Real Signatures versus Pseudo-Names (Vol. vi., p. 310.; Vol. viii., p. 94.).—There is no doubt that the straightforwardness of open and undisguised communications to your excellent miscellany is desirable; but a few words may be said on behalf of your anonymous contributors. If the rule were established that every correspondent should add his name to his communication, many of your friends might, from motives of delicacy, decline asking a question or hazarding a reply. By adopting a nom-de-guerre, men eminent in their various pursuits can quietly and unostentatiously ask a question, or contribute information. If the latter be done with reference to standard works of authority, or to MSS. preserved in our public depositories, the disclosure of the name of the contributor adds nothing to the matter contributed, and he may rejoice that he has been the means of promoting the objects of the "N. & Q." without the "blushing to find it fame." It should, however, be a sine quâ non that all original communications, and those of matters of fact, should be authenticated by a real signature, when no reference can be given to authorities not accessible to the public; and it is to be regretted that such authentication has not, in such cases, been generally afforded.
Thos. Wm. King (York Herald).
Lines on the Institution of the Garter (Vol. viii., p. 53.).—
"Her stocking's security fell from her knee,
Allusions and hints, sneers and whispers went round."
May I put a Query on the idea suggested by these lines—that the accidental dropping of her garter implied an imputation on the fair fame of the Countess of Salisbury. Why should this be? That it did imply an imputation, I judge as well from the vindication of the lady by King Edward, as also from the proverbial expression used in Scotland, and to be found in Scott's Works, of "casting a leggin girth," as synonymous with a female "faux pas." I have a conjecture, but should not like to venture it, without inquiring the general impression as to the origin of this notion.
A. B. R.
Belmont.
"Short red, God red," &c. (Vol. vii., p. 500.).—Sir Walter Scott has committed an oversight when, in Tales of a Grandfather, vol. i. p. 85., he mentions a murderer of the Bishop of Caithness to have made use of the expression, "Schort red, God red, slea ye the bischop." Adam, Bishop of Caithness, was burnt by the mob near Thurso, in 1222, for oppression in the exaction of tithes; John, Earl of Orkney and Caithness, was killed in retaliation by the bishop's party in 1231.
The language spoken at that time on the sea-coast of Caithness must have been Norse. Sutherland would appear to have been wrested from the Orkney-Norwegians before that period, and the Celtic tongue and race gaining on the Norse; but on the sea-coast of Caithness I should apprehend the Norse continued to be the spoken tongue till a later period, when it was superseded by the Scottish. The Norwegians in the end of the ninth century colonised Orkney, and expelled or destroyed the former inhabitants. The Western Isles were also subjugated by them at that time, and probably Caithness, or at all events a little later. It would be desirable to know the race and tongue previously existing in Caithness, and if these were lost in the Norwegians and Norse, and an earlier Christianity in Scandinavian Paganism. This may, however, lead to the unfathomably dark subject of the Picts. Is it known when Norse ceased to be spoken in Caithness? The story of the burning of the Bishop of Caithness forms the conclusion of the Orkneyinga Saga; and vide Torfæus, Orcades, p. 154., and Dalrymple's Annals of Scotland, of dates 1222 and 1231.