Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 9.djvu/95

 9* s. ix. FEH. i, loos.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

87

Can any one tell me what is meant by a " drawing-knife "1 The passage, in its litera sense, means that with it they cut through a mast some sixteen inches in diameter ; but il may probably be merely a careless way of saying that they cut the shrouds, and the mast broke off by its own weight. But at any rate what was a "drawing-knife"?

J. K. LAUGHTON. [There is a full explanation in the * H.E.D.']

"SAY NOT THAT HE DID WELL." Can you tell me the author of the following quotation ? Say not that he did well or ill, But say he did his best.

F. M. CAMILLERI MAJOR, F.S.I.

METHOD OF TESTING CLOTH. Can you tell me of any means by which one can ascertain if flannel or cloth of any kind is really made of wool or not ? A. J. E.

[If a small fragment of cloth is cut off the piece, you may by a simple process of unravelling dis- tinguish if the warp is of cotton. Supposing the material to be made of what is called wool, the presence of what is technically known as " shoddy" is revealed when the fragment on being stretched by the thumbs with the leverage of the forefingers is inelastic, soft, and spongy, yields easily, and having yielded does not return to its original firm- ness.]

MOORE'S * HISTORY OF DUNSTABLE.' In- formation as to date, author, price, &c., earnestly requested. . F. C. BEAZLEY.

Fern Hill, Oxton, Birkenhead.

[We fail to trace any such work.]

WINDOW GLASS. Was any kind of "win- ,dow glass" (apart from coloured mosaic) used by the Romans, or any other ancient people ? My impression is that such was not employed at all until the eleventh or twelfth century, and that any statements to the contrary are mistakes of historians or translators.

G. C. WARDEN.

PSALMORUM CODEX LATINUS. I have a beautiful copy of a Latin edition of the Psalms, with a commentary by Bishop Bruno. The book is a folio of 276 printed leaves, measuring lljin. by 8 Jin., and is in three sizes of type. There are two columns to a page, the large type of the Psalms having twenty-five lines to a full column, and the commentary fifty lines. The book is without colophon, or numerals, or signatures, or catchwords, and has no printer's name, place, or date, and therefore was, in all pro- bability, issued while printing was in its infancy, and the art was a secret, and printed copies were sold as MSS. It is one of the earliest books printed in two colours, red and black. My object in giving these par-

ticulars is that the edition may be identified. It has an introduction of fourteen pages, which cannot have been written by Bishop Bruno, seeing that it records his death in 1045. Can any of the readers of * N. & Q.' tell me who is supposed to have written it? Internal evidence points to its having been written about two hundred years after the commentator's death, for the introduction speaks of the testimony of Origen as dating back one thousand years ; and as Origen died in 253 or 254, that brings the date of the introduction to about 1253. The Psalms are from the Vulgate.

GEO. WASHINGTON MOON, Hon.F.RS.L. 21, Hove Park Villas, Hove, Sussex.

DALRYMPLE ON THE FUR TRADE: I am anxious to learn the correct title and date of Dalrymple's ** admirable pamphlet on the Fur Trade," thus described in the preface to Meares's * Voyages,' London, 1791. Lowndes states that several of this writer's minor works are in the British Museum. An answer direct will oblige. C. KING.

101, Union Street, Torquay.

"WiTH AFFECTION BEAMING." Can you dentify this description : " With affection Deaming in one eye and calculation in the ther"? R. LUCAS.

MUMMERS. I shall be greatly obliged if you or some of your correspondents will dndly state where full and trustworthy in- formation may be found with reference to mummers and their quaint dialogues or plays and their origin. H. W.

[Consult 2 nd S. x. 466 ; xi. 271. See also Brand's Popular Antiquities,' ed. Hazlitt, 1870, vol. i. >p. 245 et seq., and Gomme's ' Dictionary of British folk-lore,' part i. vol. ii.]

MARKOE OR MARCOU FAMILY : RECORDS OF ^EVIS, ST. EUSTATIUS, AND SANTA CRUZ. The Markoe or Marcou family, from Salins and Montbeliard in the Franche-Comte of Trance, were, with a Count Crequi, early .ettlers in the above islands, and some systematic search is now being made to Hscover genealogical data as to the family .nd the. existence of any records of the slands in England, as a consequence of naval perations or military successes in the West Indies. Careful inquiry in the islands dis- poses the not unexpected fact that not a ingle public record antedating 1780 is in the
 * ustody of the local authorities. The church

Accords and gravestones which I am about X) examine personally are reported as few and fragmentary. Recitals in legal docu- ments as to St. Eustatius show that one