Replies to Minor Queries.
Ancient Timber Town-halls.—Since my account of ancient town-halls (Vol. v., p. 470.) was written, one of these fabrics of the olden time noticed therein has ceased to exist, that of Kington, co. Hereford, it having been taken down early in November last, but for what reason I have not learned. Another, formerly standing in the small town of Church Stretton, in the co. of Salop, which was erected upon wooden pillars, and constructed entirely of timber, must have been a truly picturesque building, was taken down in September, 1840. A woodcut of the latter is now before me. Of the old market-house at Leominster I possess a very beautiful original drawing, done by Mr. Carter upwards of half a century ago.
J. B. Whitborne.
Magnetic Intensity (Vol. vi., p. 578.).—The magnetic intensity is greatest at the poles; the ratio may roughly be said to be 1.3, but more accurately 1 to 2.906. This is found by observation of the oscillations of a vertical or horizontal needle. A needle which made 245 oscillations in ten minutes at Paris, made only 211 at 7° 1′ south lat. in Peru. The intensity and variations to which it is subject is strictly noted at all the magnetic observatories, and I believe the disturbances of intensity which sometimes occur have been found to be simultaneous by a comparison of observations at different latitudes.
For the fullest information on magnetic intensity, Adsum is referred to Sabine's Report on
Magnetic Intensity, also Sabine's Contributions to Terrestrial Magnetism, 1843, No. V.
T. B.
Monument at Wadstena (Vol. vi., pp. 388. 518.).—I have received the following (which I translate) from my friend in Denmark, whom I mentioned in my last communication on this monument:
"It is only about a month since I saw Queen Philippa's tombstone in the church of Vadstena Monastery. It is a very large stone, on which the device and inscription are cut in outline, but there is no brass about it. King Erik Menved's and Queen Ingeberg's monument in Ringsted Church is the finest brass I ever saw, and I have seen many."
There is a good engraving of the brass alluded to, which is a very rich one, in Antiquariske Annaler, vol. iii.: Copenhagen, 1820. The inscriptions are curious, and the date 1319.
W. C. Trevelyan.
Wallington.
David Routh, R. C. Bishop of Ossory (Vol. iii., p. 169.).—In the article on a Cardinal's Monument, by Mr. J. Graves, of Kilkenny, allusion is made to the monument of the above Catholic Bishop Routh or Rothe, as being in the Cathedral of St. Canice, Kilkenny, with his arms "surmounted by a cardinal's hat," and that he died some years after 1643. If Mr. Graves would give the date of this prelate's decease, or rather a copy of the full inscription on his monument, with a notice of the sculptured armorial bearings thereupon, he would be conferring a favour on a distant inquirer; and as Mr. Graves is, apparently, a resident at Kilkenny, no obstacle exists to prevent his complying with this request.
Any notices procurable regarding Bishop Routh are well deserving of insertion in "N. & Q.," for he was a man of deep learning and research, and is well known to have assisted the celebrated Archbishop Ussher of Armagh in the compilation of his Primordia, for which he had high compliments paid him by that eminent prelate, notwithstanding their being of different religions.
Bishop Routh was also himself the author of a work on Irish Ecclesiastical History, now very rare, and seldom procurable complete. He published it anonymously, in two volumes 8vo., in the year 1617, at "Coloniæ, apud Steph. Rolinum," with the following rather long title:
"Analecta Sacra, Nova, et Mira, de Rebus Catholicorum in Hibernia: Divisa in tres partes, quarum I, Continet semestrem gravaminam relationem, secundâ hac editione novis adauctam additamentis, et Notis illustratam. II. Parænesin ad Martyres designatos. III. Processum Martyrialem quorundam Fidei Pugilium; Collectore et Relatore, T. N. Philadelpho."
I fear this has degenerated from a Note into a Query; however, I may state in conclusion, that Mr. Graves is in error in styling the hat on Bishop Routh's monument a cardinal's, for all Catholic prelates, and abbots also, have their armorial bearings surmounted by a hat, exactly similar to a cardinal's hat, with this difference only, that the number of tassels depending from it varies according to the rank of the prelate, from the cardinal's with fifteen tassels in five rows, down to that of a prior with three only on each side in two rows.
A. S. A.
Punjaub.
