Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 9.djvu/259

 9" S. IX. MARCH 29, 1902.) NOTES AND QUERIES.

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expressed " French willow " by coining a name from a naturalized (French) form saule, rather than from our Scottish saugh, to denote the osier Saint Antoine. I do not think that saulie in this case is a local rendering of sallow, for, as far as I know, the name salloio is applied only to the broad (ob-ovate) leaved Salix capi*cea. The willow herb has linear lanceolate leaves, like Salix viminalis, the osier blanc. My theory involves a further departure from CELER'S rule that we must not form dissyllables from monosyllabic French forms; but we are a law to ourselves in Scotland in the matter of adding ie to any word we see reason to appropriate.

J. M. T. Colinton, N.B.

It is scarcely probable that this word is derived from the French saule, seeing that the native word sauch (=willow) is so gener- ally in use all over Scotland. Having this word at hand, the Scotch would not be likely to adopt the French word for willow to mean a man who looks like a willow. F. J. C.

GREEK PRONUNCIATION (9 th S. vii. 146, 351, 449; viii. 74, 192, 372, 513; ix. 131). In reply to W. H. B.'s courteous rejoinder to my comments on one of his former notes, I must remark that he does not adhere to the principal point of the note in question. This clearly was that the French word sel would be more likely to be nearer in sound to the Latin original than the English salt (assuming, as he did, that salt came from sel). In answer to my argument that it would then follow that the Italian word sale was still more likely to have kept nearer to the Latin sound, W. H. B. now says that he con- ceives the Italian word would not be more likely than the French to have retained the old Latin sound, but less likely. I will, how- ever, not insist upon what seems to me a contradiction, but endeavour to reply to what W. H. B. says about the French sel. To begin with, W. H. B. thinks it strange that the Latin sal, if pronounced with the Italian a, can have become sel in French. But sel^ is only one of a class of French words in which the Latin a has become e in French (see par. 295 of Hatzfeld and Darmesteter's * Dic- tionnaire Ge'neral de la Langue Franchise ') As to the nature of the a in sal, we tind in the same dictionary, firstly, that the French language has been formed from popular Latin ; in the second place, that the five vowels of classical Latin, which, according to the authors of this excellent dictionary, were at first either long or short, but without dif- ference of sound (timbre), had in the imperial

period come to be pronounced open (ouvertes) or shut (ferme'es), the long vowels having become "shut" and the short "open," with the exception of d, d, ivhich both appear to have merged (abouti) into one sound ontythe open sound (italics mine). It is further remarked in this dictionary that there was in the Latin spoken in Gaul the peculiarity that the u of classical Latin, pronounced like the French ou, took the sound of the actual French ii. L note this last point because I see no more difficulty for the broad d to have toned down into e than for the broad u to have become ii. And, indeed, to any one acquainted with the actual pronunciation of French by Parisians, the change of d into d and then into e can only appear most natural, as the present French d is daily becoming finer and finer. Even in certain words written with d the d is no longer pronounced by Parisians so long as it usea to be : witness the words gateau, chateau. It is needless to add that where the a has no circumflex accent its thinness is extreme. In conclusion, I should be very glad if one of the readers of *N. & Q.' would tell us how the Anglo-Saxon word sealt was pro- nounced. M. HAULTMONT.

CHRIST'S HospiTAL(9 th S. viii. 283 ; ix.231). The following appears in the Daily Telegraph of Saturday last :

"Mr. R. L. Cassie, Churchwarden of Christ Church, Newgate Street, writes to correct the notion generally held that the farewell sermon preached before the boys of the Blue Coat School by the Bishop of London on Sunday was the last time the scholars of the famous institution would attend their parish church. Such, however, is not the case, and the boys will take part in the services as usual until Sunday, April 13. On Easter Tuesday the Lord Mayor and Sheriffs are to be present in state."

DISAPPEARING CHARTISTS (9 th S. ix. 144). Since I wrote concerning Mr. Bartlett, another real old Chartist has died Charles Junius Haslam. George Julian Harney was always called "Julian," like some others I could mention who were known best by their second name. But Haslam was never called Junius, but always spoken of as "C. J. Haslam." As he was also known for his literary performances, he deserves the passing record of your interesting pages.

Haslam was born at Waddrington, Northum- berland, in 1811, and was ninety-one years of age at his death. His father was the village schoolmaster at Waddrington, and he probably inherited a taste for letters. Few persons were able to read or write then, and the villagers used to come to his father s