2n-i S. VII. April 16. '59.] 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



313 



at five, and they had the same) ; and he said the 

 tradition was that all swine had had them ever 

 since the casting out of the devils which destroyed 

 the herd in the sea. My queries are, does this 

 mark always exist? How do anatomists account 

 for it ? Q. C. 



Fairy Superstition of the present Age. — It 

 seems hardly credible that even in our rural dis- 

 tricts such products of ignorance should obtain, 

 but an instance has occurred in this neighbour- 

 hood proving the fact, contiguous as we are to one 

 of the great centres of intelligence and commer- 

 cial activity. Some large blocks of stone, quar- 

 ried a few years ago for the construction of the 

 Birkenhead docks, were piled (or cessed, as it is 

 here termed,) upon Bidstone Hill, and in process 

 of time became surrounded by gorse and heather, 

 and the genius of superstition dubbing them "fairy 

 stones," they became objects of dread to the more 

 simple of the country folks and youngsters, not 

 one of whom would willingly pass the locality after 

 dark. Happily these blocks are at length in 

 course of removal for their original use, but the 

 fact is worth noting. Danum. 



Rustic Rhymes. — It is the custom for boys 

 or men to keep birds off cornfields until the seeds 

 are up, and the stalks high enough for protection. 

 Passing through the village of Halstock, co. of 

 Dorset, a boy was heard loudly singing this ditty : 



" Vlee away blackie cap, 

 Don't ye hurt measter's crap 

 While I vill my tatie trap, 

 And lie down and teak a nap." 



J. M. 

 Burmese Superstition. — On a recent visitation 

 of cholera, the inhabitants of Tonghoo being 

 much alarmed, occupied themselves for some days 

 in beating the walls of their houses with sticks to 

 drive away the devil. E. H. A. 



THE OLD COUNTESS OF DESMOND. 



This wondrously aged lady is the subject of 

 many interesting communications in early volumes 

 0^ "N. & Q.," and has employed the pens of some 

 of its ablest correspondents. I do not now write 

 for the purpose of reopening a discussion which 

 seems to have been for some years regarded 

 as closed, but of communicating a very inter- 

 esting piece of evidence. It is a letter written 

 by the late venerable Marquis of Bristol to the 

 nobleman in whose possession 1 have just now 

 seen it, and by whose permission I make public 

 the subjoined extract, which, although it does not 

 elucidate the personal history of the old Countess 

 of Desmond, adds important testimony in corrobo- 

 ration of her astonishing age, and connects with 

 her case some remarkable instances of longevity 



and of tradition through few links. For sake of 

 reference, I may remark that a query put in 

 vol. ii. of 1'' Series, p. 153., elicited communica- 

 tions printed at pp. 186. 219. and 317. of that 

 volume, in one of which she was still treated as a 

 mythical personage ; — in vol. iii. at pp. 250. and 

 341., at the former of which places A Borderer 

 communicates an inscription on an engraved por- 

 trait, which is to the effect that Catherine Fitz- 

 gerald, Countess of Desmond, was born in 1464, 

 married in the reign of Edw. IV., lived during 

 the reigns of Edw. V., Rich. IH., Hen. VII., Hen. 

 VIIL, Edw. VI., Mary, Elizabeth, and James, 

 dying at the end of his reign, or In the beginning 

 of that of Charles I., at the age of 162 ; — in vol. iv. 

 pp. 305. and 426., at the former of which places 

 A. B. R. adduces, amongst other particulars, Ra- 

 leigh's authority for her having been married in the 

 reign of Edw. IV.; — and in vol, v., at p. 14. (where 

 there is an interesting communication touching 

 the question, who was she ?) ; pp.43. 145. 260. 322. 

 and 381., the last note I find upon this subject. 

 I now suljjoin the extract from the letter of the 

 Marquis, which is dated St. James's Square, 

 March 12, 1851, when the venerable peer was, I 

 believe, in the eighty-third year of his age : — 



" My dear , 



" In answer to your Letter of the 9th instant, I fear 

 I cannot give you any very precise and satisfactory in- 

 formation. All that I can tell you is, that when I was a 

 young man, the Dowager Lady Stanhope (the mother of 

 the Jacobin Lord Stanhope of that day) used to saj- that 

 she knew a lady who had known a lady who had seen 

 the Countess of Desmond, who had danced at court with 

 Richard the Third when Duke of Gloucester — only two 

 ladies between Lady Stanhope and the old Countess of 

 Desmond I " 



W. S. G. 



ON MOSAIC PICTURES. 



In a number of " N. & Q." (2°'^ S. vli. 254.) I 

 laid before its readers a communication on a re- 

 vival of the ancient and beautiful art of encaustic 

 painting, and hope that a few observations on the 

 still more enduring and equally beautiful art of 

 executing pictures in what is often, but errone- 

 ously, termed mosaic painting will be acceptable. 

 The name of the art is incorrect, as it cannot be 

 called painting, but rather an imitation of paint- 

 ing without paint ; nor is the artist M^usivarius a 

 painter. 



Sir Henry Wotton, in his learned work on 

 Architecture, describes it as a kind of painting 

 with small pebbles, cockles, or shells of sundry 

 colours, used chiefly for pavements and floorings. 

 This definition, taken from Pliny, and other an- 

 cient authorities, leads to a supposition that the 

 art of making tesselated pavements or floorings 

 was derived from the East, where the art of de- 

 lineating figures of every description heightened 



