2"<» 8. VII. Jan. 8. '69.] 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



31 



tween the bishop and prior of Windham, in 1450, it 

 appears that the customary ordinary visitation of the 

 bishop was septennial. lb. ii. 513-14. J 



Quotations. — Where do these quotations come 

 from ? — 



" That boame from whence no traveller returns." 

 ^Hamlet, Act HI. Sc. 1.] 

 " The feast of reason and the flow of soul." 

 [Pope's Imitations of Horace, book ii. sat. i.] 

 *' Like angels' visits, few and far between." 

 [The line occurs in Campbell's Pleasures of Hope, 

 Part II., as well as in Blair's Grave ; but both Campbell 

 and Blair may have derived it from John Norris, who 

 died in 1711, in whose Transient Delights is the following 

 line : — 



" Like angel visits, short and bright." 



See also " N. & Q.," 1»' S. ii. 286.] 



" Men are but children of a larger growth." 

 [See Drvden's All for Love; or the World well Lost, 

 Act IV. Sc. 1.] 



J. N. W. 



^tpUtS. 



NORDSTEAND. 



(2'"»S.i. 471.) 



Me. Boasb says, a Polish merchant of Altona 

 told him that all the inhabitants of the island of 

 Nordstrand, on the west coast of Schleswig (some 

 2000), spoke English, and were all descended 

 from one settler and his family. This information 

 is unquestionably incorrect. On account of its 

 calamities, caused by inundations of the sea, few 

 islands of so little importance have been so much 

 noticed in geographical works as Nordstrand. For 

 three centuries before 1634, it had suffered much 

 from inundations, but in that year a tremendous 

 one swept away above 1300 houses, 6000 persons, 

 50,000 head of cattle, and broke up the island, 

 which had previously been a large one, into many 

 fragments. Of these only two, the larger, still 

 retaining the name of Nordstrand, and another 

 called Pellworm, are secured by dykes. Nord- 

 strand has at present 2500 inhabitants, descend- 

 ants of Frieslanders, whose language they still 

 speak. They are partly Lutherans, partly Roman 

 Catholics. Thus far I have quoted from English 

 authorities (the Penny Cyclopaedia and others), 

 which do not mention any colony. -M. Gachard, 

 well known for his antiquarian and historical re- 

 searches, states, however, that 'after the frightful 

 calamity of 1634, some Belgians settled in Nord- 

 strand, — being assured of exemption from taxa- 

 tion for fourteen years, and for the same period 

 after every new inundation. The free exercise of 

 their religion — a fact which may probably ex- 

 plain the statement above, that the inhabitants 

 are partly Roman Catholics — was also guaranteed 

 to them. Christiern V. and Frederick IV. subse- 



quently confirmed their privileges. Nevertheless, 

 after experiencing three inundations between 

 1717 and 1720, they were required to pay taxes in 

 1721, when there was another inundation. They 

 applied for protection to the Emperor Charles VI., 

 whose intervention gained for them two years' ex- 

 emption. But in 1723 the taxes were again 

 demanded, and payment enforced by military exe- 

 cution. The latest notice of these Belgian colo- 

 nists which M. Gachard has met with, is in a 

 return of the possessions of the religious houses 

 in the Pays Bas, which was required in 1786 by 

 Joseph II., so aptly called " revolution couronnee," 

 in order to confiscation. It was, in short, one of 

 his many arbitrary acts which led to the Brabant 

 revolution. From this return M. Gachard dis- 

 covers that the Oratorians of Malines were pro- 

 prietors of an estate in Nordstrand, 



It would be interesting to learn what reason 

 the Danish government had for inducing the Bel- 

 gians to settle in Nordstrand. Was it for the 

 formation or better management of the dykes ? 



The story of the descent of the inhabitants of 

 Nordstrand from an English family may be dis- 

 missed as apocryphal. In regard to their lan- 

 guage I am inclined to suppose that the Polish 

 merchant was imperfectly acquainted with Eng- 

 lish at the time of his visit, and consequently mis- 

 took the Frisian for our language. That it more 

 closely than any other Teutonic dialect resembles 

 English, has been remarked by Sir William Tem- 

 ple and other writers. H. P. 



ARMS OF THE ISI,E OF MAN OTiT ETRUSCAN VASES. 



(2°« S. vi. 409. 490.) 



Your correspondent Tourist, in mentioning 

 that the Museum at Rouen contains an Etruscan 

 vase, on which are three legs resembling the armo- 

 rial bearings of the Isle of Man, opens to us a 

 field of interesting inquiry. It has subsequently 

 been shown by other correspondents (p. 490.) that 

 in ancient days the three legs were especially con- 

 nected with the Island of Sicily. 



But it is also worthy of observation that there 

 evidently existed some peculiar relation between 

 the three legs and Mercury or Hermes. Lower, 

 depicting to us in his Curiosities of Heraldry 

 (1845) the coat of the Isle of Man, adds in a note 

 (p. 79.), " Some of the Greek coins in Sicily bear 

 an impress of three legs conjoined, exactly similar 

 to this fanciful charge [of Man], except that they 

 are naked, and have at the point of conjunction a 

 Mercury s head." And Walsh, in his Essay on 

 Ancient Coins, ^c, remarks on a Gnostic gem 

 bearing the image of Mercury, " He has all the 

 symbols of Mercury about him ; his wings, cap, 

 and buskins, and his caduceus; but what distin- 

 guishes him is his three legs " (p. 60.). Is there no 



