194
NOTES AND QUERIES. tn s. i. MAR. 5, 1910.
minority of Indo-European gutturals n ;
and at p. 41, referring to kh ana gh, generally
called aspirated gutturals, he says that
" their precise character is obscure and
difficult to determine. " With regard to the
palatal sh, it is usually held to have been
derived from guttural k through an inter-
mediate ch stage. This is true in some
cases. I beg to submit, however, that it is
directly derived from kh and gh pronounced
not as aspirates, but as the Semitic gutturals.
But even if they are merely aspirates, there
is considerable doubt as to the pronuncia-
tion of media asp. -f- t or s, as may be shown
by the following quotation from Karl
Brugmann's ' Grundriss l (Wright's trans.,
vol. i. p. 346) :
"How was the combination media asp. + t or s spoken at the time immediately preceding the dis- integration of the Indg. prim, community ? What was, e.g., the Indg. prim, form of Av. dug e dar Lith. dulster' daughter,' which on etymological principles would have to be put down as
- dhughter ? A positive answer has not yet been
found."
This will also answer PROF. SKEAT'S asser- tion that the h of Sansk. duhitra is to be accounted for by the fact that the word "once began with dh. n True, the original word did begin with dh. But this dh merely became d, ana the h is the representative of original gh.
There is no doubt at all about an original guttural. The only doubt is as to its pro- nunciation. I believe that an examination of changes undergone in Indo-European languages will show that palatal sh arose thus :
Either (1) Indo-European had gutturals kh and gh (khe and ghain) in addition to the usual series, and these became k or g in some languages, and palatal sh or h in others.
Or (2) Indo-European gutturals k, g, kh, gh (aspirates), became palatal sh or h through intermediate forms kh, gh (khe and ghain).
I offered the first view in my previous reply. But it is possible the second is the correct one, though in either case my con- tention as to palatal sh is substantially the same. V. CHATTOPADHY!YA.
LE SCEUR'S STATUE OF CHARLES I. (10' S. xii. 225, 397). MR. NEWTON is correct in saying that Mr. Holden MacMichael antici- pated my note in his excellent volume on Charing Cross. I regret having inaccurately suggested that he had overlooked this rather important point. It is not recorded that the sword with buckles and straps passed to the Board of Green Cloth, so pre-
sumably they went on account of their
weight to the melting-pot ; but would it not
be desirable to replace them ?
The disappearance of the inscription plates occurred before 1838, because John Woods of Clapton, who engraved the view of ' St. Martin's Church from Charing Cross ' for Fearnside and Harral's '.History of London,* 1838, shows the pedestal without them. The artist of this view (probably J. K. Hablot Browne) has brought Morley's Hotel in the background much too close, as if the statue was in the south-east corner of Trafalgar Square.
The inscription plates were placed one on the base and one in the recess of the pedestal on both sides four positions in all. Of the railings, although they are shown in Woods's plate, they were probably re- moved before 1837. The posts that now surround the site are marked "IV. W.R." or " W R " only, which may mean 1833 or any year between 1830 and 1837.
MR. NEWTON, who has evidently studied closely the detail of this fine work, may care to notice that there are eight nails in the shoe on the horse's uplifted foot, and that the other feet are held down to the base by metal tongues and bolts. ALECK ABRAHAMS.
LYNCH LAW (10 S. xi. 445, 515 ; xii. 52, 133, 174, 495; 11 S. i. 55). At the penultimate reference I stated that Wirt " had finished his biography on or before 23 Oct., 1816.'* On consulting my notes I find that I wrote not " had finished, 31 but " had virtually finished," and that the word " virtually " in some way got dropped out in typewriting. For this carelessness, which I naturally regret, I apologize to M.
In The Analectic Magazine for July, 1815, a writer said that " William Wirt is pre- paring for the press a Life of Patrick Henry ? ' (vi. 83), and in the same magazine for November, 1815, "Mr. Wirt's promised Life of Patrick Henry " is again referred to (vi. 376). In the summer of 1815 (see Kennedy's ' Memoirs of Wirt, 4 i. 408) Wirt engaged a publisher ; and a " Proposal by James Webster, of Philadelphia, for pub- lishing by subscription the Life of the late
Patrick Henry by William Wirt " was
printed in The Port Folio for August, 1815 (Third Series, vi. 183-4). In the same magazine for December, 1816 (Fourth Series, ii. 460-68), was printed that part of the biography which fills pp. 114-24 of Wirt's 'Life of Henry. 1 In the same letter (27 Feb., 1817) in which Wirt spoke of " the first rough draft," he said, " I am
