hats were becoming obsolete), and offered to the British public at the reasonable figure of four shillings and ninepence. Albert Smith sang:—
With a brim very broad and quite flat.
’Tis a pity that medical students
Have such love for a gossamer hat.
E. G. Younger, M.D.
The word goss, applied to a hat, is usually supposed to be a shortened form of gossamer, with reference to the use of gossamer silk in the manufacture of hats. Bardsley thinks that the origin of the surname is to be found in goose, cf. ‘English Surnames,’ p. 494, ed. 1875. Ferguson, in ‘The Teutonic Name-System,’ p. 309, thinks that the name is connected with goz, another form of gaud=Goth. F. C. Birkbeck Terry.
[Other correspondents reply to the same effect.]
The Sling (7th S. iv. 427).—The sling, as σφενδόνη, is mentioned once in Homer, as part of the equipment of Helenus, and borne by his attendant in the combat with Menelaus (‘Il.,’ N. xiii. l. 600). It appears under the synonym, ἐΰστροφος ὀιὸς ἄωτος, as a part of the arms with which the Locrians came supplied (ib., l. 716). When the Athenians landed, B.C. 425, upon the island of Sphacteria to attack the Lacedemonian garrison, they feared that in the event of a retreat they might be set upon, inter alia, καὶ σφενδόναις (Thuc., iv. 32).
Virgil has an excellent description of the use of the sling in the combat between Mezentius and the son of Arcens:—
Ipse ter adducta circum caput egit habena;
Et media adversi liquefacto tempora plumbo
Diffidit, ac multa porrectum extendit arena.
‘Æn.,’ ix. 586–9,
Pliny attributes the invention to the Phœnicians (‘N. H.,’ vii. 56). Others attribute the invention to the inhabitants of the Baleares Insulæ, who were famous for the use of the sling. So Livy has, in reference to their alliance with the Carthaginians and opposition to the Roman fleet:—
“Fundis ut nunc plurimum, ita tunc solo eo telo utebantur, nec quisquam alterius gentis unus tantum ea arte, quantum inter alios omnes Baleares excellunt: itaque tanta vis lapidum creberrimæ grandinis modo in propinquantem jam terræ classem effusa est, ut, intrare portnm non ausi averterent in altum naves.”—B.C. 206, lib. xxviii. c. 37.
Florus writes of another attack upon the Romans at a later time, B.C. 123, in very similar terms:—
“Sed quum venientem ab alto Romanam classem prospexissent, prædam putantes, ausi etiam occurrere; et primo impetu ingenti lapidum saxorumque nimbo classem operuerunt. Tribus quisque fundis præliatur. Certos esse quis miretur ictus, quum hæc sola genti arma sint, id unum ab infantia studium? Cibum puer a matre non accipit, nisi quem, ipsa monstrante, percussit.”—‘Hist. Rom.,’ l. iii. c. 8.
They were not, however, successful, but were overcome by Metellus. Strabo connects the two original sources of the invention very neatly when, in writing of the inhabitants of these islands, he observes:—
Εφενδονῆται ἄριστοι λέγονται, καὶ τοῦτ ἤσκησαν, ὥς φασι, διαφερόντως, ἐξ ὅτον Φοίνικες κατέσχον τὰς νήσονς.—‘Geogr.,’ l. iii. p. 168.
Cæsar availed himself of them:—
“Eo de nocte Cæsar, iisdem ducibus usus, qui nuncii ab Iccio venerant, Numidas et Cretas sagittarios et funditores Baleares subsidio oppidanis (Remorum) misit.”—‘De Bell. Gall.,’ ii. 7.
The use of slings by the early Britons forms the subject of some notices in ‘N. & Q.,’ 1st S. v. 537; vi. 17, 377. Ed. Marshall.
See the following: ‘The Use of the Sling as a Warlike Weapon among the Ancients, by W. Hawkins, 4to., illustrated, 1847; the article “Sling” in Smith’s ‘Dictionary of the Bible.’ W. C. B.
See Virgil, ‘Æneid,’ ix. 665:—
Jonathan Bouchier.
Public Penance (7th S. iv. 469).—The instance referred to by Mr. Walford is not the last. The following appeared in the Liverpool Mercury of August 2, 1882, and as the remarks of the clergyman are pertinent, I give the report in extenso:—