June 12. 1852.] 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



573 



sneezed, arose from the fact that in the great plague 

 of Athens sneezing was an unfailing proof of 

 returning convalescence. Your classical readers 

 will remember the anecdote told in the Anabasis 

 of Xenophon (c. ii. sect. i.-v.). I copy from Mit- 

 ford, who has besides a note to the purpose : 



" At daybreak the troops were assembled, and Chiro- 

 sophus, Cleanor, and Xenophon successively addressed 

 them. An accident, in itself even ridiculous, assisted 

 not a little, through the importance attributed to it by 

 Grecian superstition, to infuse encouragement. Xeno- 

 phon was speaking of that favour from the gods which 

 a righteous cause entitled them to hope for against a 

 perjured enemy, when somebody sneezed. Immedi- 

 ately the general voice addressed ejaculations to pro- 

 tecting Jupiter, whose omen it was supposed to be. A 

 sacrifice to the god was then proposed; a universal 

 shout declared approbation ; and the whole army, in 

 one chorus, sang the Paean." — History of Greece, vol. v. 

 p. 185. cap. xxiii. sect. iv. : Lond. 1835, 8vo. 



We must not, however, forget that when Elisha 

 restored the Shunamite's son to life — 



" The child sneezed seven times, and the child opened 

 his eyes." — 2 Kings, iv. 35. 



Rt. 



Rents of Assize (Vol. v., p. 188.). — Has not 

 J. G. misquoted ? Is not the line — 



" Regis ad exemplar, totus componitur orbis." 



J. E. 

 Rochester. 



Fire unknown (Vol. iv., pp. 209. 283. 331.). — In 

 An Account of the Native Africans of Sierra Leone, 

 by T. M. Winterbottom : Lond. 1803, 2 vols., 

 occurs the following note to vol. i. p. 75. : — 



" It is said that the inhabitants of the Marian or 

 J^adrone islands were ignorant of the use of fire before 

 they were visited by the Spaniards ; but even then 

 they were acquainted with the mode of producing in- 

 toxication by means of tlie wine of the cocoa-nut tree." 



Zeus. 



Newtonian System (Vol. v., p. 490.). — The au- 

 thor of the pamphlet entitled The Theology and 

 Philosophy of Cicerds Somnium Scipionis ex- 

 plained, London, 1751, 8vo., was Bishop Home. 

 He wrote it before he had attained majority, and 

 many attacks were made upon it. It is not in- 

 cluded in the edition of his collected works in 

 6 vols. 8vo. 1809. Bishop Warburton, who cor- 

 dially disliked the Hutchinsonians, or, as he styled 

 them, the English Cocceians, mentions this tract 

 in his Letters to Bishop Hard : 



" There is one book, and that no large one, which I 

 would recommend to your perusal ; it is called The 

 Theology and Philosophy of Cicero's Somn. Scip. examined. 

 It is indeed the ne plus ultra of Hutchinsonianism. 

 In this twelve-penny pamphlet Newton is proved an 

 atheist and a blockhead. And what would you 

 more?" — Warburton's Letters to Hurd, edit. 1808, 

 4to. p. 68. 



The anecdote as to Newton, Locke, and Lord 

 Pembroke, p. 27., was first told by Whiston, whose 

 character for accuracy does not stand high, par- 

 ticularly when Sir I. Newton, against whom he 

 bore a grudge. Is concerned. Jas, Crossley. 



Newton, Cicero, and Gravitation (Vol. v., p. 344.). 



— Newton is celebrated for having proved that all 

 bodies attract one another with a force varying 

 inversely as the square of the distance. What re- 

 semblance has this to a statement, that all bodies 

 gravitate to the centre of the world, or, as ex- 

 plained by Cicero, the earth ? which at most only 

 implies its rotundity. Perhaps S. E. B. was joking, 



like Hegel, when he said that Newton called — 

 gravitation, and inferred that gravitation varied as 

 j-^ Otherwise modern philosophers, as e.g. Kep- 

 ler, would have supplied much nearer approxi- 

 mations to Newton's law. Altkon. 



jRhymes on the Names of Places (Vol. v., p. 404.). 



— I remember hearing the following verse in the 

 neighbourhood of Nottingham : 



" Eaton and Taton, and Bramcote o' th' hill. 

 Beggarly Beeston, and lousy Chilwell ; 

 Waterside Wilford, hey little Lenton ! 

 Ho fine Nottingham ! Colwick and Snenton." 



The villages whose names occur are all within a 

 few miles of Nottingham. 

 The following rhyme I have'also heard : 



" Derbyshire born and Derbyshire bred, 

 Strong i' th' arm and weak i' the head." 



R. C. C. 

 Oxon. 



Saint Wilfrid's Needle (Vol. v., p. 510.), 

 where, according to Burton, "they used to try 

 maids whether they were honest," is not, as B. B. 

 supposes, a stone, but a narrow passage in the 

 crypt beneath the central tower of Ripon Minster. 

 This crypt is of Saxon workmanship, and is pro- 

 bably either a part of the original church built 

 by Saint Wilfrid, or " the new work," which, ac- 

 cording to Leland — 



" Odo, Archebishop of Cantewarbyri .... causid to 

 be edified, wher the Minstre now is." 



This passage is said to have been used as a 

 place of ordeal through which maidens of sus- 

 pected honesty were caused to pass, — a feat which 

 none but a virgin could accomplish. K. P. D. E. 



" Measure for Measure," Act I. Sc. 1. (Vol. v., 

 p. 535.). — I should be sorry to cast a cloud over 

 the satisfactory elucidation which A. E. B. flatters 

 himself he has made of a passage in Measure for 

 Measure, for, if not convincing, it is unquestion- 

 ably ingenious. I am afraid, however, there is 

 one fatal objection, of which, when pointed out, I 



