86 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[2nd g. n;-o 83., Aug. 1. '57. 



some permanent record of the life and labours of 

 so eminent a man, whose early efforts in the for- 

 mation of the " Royal Society" are not the least 

 of the claims he has on the gratitude of admiring 

 posterity. 



Besides the charm of association with the name 

 and memory of Boyle, this favoured spot boasts 

 connexion with another great name : for within 

 the limits of the parish, and about a mile from the 

 "Park," still stands Thornhill House, the resi- 

 dence of Sir James Thornhill, F.R.S., and " chief 

 of our English painters," whose efforts to regain 

 this the ancient seat of his family are well known.* 

 The property has since been alienated, and is now 

 possessed by the Rev. Henry Boucher. In the 

 grounds may still be seen the obelisk (though not 

 entire) erected by Sir James Thornhill in honour 

 of his patron King George I. There is a well- 

 executed portrait of Sir James extant by Faber, 

 after a painting by Highmore, bearing the date 

 "1732, ffit. 56." 



In the adjoining parish of MarnhuU is Nash 

 Court, the residence of Giles Hussey, the portrait 

 painter; and at no great distance, Sherborne Castle, 

 the residence of " the great and unfortunate Sir 

 Walter Raleigh," of which Mr. Hutchins says,f — 



" The ruins of the (old) Castle, Sir Walter Rawleigh's 

 grove, the seat of Lord Digby, — a grove planted by Mr. 

 Pope, and a noble serpentine body of water, with a fine 

 stone bridge of several arches over it, made by (the late) 

 Lord Digby, conspired to make this seat one of the most 

 venerable and beautiful in England." 



Henet W. S. Taylor. 



ETYMOLOGIES. 



ShanTiS Nag. — A proverbial expression for 

 going on foot is ride on Shank's nag, or Shank's 

 mare, as it is expressed in Ireland. The meaning 

 seems obvious enough, but still the phrase has not 

 the air of an original. Now the corresponding 

 expression in Spain is, ride on St. Francis' mule, 

 alluding to the barefoot Franciscans, who always 

 went on foot ; and I suspect that before the Re- 

 formation the phrase was common in England too, 

 but, as mules were little used there for riding, nag 

 took the place of mule. After the Reformation it 

 may have become Frank's nag, and thence, by an 

 easy transition, Shank's nag. 



I take this opportunity of giving a farther proof 

 of the correctness of my explanation of Finding a 

 mare's nest in a former number. In Swift's Polite 

 Conversation, I have met with, " What ! you have 

 found a mare's nest, and laugh at the eggs ! " 



Clamour. — There can be no doubt of this word 



* See a pedigree, and many iateresting particulars of 

 the family, in Hutchins (above quoted), under Wolland. 

 the subsequent residence of the Thornhills. — Vol. ii. 

 450. 1. ; also, Vol. i. 410., under Melcombe Regis. 



t Vol. ii. p. 390. 



as a noun, the Latin clamor ; but was there a verb 

 (a misspelt one of course), as in clamor your 

 tongues ( Winter's Tale, Act IV. Sc. 3.) ? I have 

 already given my opinion that there was, and I 

 am confirmed in it by the following passage in 

 Mr. Singer's note on that place: "Mr. Hunter has 

 cited a passage from Taylor the Water Poet, in 

 which the word is thus again perverted : 



" Clamour the promulgation of your tongue.' " 

 Mr. Singer's word is chamour, chaumer, or 

 chaumbre (of which last he gives a single ex- 

 ample from Udall), which, he says, comes from 

 the French chomer, to refrain (not its exact sense, 

 by the way). Taylor, I believe, printed his own 

 poems, and such a " perversion " could hardly 

 have escaped his eye ; and I think that both he 

 and Shakspeare used a verb pronounced like 

 clamour, but which should be spelt clammer, and 

 signified to press or squeeze ; so that clammer 

 your tongue is the same as hold your tongue. It 

 is true clammer is not in use, but clem (i. q. clani) 

 is. I myself have heard a peasant in Hants say 

 " his stomach was clemmed with fasting," i. e. 

 squeezed, pressed together ; and Massinger uses 

 it exactly in the same sense : 



" When my entrails 



Were clemmed with keeping a perpetual fast." 



itotnan Actor, IL 1. 



where Coxeter and M. Mason read clammed, as it 

 is in the passage from Antonio and Mellida quoted 

 in Mr. Wright's Dictionary, s. v. Clam. Surely 

 such a word as clammer was more appropriate in 

 the mouth of a clown than Mr. Singer's chaumer 

 or chaumhre. As to the substitution of charm, first 

 proposed by Grey, and since found in Mr. Col- 

 lier's corrector, I utterly reject it, for it occurs 

 nowhere except in the mouths of persons of sta- 

 tion and education ; for Tranio, in the Taming of 

 the Shrew, is such for the nonce. I may add that 

 Mr. Richardson is inclined to regard clamor, in 

 the Winter's Tale, as connected with clam. In 

 confirmation of this it may be observed that there 

 seems to have been a verb clomsen, also akin to 

 clam : 

 "Other when thou clomsest for hunger, other clyngest 

 for drouth." 



Vision of Pieis Plowman. 



Cling. — This verb, as we may see, is connected 

 in sense, and perhaps also in origin, with clem, 

 Somner derives it from clinjan, A.-S., a verb 

 which, as far as I can ascertain, does not occur In 

 any extant Anglo-Saxon MS. ; and indeed I have 

 often wondered where Somner, who cites no au- 

 thorities, got many of his words. I,' however, do 

 not want to call his honesty in question. Cling is 

 used by Lord Surrey In the following verse of his 

 paraphrase of Eccleslastes (v. 18, 19.): 



" Clings not his guts with niggish fare, to heap his 

 chest withal," 

 in a manner which illustrates " Till famine cling 



