Minor Queries Answered.
Meaning of Aneroid.
—What is the derivation of the word aneroid, as applied to a new description of barometer lately introduced?
AGRICOLA.
[From a note in Mr. Dent's interesting pamphlet, A Treatise on the Aneroid, a newly invented Portable Barometer; with a short Historical Notice of Barometers in general, their Construction and Use, it appears that the word aneroid has been the subject of some philological discussion. "It is said to be derived from three Greek words, ἀ, νηρὸς, and εἶδος, and to signify a form without fluid. If so, it does not appear very happily chosen, since it indicates merely what the instrument is not, without at all explaining what it is.">[
Fox's Cunning.
—Can any of your correspondents or readers give any authentic information as to the fact having been witnessed by any one, of the old story of the fox relieving itself of fleas by taking a feather in its mouth, and gradually, though slowly enough, retrograding itself into the water, first by legs and tail, then body, shoulders, and head to the nose, and thus compelling the fleas, to escape from the drowning element, to pass over the nose on to the bridge of the feather, which is then committed to the stream.
Has any one actually seen this? Has any one heard it related by one who has seen the ejectment performed?
J. D.
Torquay, May 12.
[Lord Brougham, in his Dialogues on Instinct (ed. 1844, p. 110.), does not allude to this proverbial instance, but says: "I know not if it (the Fox's cunning) was ever more remarkably displayed than in the Duke of Beaufort's country; where Reynard, being hard pressed, disappeared suddenly, and was, after strict search, found immersed in a water pool up to the very snout, by which he held a willow bough hanging over the pond.">[