Cardinal Erskine (Vol. ii., p. 406.; Vol. iii., p. 13.).—Several notices of this ecclesiastic have appeared in "N. & Q.," but as none of them give the exact information required, I now do so, though perhaps tardily. He was born 13th February, 1753, at Rome, where his father, Colin Erskine, a Jacobite, and exiled scion of the noble Scottish house of Erskine, Earls of Kellie, had taken up his residence. "Monsignor Charles Erskine," having embraced the ecclesiastical life at an early age, and passed through several gradations in the Church of Rome, was, in 1785, "Promotore della Fede," an office of the Congregation of Rites; in 1794 auditor to Pope Pius VI., and raised to the purple by Pope Pius VII., who created him a Cardinal-Deacon of the Holy Roman Church, 25th February, 1801. Cardinal Erskine accompanied the latter pontiff in his exile from Rome in the year 1809, and died at Paris, 19th March, 1811, in the fifty-eighth year of his age, and eleventh of his cardinalate.
A. S. A.
Punjaub.
"Ne'er to these chambers," &c. (Vol. vii., p. 14.).—In reply to Aram's Query: "Where do these lines come from?" they come from Tickell's sublime and pathetic "Elegy on the Death of Addison." Aram ("Wits have short memories," &c.) has misquoted them. In a poem of so high a mood, to displace a word is to destroy a beauty. Aram has interpolated several words. The following is the true version:
"Ne'er to these chambers, where the mighty rest,
Since their foundation, came a nobler guest,
Nor e'er was to the bowers of bliss convey'd
A fairer spirit, or more welcome shade."
George Daniel.
Canonbury.
These lines are taken from the "Elegy on the Death of Addison," written by Tickell. They are, if I remember rightly, inscribed on the gravestone recently placed over his remains by the Earl of Ellesmere, in the north aisle of Henry VII.'s Chapel. The last two lines which your correspondent quotes should be as follows:
"Nor e'er was to the bowers of bliss convey'd
A fairer spirit, or more welcome shade."
J. K. R. W.
The Budget (Vol. vi., p. 604.).—It may be useful to inform Prestoniensis, that, in a recent work on political economy, M. Ch. Coquelin says, that the word budget, in its present signification, has passed into France from England: the latter country having first borrowed it from the old French language—bougette signifying (and particularly in old Norman) a leather purse. It was the custom in England to put into a leather bag the estimates of receipts and expenditure presented to parliament: and hence, as Coquelin observes, the term passed from the containant to the contained, and, with this new signification, returned from this country into France; where it was first used in an official manner in the arrêtés of the Consul's 4th Themidor, year X, and 17th Germinal, year XI.
F. H.
"Catching a Tartar" (Vol. vi., p. 317.).—This common and expressive saying is thus explained in Arvine's Cyclopædia:
"In some battle between the Russians and the Tartars, who are a wild sort of people in the north of Asia, a private soldier called out, 'Captain, halloo there! I've caught a Tartar!' 'Fetch him along then,' said the Captain. 'Ay, but he won't let me,' said the man. And the fact was the Tartar had caught him. So when a man thinks to take another in, and gets himself bit, they say he's caught a Tartar."
Grose says that this saying originated with an Irish soldier who was in the "Imperial," that is, I suppose he means the Austrian service. This is hardly probable; the Irish are made to father many sayings which do not rightly belong to them, and this I think may be safely written as one among the number.
Eirionnach has now two references before him, Grose's Glossary and Arvine's Cyclopædia, in which his Query is partly explained, if he can but find the dates of their publication. In this search I regret I cannot assist him, as neither of these works are to be found in the libraries of this island; at least thus far I have not been able to meet with them.
W. W.
Malta.
The Termination "-itis" (Vol. vii., p. 13.).—Adsum asks: "What is the derivation of the term -itis, used principally in medical words, and these signifying, inflammation?" If "N. & Q." were a medical journal, the question might be answered at length, to the great advantage of the profession; for, of late years, this termination has been tacked on by medical writers, especially foreigners, to words of all kinds, in utter defiance of the rules of language: as if a Greek affix were quite a natural ending to a Latin or French noun. -itis can with propriety be appended only to those Greek nouns whose adjectives end in -ιτης: e.g. πλευρα, πλευριτης; κερας, κερατιτης, &c. Πλευριτις is used by Hippocrates. Πλευρα means the membrane lining the side of the chest: πλευριτις (νοδος understood) is morbus lateralis, the side-disease, or pleurisy. In the same manner keratitis is a very legitimate synonym for disease of the horny coat (cornea) of the eye. But medical writers, disregarding the rules of language, have, for some years past, revelled in the use of their favourite -itis to a most ludicrous extent. Thus, from cornea, they make "corneitis," and describe an inflammation of the crystalline lens as lentitis. Nay, some French and German writers on diseases of the eyes have coined the monstrous word "Descemetitis," on the ground that one Monsieur Descemet discovered a structure in the eye, which, out of compliment to him, was called "the membrane of Descemet."
Jaydee.