Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 9.djvu/309

 9*8. IX. APRIL 19, 1902.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

301

LONDON, SATURDAY, APRIL 19, 1902.

CONTENTS. No. 225.

NOTES : The Roumanian Language Bacon-Shakespeare Question, 301 -St. Margaret's Church and Westminster Benefactors, 303 Saxon Names for Meat G. Sandys Sberidan and Maginn " Hog," 305 Young Pretender in London, 17*51 Simon Fraser "Chic" Macaulay and Hannah More, 306.

QUERIES : " Olive" : " Olivaceous" Osorio Family Travels in India Castor Sugar Cabinet carved in Prison Albino Animals, 307 W. T. Edwards Jay Cellini and Shakespeare Landguard Fort Wellington, a Picture Charles II. on Weight of Fish Ganganelli's Bible Nap >leon and the Temple at Jerusalem Sir John Old- castle -Arms of Continental Cities Cigarette-smoking, 308 St. Patrick Author of Book Wanted Santiago Penitents-Standsfield White Gloves at Assizes Official Leaders of the Opposition, 309.

REPLIES : -Michael Bruce and Burns, 309 Royal Yacht- Greek Pronunciation, 311 " Rather " Parentage of Caesar Borgia Arms of Dutch East India Company- Swift's Visits to England East India Badge, 312-Wesley, Lillo, and Home "Cock and Cryer "Italian Sundial Inscription Filbert Warren and Clegg "High- faluting," 313 Apple-tree Folk-lore " Limerick" Sir T. Morgan Bull-baiting "Hop the twig," 314 Bible: Authorized Version Sleeping Garments " Tolpatchery " "Bar sinister," 315 Pontefract Arms of Le Neve Foster Post-fine, 316 Hour of Sunday Morning Service Locomotive and Gas Bristow Family "Mad world, my masters" Celtic, 317 Author of Quotation Georges I.-IV. Defoe at Tooting "Wagues," 318 Gwyneth, 319.

NOTES ON BOOKS : Sheppard's Old Palace of White- hall' Hume Brown's ' History of Scotland.'

Notices to Correspondents.

gobs*

THE ROUMANIAN LANGUAGE. I HAVE often wondered why more attention is not paid in this country to Roumanian, a language as melodious as Italian, while the quaint Slavonic and Oriental elements in its vocabulary add, at least in some eyes, to its interest. There seems to be only one Rou- manian grammar in English viz, Torceanu's, in Trubner's series of simplified grammars. Even in German I know of only two of any value namely, George Dan's (Vienna, 1897), used in Austrian schools, and Th. Wechsler's, in Hartleben's two- shilling series (Leipzig, 1890). The latter is commendable particularly for its literary extracts for reading practice. Roumanian accidence is for the most part like that of the other Romance tongues. Its chief peculiarity, the suffixed article, it has imi- tated from Albanian and Bulgarian. Except- ing auxiliaries, it has no irregular verbs. The greater proportion of the words in common use is still Latin, yet on account of the weird foreign strain, to which I have already alluded, it is perhaps fortunate that the language is rich in etymological dictionaries. I can recommend Pontbriant (1862), Cihac (1870),

or Laurianu and Massimu (1873). A more ambitious etymological dictionary, Hasdeu's ' Etymologicum Magnum Romanise,' of which the first part was issued at the expense of the Bucharest Academy in 1885, is still in pro- gress. For purely practical purposes the oest dictionary is Dame's ' Dictionnaire Roumain- Fran^ais' (Bucharest, 1893). The 'Chresto- mathie Roumaine,' by M. Gaster (Leipzig, 1891), contains extracts from 200 books and 100 manuscripts and documents, but is chiefly concerned with the ancient language, and is unhappily printed in a gratuitously ugly Cyrillic character, so that to read even a few lines of it makes one's eyes ache. Of course all modern books are printed in Roman letters. The orthography is by no means settled. The one provisionally adopted by the Roumanian Academy has always seemed to me pedantic, and I am glad to say it is being replaced by forms more in accordance with the genius of the language. My advice to any one desirous of entering upon a course of Roumanian reading is to patronize the "Biblioteca pentru TotI," a series now numbering some 200 volumes, pub- lished in Bucharest at the low price of three- pence each. It includes not only masterpieces of native writers (such as Alexandrescu, Cara- giale, Demetrescu, Ollariescu, Rossetti, Teleor, Zamfirescu), but also translations from Eng- lish, French, German, &c. Among transla- tions from English I notice works by Huxley, Lubbock, and Spencer, together with a credit- able rendering into Roumanian verse of Tennyson's * Enoch Arden ' and specimen stories from Bret Harte and Mark Twain. 'The Luck of Roaring Camp' appears as 'Norocul Roaringcampului,' and its three principal characters respectively as " Ken- tuckianul," "Sarah din Ciroki 1 ' (sic), and " Broscoiul Dracului " (" the d-d little cuss "). The pieces from Mark Twain are 'Aurelia's Unfortunate Young Man' (' Pasurile Sufle- testi ale drei Aurelia') and 'The Bad Boy' (' Baiat R6u Crescut '). The translator, Maio- rescu, introduces into the latter an interest- ing bit of local colour by stating that in the Roumanian equivalents of our Sunday-school books bad little boys are called loan (John) or Radu (Rudolph), whereas this bad boy waa called Gaga. JAS. PLATT, Jun.

THE BACON-SHAKESPEARE QUESTION.

(Continued from p. 204.)

BACON notes a number of small turns of expression, but for what purpose is not known, unless he intended them for use in a treatise on grammar. They are expressions