58 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[2«"» S. Vlll. July 1G. '69. 



not to be aware that the sentence " to be wirried 

 at a steack till they be dead," &c., means in old 

 Scotch, " to be strangled at a stake," &c. The 

 worrying was merely to destroy life with as little 

 pain as could be, previous to the body being 

 burnt. 



The Scottish Criminal Trials published by the 

 Maitland Club, show that what Ache calls " this 

 barbarous penalty," ^as very common in cases of 

 condemnation for witchcraft in Scotland. Z. 



Pi'ovincial Words : " Pishty" " Cess-here " (2"'' ' 

 S. viii. 9.) — The term *^ pishty" which your cor- [ 

 respondent finds employed in calling a young dog, I 

 is given by Hallivvell in a more general sense as I 

 " a call used to a dog," without reference to age. ! 

 It is also worthy of observation that a dog is in 

 Basque potzoa, and a bitch in German Petze. 

 Are not potzoa, petze, and pishty near akin ? It | 

 is possible that pishty, even if originally feminine | 

 from petze, may in time have come to be used in- ' 

 discriminately for any individual of the dog kind, 

 female or male. 



With respect to the expression " cess-here," 

 used in inviting a dog to come to his food, cess or ; 

 sess is a call to feed, and so also is suss ; only with j 

 this difference, that the former is addressed to the ' 

 canine race, thfl latter to the porcine. " Cess, to ; 

 call dogs to eat. South ; " " Sess, invitation to ! 

 a dog to eat something. Dorset ; " " Suss, suss, a 

 call to swine to eat their suss, or hog-wash. East." 

 (Halliwell.) Suss is so much like the Latin for 

 pig that one might be inclined to suppose it the 

 original term, and sess or cess only a modification, 

 .extended to dogs. But perhaps it will be safer 

 to conclude that all three, suss, sess, and cess, are 

 from the A.-S. ceosan, cisan, to take. "And 

 hath hym by the bridell sesed; " "Possession and 

 sesenynge." (Gower and Froissart.) 



Thomas Boys. 



A Letter to a Clergyman, ^c. (2"^ S.,viii. 27.)— 

 I have both editions of this spirited Letter ; the 

 first (1746) bears upon the title by a Lover of 

 Truth ; and the second (1747), by G. Coade, 

 Jun., Merchant at Exeter. 



Mr. Coade addresses his book, in a highly com- 

 plimentary strain, to the Bishop of Winchester, 

 the famous Hoadly of Bangor, who preceded him 

 in battling against arbitrary government in Church 

 and State. There appears to have been a heredi- 

 tary hatred to tyranny on the part of this pa- 

 tronymic of Coade. See A Memorandum of the 

 Wonderful Providences of God to a Poor unworthy 

 Creature, Sfc, by John Coad, published in 1849, 

 from the original MS., in consequence of being 

 favourably noticed by Macaulay. This Sufferer 

 joined Monmouth in his attempts to preserve the 

 religion and liberties of this kingdom, and falling 

 into the hands of Jeffries was banished to Jamaica. 

 Like most religious enthusiasts, the Puritan sol- 



dier and convict is scant under the head of what 

 he calls his temporals, which to us moderns would 

 have been the most interesting part of the jour- 

 nal. J. O. 



Negro Slaves sold in England (2'"^ S. vi. 267. ; 

 vii. 153.) —Mr. Salmon will find the following in 

 the Quarterly Review (vol. xcvii. No. cxciii. pp. 

 209—210.), and he will do well to consult this 

 article for other facts regarding Blackamoors, and 

 the sale of them. 



" In the Tatler of 1709 we find one oifered to the pub- 

 lic in the following terms : — 



" ' A black boy, twelve years of age, fit to wait on a 

 gentleman, to be disposed of at Denis's Coffee-house in 

 Finch Lane, near the Royal Exchange.' 



" Again, in the Daily Journal, of Sept. 28th, 1728, we 

 find another : — 



" ' To be sold, a negro boy, aged eleven years. Enquire 

 of the Virginia Coffee-house in Threadnee'dle Street, be- 

 hind the Koyal Exchange.' " 



In the same paper there is an advertisement of 

 a runaway black boy, who had my " Lady Brom- 

 field's black in Lincoln's Inn Fields," engraved 

 on a collar round his neck : " for," says the writer, 

 " the notion of property in fhtse boys seems to 

 have been complete." 



T. C. Anderson, 

 H.M.'s 12th Regt. Bengal Array. 



The Game of Sqtiaring (2""* S. viii. 8.) —Your 

 correspondent W. VV. asks for some other ways of 

 " squaring the circle." I never have happened to 

 meet with the one he sent to " N. & Q.," but en- 

 close a few squares of words, v/hich may be what 

 W. W. wishes for : — 



D I o M 

 I E V E 



L O 

 E M 



TREES 



C K E W 



CUBE 



E R 

 R E 



H. E. P. 



Stuffvnwood. 



Publishing hefore the Livention of Printing (2'"* 

 S. viii. 11.) — Consult The Origin and Progress 

 of Writing, by Thomas Astle, Esq., F.R.S., F.A.S. 

 4to., Lond. 1803 (2nd edit.); and The History of 

 English Poetry, bv Tom Warton, edited by Rich. 

 Price, 3 vols. 8 vo.' Lond. 1840. i3. 



Clapping Prayer-Boohs on Good Friday (2"'' 

 S. viii. 32.) — Allow me to rectify a small mistake 



