Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 4.djvu/146

234 NOTES AND QUERIES. [9th B. iv. SEPT. ie, "I mind me hanging on the gallows-tree nine whole nights wounded with the spear, offered to Woden, myself to myself ; on the tree whose roots no man knoweth. They gave me no loaf: they held no horn to me. I peered down. I caught the mysteries with a cry, then I fell back." Can it be that we have here a lost frag- ment of a widely diffused legend? It would seem as if the birds came and fed the god as he hung on the tree, when men had refused him meat and drink. It is quite possible that a man called Tom Otter, or Jack Otter, was hung at Lincoln in 1808, and gibbeted near Saxilby. But if this were true it would only prove that an ancient legend had been transferred to a modern criminal. Whenever a folk-tale contains verses, and especially when those verses are in the form of a riddle, it is certainly very old. As the date of Tom Otter's execution is given, documentary evidence, or some kind of written testimony, should be obtainable. Is the order for suspension on a gallows to be found in the records at Lincoln, and is the fact mentioned in any newspaper of the period 1 I ask these questions because I have often noticed that when the populace are inclined to romance about a thing they usually fix the date about seventy or eighty years ago, or just beyond the memories of persons now living. S. O. ADDY. Forty years ago this was sent round "in company" as a riddle. The version used was:— Ten tongues in one head, Between the living and the dead : One went out to seek some bread, To feed the living in the dead. The answer was: " A tomtit's nest with young ones in a hanged man's head." It was not until many years after I first heard it that I learnt the " riddle " was connected with the hanging of Torn Otter in his gibbet- irons. THOS. RATCLIFFE. Worksop. "LiKE A THRESHER" (9th S. iv. 106, 171).— If I may trust a very distant memory, there is mention made of the flail being employed as an offensive weapon in ' Peregrine Pickle,' published in 1751. A publican named Tunley, armed with one, waylays an enemy, but, not being skilled in the use of it, strikes his own head7 "causing lights to dance before his eyes." It is an instance of placing weapons in unskilful hands, and of using them for a purpose for which they were not intended. JOHN PICKFORD, M.A. Newbourne Rectory, Woodbridge. In the days when the deer existed in Cran- bourne Chase the poachers used a flail with a short bob which was called a swingell. The keepers wore thick straw beehive hats as a protection. I have seen them both many years ago. W. E, M. THOYTS. Sulhamstead. "HILL ME UP" (9th S. iii. 285, 435,496).— Several correspondents say MR. RATCLIFFE is mistaken in holding that the verb to hM implies raising a mound. Their contention is at variance with American usage, ine verb has seldom, if ever, been used in New England except to describe raising a mound or hill about stalks of corn (maize). About half a dozen kernels were thrown into each hole in the ground. Half of them would become each a stalk of corn. Hilling con- sisted in raising a mound (of old with a hoe, and now with a cultivator) round each cluster of stalks. When the critics cross the ocean they will see " hills of corn " in " corn oceans, as the phrase is, as multitudinous or beyond counting as oceanic waves. Indian corn is the most valuable crop—of more worth than cotton, wheat, tobacco, or sugar. English visitors perpetually say that corn-fields are the unique American wonder—the standing army of peace. JAMES D. BUTLER. BLACK JEWS (9th S. iv. 68).—The undated volume referred to by MR. HOOPER must have been published this side of 1878 ; for it was in that year that a few regiments of the Indian army were dispatched to Malta. There is no historical evidence of the exist- ence of Jews on the west coast of India before the Christian era. See 'Madras Manual of Administration,' vol. iii. p. 194, under the heading ' Cochin.' There are still white and black Jews on the west coast. The former are generally recognized to be the pure- blooded descendants of Jewish settlers ; and the latter, some native converts and some half-blooded descendants. FRANK PENNY, LL.M. Fort St. George. " PERFIDIOUS ALBION " (9th S. iv. 169).-The anecdote referred to by MR. HEBB is an old one, and is told of the first and also of the third Napoleon. I do not know the date of 'Boule de Suif,' but the tale has, curiously enough, just cropped up again as to Napoleon III. in the recently published (1899) and much overrated ' Me"moires de Madame de la Ferronnays.' This lady, who seems to have thought it necessary to drop into her rather dull record a story or two of the kind which we must apparently take as in vogue among the French "literary aristocrats," says :— "Le poignard et les armes a feu n'ayant pas riussi S debarrasser de 1'empereur ceux qui