256
NOTES AND QUERIES. 112 s.iv. SEPT., i9is.
ARHBOURNE, DERBYSHIRE (12 S. iv. 218).
Through the courtesy of the editor of The
Ashbourne News, I am enabled to inform
Cr. F. R. B. that the author of ' The History
and Topography of Ashbourn, the Valley
of the Dove, and the Adjacent Villages '
was the late Mr. Robert Hobson. I am
also told that the work is out of print, and
copies very rare. CECIL CLARKE.
%f Junior Athenaeum Club.
Rupert Simms's ' Bibliotheca Staff ord- iensis,' 1894, in a notice of Robert Hobson, says that he was " the responsible com- piler " of the local work inquired about, of which 400 copies large, and 600 copies small, paper were issued. Mr. Hobson, torn at Ashbourne in 1815, was a member of the publishing firm, but afterwards joined an old-established printing and pub- lishing concern at Wellington, Salop.
W. B. H.
BIRTH FOLK-LORE : PARSLEY BEDS AND GOOSEBERRY BUSHES (12 S. iv. 219). Young inquisitive people when suddenly confronted with a newly arrived brother or sister naturally ask the question, " Where did it come frpm ? " The stock reply to this query varies in different places. The answer in most common use appears to be " From the parsley bed." One of a more elaborate form is, " The doctor dug it up with a golden spade under the gooseberry "bush." Of this the currant bush is an occasional variant. In certain parts of the Continent storks are credited with bringing the babies. Swift evidently refers to the parsley saying when, in his ' Receipt for stewing Veal,' he recommends
Some sprigs of that bed
Where children are bred.
Certain up-to-date children, products of the modern system of education, have apparently very different ideas from the foregoing, for amongst some " howlers " recorded in The /Schoolmaster is the following. Two children, on being awakened one morning and informed of the advent of a new brother, were keen to know whence and how he arrived. " It must have been the milkman," said the girl. " Why the milk- man ? " asked her little brother. " Because he says on his cart ' Families supplied,' " replied the sister. JOHN T. PAGE.
Long Itchington, Warwickshire.
It is an old tale in Derbyshire to tell inquiring children, on the advent of a new baby, that boys arc dug up from nettle beds, and girls from'parsley beds, a variant being
j that boy babies are dug from under the
! gooseberry bushes, and girl babies from
I under the rose-tree bushes : but the former
I pleased better girls not yet in their teens,
while lads accepted the rough-and-ready
idea of the nettle bed as a matter of course.
THOS. RATCLIFFE.
Worksop.
I believe that in Germany, Denmark, and Holland storks are supposed to bring the babies which in Lincolnshire imagination come from gooseberry bushes. J. T. F.
Winterton, Lines.
In the last chapter of ' The Little Minister,' j by Sir James Barrie, Margaret, aged 5, says I that her father found her in a cabbage in j the garden. M. H. DODDS.
VALENTINE KNIGHTLEY CHETWOOD LABAT : ilsMENiA (12 S. iv. 188). As regards the I origin of the name Ismenia, it is borne by
- the -female delegate from Bceotia in the
' Lysistrata ' of Aristophanes ; and Ismene I as the name of a fount or a woman, and
Ismenos a stream or a hero, are familiar in j the legendary history of Thebes. To go I behind this and etymologize is unnecessary
for the present purpose.
EDWARD BENSLY.
"RuA NOVA," 1636-7 (12 S. iv. 215). | When I was at Panjim (New Goa) some 'years ago, an official presented me with a j copy of the ' Planta da Velha-Cidade de j Goa ' (published by the Direccao das Obras Publicas, 24 de Agosto, 1910). This plan has a long list of buildings in Old Goa as it formerly existed and the names of about a dozen streets, but " Rua Nova " is not among these. L. L. K.
DUTCH THERMOMETER OR BAROMETER
(12 S. iv. 158). The glass vessel described
I in the query is a form of water barometer,
I and when kept in an even temperature is a
j reliable indicator of the rise or fall of
i barometric pressure. It should be charged
! with water, at a time when the mercury
barometer stands fairly high, by immersing
the whole thing in a bucket of water and
allowing the air to bubble out of the long
spout. An excess of water inside is of little
consequence, for in a week or two the
instrument will adjust itself. When rain
may be expected the water rises in the spout,
and may at first flow out at the top.
When fine weather predominates the water
drops down to the bottom of the spout ;
and as there is a wide range of action
