May, 1556, Thomas Gee being one of the ninety-four members whose signatures were attached thereto. The name appears frequently in the City of London. The registers of St. Botolph, Bishopsgate, commenced in 1558. During the next century there were eleven baptisms, fifteen marriages, and nine deaths, of which I will furnish MR. GEE with details should he require them. See also 6 th S. ii. 71.

EVERARD HOME COLEMAN.

71, Brecknock Road.

BOWYER WILLS (9 th S. viii. 444). William Bowyer, senior, died in 1737, and William,

his son, in 1777, both at Low Leyton, Essex, where a monument was erected to their memory. Would not their wills be probably proved at the District Registry, Ipswich 1 A copy of the will of the latter is given in 'Nichols's Literary Anecdotes' with a bio- graphical memoir, vol. viii. p. 270. This work may be consulted in the Corporation Library, Guildhall. Extracts therefrom may be found in Timperley's * Dictionary of Printers and Printing,' and 2 nd S. iv. 209.

EVERARD HOME COLEMAN. 71, Brecknock Road.

QUOTATIONS (9 th S. vi. 489 ; vii. 74, 170, 497; viii. 113). "Cum rerum natura nusquam magis, quam in minimis, tota sit" (Plin., ' Nat. Hist.,' xi. i. (2).

" Veuve d'un peuple-roi, mais reine encore du monde." According to Ramage's 'Beautiful Thoughts from French and Italian Authors/ second edition, this saying is by Gabriel Gilbert, who flourished about 1650. The heading is 'Papal Rome.' No more par- ticular reference is given.

ROBERT PIERPOINT.

GREEK PRONUNCIATION (9 th S. vii. 146, 351, 449 ; viii. 74, 192, 372, 513). While noting M. HAULTMONT'S interesting comments upon certain remarks of mine in the above con- nexion, I cannot own to being as much convinced by the arguments brought forward as that writer will probably expect me to be, for I conceive that the Italian would not be more likely than the French to have retained the old Latin sound of sal, but less so. Words received by the French language from the Latin would more naturally remain unaltered and unaltering in sound in the and of their adoption than they would in the land of their origin, where they would be Dart of a living and always moving tongue, and open to all the changes of such a tongue, and it is in the vowel-sounds more particu- arly that changes in such a tongue would be ! ound to occur.

In modern times, English, as talked in

rural America, is more likely to retain the

owel-sounds of English speech two hundred

ears ago than to-day's island English, and

specially to-day's London English, is. Many

.vords of old French origin, embedded in our

>wn tongue, are surely more likely to retain

he old French vowel-sounds than the same

>r similar words in their modern form in

,he French of to-day. It was an ancient

dictionary that gave the derivation of salt

is from the Latin sal. I need not defend

t. If salt is rather from the A.-S. sealt

cf. N.H.Ger. Salz\ we only see more clearly