Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 2.djvu/165

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page needs to be proofread.

9* s. ii. AUG. 20,


NOTES AND QUERIES.


157


Gironde, and there is no doubt that the name is derived from the gravelly soil on which the vines grow, but there are three passages in Rabelais which do not seem to support the contention that there was no vine-growing district known as Grave :

1. "Certain nombre de tonneaulx de vin de

Grave, d'Orleans, de Beaulne, de Myrevaulx," &c. 'Pant.,' iii. 52.

2. " tin grand vignoble de toutes especes de vignes,

comme Phalerne, Malvoisie Beaune, Mirevaux,

Orleans Anjou, Grave." 'Pant.,' v. 34.

3. "C'est vin de Grave." 'Pant,,' v. 43.

In the last passage Jannet reads "vin de Grece" but in the fifth book the text is uncer- tain and the word occurs in connexion with Beaune and Mirevaux, so that the proper reading is almost certainly Grave.

W. F. SMITH. 13A, Margaret Street, W.

SIR WILLIAM BEAUMARIS RUSH (9 th S. i. 488, 498). He was the eldest son of William Rush, of Lambeth, and Mary, daugh- ter of George Smith, of London, his wife. He inherited the estate at Royden in Suffolk which was afterwards sold to Admiral Sir Hyde Parker, and after his death resold, and the mansion (which had cost the preceding Mr. Rush 30,000/.) pulled down. Sir William then removed to Wimbledon, where he resided for the last thirty years of his life. He wedded, 10 April, 1782, Laura, daughter of Cremer Carter, of Southwark, by whom (who died 14 November, 1822) he had six daughters. Knighted 19 June, 1800. For further parti- culars of the family see Burke's ' Commoners and Gentry.' JOHN RADCLIFFE.

PUDDLEDOCK (9 th S. i. 329, 478). There is a large wood with a cottage or two near and a farm, about three and a half miles south of Warley in Essex, which is so named.

MRS. STEPHENSON.

Warley Barracks.

THE DEVIL'S DAM (8 th S. iv. 442 ; v. 442 ; vi. 44, 284 ; vii. 203 ; viii. 25 ; 9 th S. ii. 45). In my first contribution to 'N. & Q.' on this subject I did not reveal the whole legend concerning Lilith ; but when I referred to the lines of Butler it was necessary to tell more of the story. Lilith was both the mother and the paramour of Asmodeiis. When Asmodeiis (or Asmodai, as he is some- times called) changed himself into the like- ness of Solomon, and became a devil incarnate, he had still the same perverse inclination. Isaac DTsraeli tells the story of him and Solomon, in the article entitled 'Rabbinical Stories,' in the ' Curiosities of Literature.' It has been said in ' N. & Q.' that Shakspeare


by "Devil's dam" may not have meant mother of the devil. But that he did use dam as mother is proved conclusively by the following words of Prospero in ' The Tempest ':

Thou poisonous slave, got by the devil himself

Upon thy wicked dam.

There is an equally conclusive passage in ' King John.' But I quoted that once before.

E. YARDLEY.

This involves a misconception, for Lilith is merely a feminine form of layil, night : read layiloth and cf. Assyrian lilati, evening, Arabic leu, Syriac lail ; all from Sanskrit lal, to sport, so lalita, lilata, beautiful, loving ; Greek XaAew, Eng. lullaby. Night is the time for cool enjoyment in tropical countries, and we have the idea preserved in the song "Lovely night, they nave called thee dark and drear," &c. Isaiah, taken literally, reads " Night [i. e. darkness] shall settle there and find herself a resting-place." See also chap. Ix. verse 2 : " Darkness shall cover the earth, and gross darkness the peoples." A. HALL.

SWEATING-PITS IN IRELAND (9 th S. ii. 107). An excellent description of one of these, entitled 'An Ancient Irish Hot- Air Bath or Sweat-house on the Island of Rathlin,' by Rev. W. B. Mulcahy, is to be found in the Journal of the Society of Antiquaries (Ireland), vol. i. (1891), pp. 589-90. Examples are also described as existing at Innismurry, vol. i. (1890), p. 165, and near Eglish, vol. iv. (1894), p. 180. W r . B. GERISH.

FRENCH CARDINAL (9 th S. ii. 48). The 'Encyclopaedia Britannica,' v. 96, mentions various cardinals whose ages at the time of their creation ranged from twenty-three years down to eight.

EDWARD H. MARSHALL, M.A.

Hastings.

COUNT ST. GERMAIN (9 th S. ii. 128). A life of the Count St. Germain is included in Wraxall's ' Remarkable Adventurers,' 2 vols.

Chelsea.

ANTICIPATION OF X RAYS (9 th S. ii. 106). In the ' Tarikhu-s Sind,' by Mir Muhammad M'asum, written A.D. 1600, there is an account of the application of the X rays to surgical purposes. Wandering about the country near Ghuzni, an exiled prince meets a man carrying "hukka tubes." He is astonished to find that the man's interior economy is visible as long as the hukka tubes are carried on his head. He buys the tubes and takes them to Ghuzni. The king of that place is ill, having inadvertently swallowed two