S84 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[Nov. 17. 1855. 



who would procui-e me a hedgehog. A female, 

 with a young one, was soon brought : and, besides 

 having the run of the beetles at night, these ani- 

 mals had always bread and milk within their reach. 

 One day, however, the servants heard a myste- 

 rious crunching sound in the back kitchen ; and 

 found, on examination, that nothing was left of the 

 young hedgehog but the skin and prickles — the 

 mother had devoured her little pig ! A friend has 

 since informed me, that a gamekeeper told him of 

 a hedgehog eating a couple of rabbits which had 

 been confined with it, and killing others. Our 

 cruel beast runs about the house very nimbly at 

 night, and takes high jumps if interrupted. The 

 cockroaches have much diminished in number. 



Alfred Gatty. 



Albert Smith. — In a biographical notice of 

 Albert Smith, I found it stated that, while prac- 

 tising as a surgeon,V he '.wrote a work against 

 phrenology ; can you tell me any thing of its title 

 or publisher ?, — if you can you will much oblige 

 an American reader. Thomas Webb. 



Hules to he observed by Public Meetings, Sec. — 

 Can you inform me if there is a work of any au- 

 thority, yet published, on the laws that regulate, 

 and the rules to be observed by public meetings, 

 committees of societies, &c. J* 



A TrRO Secbetabt. 



John Deane. — Fshould feel obliged by informa- 

 tion regarding John Dean or Deane, who is sup- 

 posed to have died in South Carolina, Virginia, or 

 Maryland, about 1790, in affluent circumstances ; 

 whether he left a will, and the date of his death, 

 &c. He was a native of the North of Scotland. 



W.T. Deane. 



Aberdeen. 



"Polypus" or '' Polype ?" — At p. 116. of Sir 

 Benjamin Brodie's Psycological Inquiries, he asks : 



" Is it at all certain that a polypus is endowed with, any 

 higher properties than those which belong to vegetable 

 life?" 



Setting aside the drift of the question itself, 

 and of another subsequent remark on the jiolypus, I 

 may be permitted, as a zoophytological student, to 

 inquire, whether Sir Benjamin Brodie's mind was 

 not a little too vividly impressed with images from 

 the surgery, when he penned the passages alluded 

 to? 



I leave it to Mr. Gosse, or some other abler 

 pen than mine, to defend the position of the 

 polypes in the animal kingdom ; but having myself 

 seen them busy in capturing prey, and watched 

 them performing the act of swallowing, I cannot 

 of course agree to Sir Benjamin Brodie's implied 

 opinions. 



For such a discussion your journal is, however, 

 no fit place ; but the orthographical error, on the 

 contrary, is a curious literary fact ; and in the 



No. .316.] 



event of a third edition of the Psycological In- 

 quiries, it would be well corrected. 



Margaret Gatty. 

 Scretv Propeller. — The Earl of Stanhope is 

 stated by a correspondent. Vol. ix., p. 473., to 

 have employed the identical screw propeller now 

 in use, between the years 1802-5. Can you in- 

 form me where I can see any drawing of this 

 screw, or an account of the experiment ? Fuit. 



Minav Hhutxiei tot'tlb '^nStotv^. 



Montgomery s " Cherrie and the She." — What 

 is the meaning of the first three lines of the fol- 

 lowing verse of Montgomery's " The Cherrie and 

 theSIae"? 



" Throw rowting of the river rang, 

 The roches sounding lyke a sang, 



Quhair das kane did abound, 

 With triple, tenor, counter, mein, 

 And ecchoe blew a base between. 



In diapason sound. 

 Set with the Ci-sol-fa-uth cleif. 



With lang and large at list. 

 With quaver, crotchet, semibrief, 

 And not a minum mist. 

 Compleitly, mair sweetlj', 



Scho fridound flat and sharp, 

 Nor muses that uses 

 To pin Apollo's harp." 



My difliculty is with the " das kane." Tiie best 

 interpretation I can make is, daws or jackdaws 

 (fowls) ; as kane is generally a stipulated number 

 of fowls paid as rent to the lord of a manor. 

 What is the meaning of " fridound," in the third 

 last line ? J. A. Pebthensis. 



["Das kane," says Jamioson, '"should be written as one 

 word; and properly denotes singing in parts: ha.i. dis- 

 pant-us, from d'lxcento, to sing treble." Hence, in the 

 second edition, reprinted by Dr. Irving in 1821, the line 

 reads, — 



" Quhair deskant did abound." 



According to the same lexicographer, Fridound means 

 quavered, to warble or quaver in singing, or i)laying on 

 an instrument. We subjoin a modernised version of the 

 stanza by T. D. (probably the famous T. Dempster) ; 



" Through roaring of the river rang 

 The rocks, resounding like a sang, 



Blyth music did abound ; 

 With treble, tenor, counter, mean. 

 And Echo blew a base between, 



In diapason sound ; 

 Set on Nature's clearest clift. 

 With thorow base at list ; 

 With quaver, crotchet, semibrif, 

 And not a minium mist ; 

 Compleatly, more sweetly, 

 A cording flat or sharp. 

 Than muse ere did use ere 

 To pin Apollo's harp."] 



Gage on Ciphers. — In the article " Cipher," in 

 llees's EncyclopcBflia, Mr. Blair gives a specimen 



