Ma. L.
[Our correspondent furnishes an addition to our list of parallel passages. The lines quoted by W. V. and those now given by our present correspondent can never be different readings of the same poem. Besides, it has been already shown that the lines asked for are from the poem entitled Woman, by Eaton Stannard Barrett (see antè, pp. 350. 423.).]
Satin (Vol. vii., p. 551.).—In a note just received by me from Canton, an American friend of mine remarks as follows:
"When you write again to 'N. & Q.' you can say that the word satin (Vol. vii., p. 551.), like the article itself, is of Chinese origin, and that other foreign languages, in endeavouring like the English to imitate the Chinese sz-tün, have approximated closely to it, and to each other. Of this the answers to the Query given in the place referred to are a sufficient proof; Fr. satin, W. sidan, &c. &c."
I suspect that he is right, and that Ogilvie and Webster, whom you quote, have not got to the bottom of the word. I may add that the notion of my Canton friend receives approval from a Chinese scholar to whom I have shown the above extract.
W. T. M.
Hong Kong.
"Quid facies," &c. (Vol. viii., p. 539.).—
"Bierve, N. Maréchal, Marquis de, a Frenchman well known for his ready wit and great facetiousness. He wrote two plays of considerable merit, Les Réputations and Le Séducteur. He died at Spa, 1789, aged 42. He is author of the distich on courtezans:
'Quid facies, facies Veneris cum veneris ante?
Ne sedeas! sed eas, ne pereas per eas.'"
—Lemprière's Universal Biography, abridged from the larger work, London, 1808.