70 



NOTES AND QUEEIES. 



[No. 247. 



Boin. Une fois plac^ h, ce point de vue, mes recherches 

 devinrent plus ardentes, plus fructueuses ; peu h peu la 

 lumifere se fit, et je compris I'ordre dans lequel je devais 

 commencer mes travaux. Aprfes cinq ans de recherches et 

 de labeurs, je re'ussis enfin h produire qiielques grammes 

 d'or parfaitement pur." 



As M. Tiffereau appears to be a really scien- 

 tific man, in the matter of geology and mineralogy, 

 your correspondents will probably be glad to pro- 

 cure the Memoire in which the process of dis- 

 covery is narrated. The reviewer gives some 

 quotations from M. Dumas, who, in his Lemons de 

 Philosophie Chimique, says : 



" L'experience, irfaut le dire, n'est point en opposition 

 jusqu'ici avec la possibilite de la transmutation de corps 

 simples ou au moins de certains corps simples." : 



John Macray. 

 Oxford. 



TEENCH ON PEOVEBBS. 



(Vol. viii., pp. 387. 519. 641. ; Vol. ix., p. 107.) 



The following remarks were sent to " N. & Q." 

 some months ago, but were, I suppose, accidentally 

 overlooked. Having just found a copy, I send 

 my remarks again. 



In reply to Me. Margoliouth, I must confine 

 myself to the passages which he asks me to trans- 

 late. To enter farther into the rest of the ques- 

 tion would convert 7iotes into essays. I must ac- 

 knowledge I hold my former opinions still ; but to 

 prove them would require very detailed criticism ; 

 and neither Me. Maegoliouth nor I would like 

 that sort of popular argument which consists in 

 counter-assertions. 



Now, as to the passages from Isaiah, I pass them 

 by, as I never intended to question the fact that 

 jn^ in Hebrew, like the words representing to give 

 in all languages, is often used elliptically ; that is, 

 the noun it governs is understood. My objection 

 was, that whereas in the disputed passage there is 

 the transitive verb give, and also a noun, which it 

 naturally seems to govern, the proposed trans- 

 lation would leave the verb without an accusative, 

 the noun without a governing verb. But, as Me. 

 Maegoliouth of course is aware, this very obscure 

 passage of Isaiah is capable of an interpretation 

 which altogether removes the ellipsis. 

 ,^ As to the passage in Ps. xc. 5. — 



the literal translation is, " Thou overwhelmest 

 them : asleep are they : in the morning [they 

 are] as the grass [which] groweth up." The el- 

 lipsis here is not at all analogous to that alleged. 

 It is a very usual omission of the particle of simi- 

 litude, which omission, according to the poetical 

 usage of all languages, converts a simile into a 



metaphor. Perhaps, however (for it is only so 

 that the passage can be fairly considered to bear 

 out the proposed rendering), Me. Maegoliouth 

 would translate it thus : " Thou overwhelmest 

 them in sleep : they shall be in the morning," &c. 

 If so, I have the same objection to this as to the 

 other case, as unnecessarily disturbing a natural 

 construction, and substituting a very questionable 

 ellipsis. The reading of our Bible translation is 

 borne out by the LXX, the Syriac, Jerome's 

 Latin version from the Hebrew, and the ancient 

 stichometrical arrangement. It is true the LXX 

 and Syriac difi'er as to the first word (their read- 

 ings were obviously different), but their trans- 

 lations of Vn'' occupy the same place. I must 

 confess that, having gone through the whole Book 

 of Psalms for the very object of ascertaining, if 

 possible, an analogous ellipsis, I could discover 

 none. But as my object is not victory in dispute, 

 but a real desire for information, I will acknow- 

 ledge that there is an ellipsis in one of the psalms 

 of degrees, to which I would invite Me. Margo- 

 liouth's attention, not as being strictly in point, 

 but as being as anomalous (if I am not mistaken) 

 as that which he proposes, viz. in Ps. cxxxiv. 2., 

 K^np DD1* INK', "Lift up your hands [in] the 

 sanctuary." However, it is possible that this may 

 be considered as one of those ellipses not unusual 

 after verbs of motion, in which the particle, ex- 

 pressed by us, is often contained in the verb, viz., 

 " Lift-up-unto the sanctuary your hands." An 

 interesting work might be written on the ellipses 

 of the sacred language, by some Hebraistic IBos. 

 Indeed the existing essays on Hebrew syntax are 

 strangely defective. John Jebb. 



rOEENSIC joculaeities. 

 (Vol. ix., p. 538. ; Vol. x., p. 18.) 



The two articles referred to are instances of 

 the cramhe recocta with which the heedlessness of 

 correspondents overloads the pages of " N. & Q. ;" 

 and the following notice of them may tend to 

 correct this abuse. 



The forensic jocularity which they reproduce 

 are as well known as any epigram in our lan- 

 guage. After having been extensively ventilated 

 in the newspapers, it found a more substantial 

 abode in Twiss's Life of Lord Chancellor Eldon ; 

 and it has been reproduced in Mr. Hardy's Life 

 of Lord Langdale, and still more recently in the 

 Quarterly Review of the latter work, in which the 

 occasion of the verses and the correction of some 

 verbal errors in the two former versions are given, 

 and apparently on the authority of the original 

 epigrammatist, there stated to be Sir George Rose. 



This well-known pleasantry T. A. T. sends U3 

 from " Florence as a picture of Chancery-practice 



