Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 8.djvu/22

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14


NOTES AND QUERIES,


JULY 6,1001.


highest order. A " feeding storm " is recog- nized in Scottish districts that are not specially pastoral in character, and the mean- ing that seems to be attached to it in such places is that of a lingering period of snowy weather, when the snow actually on the ground is increased or fed by intermittent falls. This is, no doubt, the kind of weather that necessitates "hand-feeding," as flock- masters call the tedious process of giving their animals artificial supplies, and so far the non- pastoral usage and Sir Walter Scott's definition are at one. At the same time the former overlaps, and indeed includes, the latter, just as it does another, which attri- butes the name " feeding storm " to the well- known voracious habit of birds in immediate anticipation of a prolonged visitation of snow. THOMAS BAYNE.

"A BAD DAY AND A WOKSE." The old

gossips still use hundreds of unrecorded sayings. One of them who has been " on the soil " nere for seventy years, talking of the shortcomings of a friend, a neighbour, said of her, " Ah ! she '11 have a bad day and a worse," meaning that she would come to grief, and worse. THOS. RATCLIFFE.

Worksop.

"THREE ACRES AND A cow." I am not aware that this celebrated political catch- phrase, used first, I believe, in the House of Commons by Mr. Jesse Collings, has been traced to its source, or at any rate its pro- bable source that is, the following passage from Sir John Sinclair's * Code of Agricul- ture' (fifth edition, 1832, Appendix 2, 'On Cottagers keeping Cows and the Establish- ment of Parochial Dairy Farms,' p. 50) :

" In order to promote so useful a measure, I was induced to draw up a plan for enabling a cottager to keep a cow on the produce of a small portion of arable land. It was there stated that three statute acres and a quarter of good arable land, worth from 20s. to 30s. per acre, would be sufficient, and a course of crops was pointed out for the management of this little farm. Such a plan was found might answer where the labourer was pecu- liarly intelligent and industrious, and pursued what may be called the field gardening husbandry of inlanders, but could not be adopted as a general system. It has never, therefore, been prosecuted to any extent."

Those interested in the subject may like to know that the plan referred to was contained ma volume of * Miscellaneous Essays,' pub- lished by Sir John Sinclair in 1802.

JAMES HOOPER. [See 8* S . xi. 365, 432, 475, 517 ; xii. 57.]

PALL MALL. The following notice relating to Pall Mall is copied from the Order Book


of General Monck. The volume contains a few passes and orders dated after the Restoration, appended to the full daily record of orders issued by him prior to that event. It is in Worcester College library (Clarke MS. xlix. fo. 155b) :

"26 Aprill, 1662. Order, that wheras there are divers persons doe presume to come and play in his Majesty's Pail-Mall in S. James's Parke without the leave or approbation of the keeper of the said Pall-Mall, itt is his Majesty's pleasure and com- mand, that heerafter noe person or persons what- soever shall play in the said Pail-Mall without the licence of Lawrence Du-puy Esq. keeper of the said Pall Mall, and that noe persons shall after play carry their malls out of S. James's Parke without leave of the said keeper, butt shall carry them to bee kept in the house appointed for that purpose. And all officers or souldiers who shall command or keepe the guards in S. James's Parke are to bee assisting to Mr. Du-puy in the observance of this order."

C. H. FIRTH.

JAPANESE NAMES. I see the manager of the Criterion, in announcing the season of Japanese plays, calls the principal actor Otojiro Kawakami. This is presumably out of deference to our insular prejudices, as the Japanese way of writing it would be just the reverse, Kawakami Otojiro, surname first and " Christian " name second. Japanese " Chris- tian " names indicate by their termination the order of birth of the children of a family, ending in -taw for an eldest son, in -jiro for a second son, in -saburo for a third, and so on down to -juro for a tenth. Gentaro means Gen-ftrst-male, Otojiro means Oto- second-male. These terminations are also used alone as "Christian" names, without prefix. Thus Saburo is equivalent to the classical Tertius. Eida Saburo, a name well known to collectors of Japanese works of art, might be translated Tertius Eida.

JAS. PLATT, Jun.

DAHLIA AND FUCHSIA. These names are sometimes misspelt and frequently mis- pronounced owing to neglect of their origin. If we bear in mind that they commemorate two botanists, Dahl and Fuchs, we shall not give the name-sound to the a in dahlia, lor pronounce fuchsia as if the c were absent. Flower - names like bougainvillia and poin- settia, derived from those of Frenchmen, lave suffered less ; and so have deutzia and ialmia, though from Germans.

ISAAC TAYLOR.

THE PRICE OF INK, 1288. Historical students may remember that the * Dialogus de Scaccario' states (book i. chap. iii.)that in Michaelmas term two shillings are due for ink for either exchequer for the whole year,