JULT 10. 1852.] 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



43 



spare), and "will f;radually increase till it comes to a 

 good national tax ; for the hocifty-marks upon our 

 hou'ies (under which miglit properly be written ' The 

 Lord have mercy upon us ! ') spread taster than a 

 colony of frogs." 



One of Swift's editors thus explains the allu- 

 sion: 



" About the bejjinnin^ of the eigbteenth centnry 

 Dr. Gwythers, a Physician and Fellow of Trinity 

 College, Dublin, brought over with him a parcel of 

 frogs from England to Ireland, in order to propagate 

 the species in that kingdom, and threw them into the 

 ditches of the University Park, but they all perished. 

 "Whereupon he sent to England for some Ijottles of the 

 frogspavvn, which he threw into those «litches, by which 

 he succeeded In his design. However, their number 

 was so small in the year 1720 that a frog was nowhere 

 to be seen, except in the neighbourhood of the Uni- 

 versity Park. But within six or seven years alter, 

 they spread thirty, forty, or fifty miles over tlie country, 

 and so at last over the whole nation." 



This seems (o be the true origin of the intro- 

 duction of frog^, though some have ascribed it to 

 the troops which the Prince of Orange brought to 

 Ireland with him. Lnsgdn and Cnaddn are the 

 Irish words for this animal. iNlr. Cleland was the 

 gentleman whom I alluded to as having introduced 

 the six snakes. Mr. liell {Hist, of Brit Bept., 

 Lond. 1839), asserts that the Lacerta agilis is to 

 be found in Ireland. Eirionnach. 



Portrait of George Fox (Vol. v., p. 464.). — I 

 possess an engraving of George Fox's portrait, in- 

 serted in his Journal, with the following inscription : 



" George Fox, aetat. 30, founder of the sect of 

 people called Quakers, from the original painting by 

 Honthorst, done in the year 1654, now in the possession 

 of Ttiomas Clio Rickinan." 



He has a broad- brimmed felt hat and a cloak. 

 His eyes and hands are turned upwards. 



BOKSALL. 



Punch avd Judy (Vol. v., p. 610.). — I am a 

 reader of " N. & Q." certainly " not aware tliat 

 Punch and Judy is a corruption" of Pontius cum 

 Judceis ; and I should be glad to know on wliat 

 ground Bceoticus represents it as sucli. I bad 

 supposed that Judy was derived from Judas. 



KB. 



^^JTostngesto Forftme" (Vol. v., p. 607.).— "The 

 Cambridge D D." who, according to your corre- 

 spondent, " attributed to Paley the following 

 passage of Lord Bacon's (Essay, viii.), ' He that 

 hath a wife and children hath given hostages to 

 fortune,' " would have had his mistake rei-titied, had 

 he during the present year attended at the Lyceum 

 Theatre, to witness the performance of The Game 

 of Speculation. Supposing the Cnmlnidge D.D. to 

 have left for a while " the theatre of the Greeks" 

 for that of the moderns, he would have heard Mr. 

 'Charles Mathews in his matchless delineation of 



the hero oT the above-mentioned piece (Mr. Affable 

 Hawk) say as follows: 



" Hawk. An ambitious bachelor may get on ; but 

 married, he has no chance. The great Bacon said, 

 • The man who has a wife and children, lias given hos- 

 tages to fortune.' In other words, has pawned his 

 whole existence." — Act I. 



The Game af Speculation has heen admirably 

 adapted to the English stage by Mr. Slingsby 

 Lawrence, from the French of De Balzac. It was 

 performed at the Lyceum Theatre, together with 

 the spectacular burles(jue of The Prince of Happy 

 Land, every night from Christmas 1851 to Easter 

 185'i ; the play-bill during that period requiring 

 no change. This circumstance has been stated, ia 

 one of our leading monthly magazines, to be un- 

 paralleled in theatrical annals; and on this account 

 is iperhaps worthy of a note. 



CUTHBEET BeD£, B. A. 



Docking Horses (Vol. v., p. 611.). — Youattj.in 

 his history of the Horse, describes the way in which 

 the operation of docking is performed, but gives.no 

 clue whatever as to the time when the practice 

 was fi^^t introduced. It is, however, believed that 

 it came into vogue in the early part of the last 

 century, as its strangeness provoked the observa- 

 tion of Voltaire, when he was in England about 

 17'25, and produced the following epigram from 

 his satirical pen : 



" Vous, fiers Anglois, et barbares que vous etes, 

 Coupent Ics teles a vos rois.et les queues a vos betes; 

 Mais les Fran9ois plus polls, et aimant les loix, 

 Laissent les queues a leurs betes, et les tetes a leyrs 

 rois." 



The fifth edition of Bailey's Dictionary (1731), 

 which is the earliest to which I have access, men- 

 tions the practice ; but if your Querist Tail would 

 consult the earliest editions, and should find it 

 omitted, he may fairly conclude that he has made 

 some approximation to the period when it was 

 first introduced. 



The reason for the operation was probably only 

 the convenience of the rider, and 1o save him from 

 the mud and dirt which a long tail, in the then 

 state of the public roads, would necessarily pick 

 up and plentifully distribute. Geoffrey Gambado 

 gives another reason, for which see his Academy for 

 Grown Horsemen. F. B — w. 



How the Ancient Irish crowned their Kings 

 (Vol. v., p. 582.). — In these days, when most sm- 

 ticpiities are judgmatically examined into, it is a 

 pity that such silly and iinpossiule tales should be 

 sent to you in order to their reproduction in type. 

 In this particular instance, the fable, before con- 

 fined to the "Kingsof Tyrconuell," an ancient ter- 

 ritory of Ulstei', is extended to the whole of "the 

 ancient Irish,"" and " their king." Not having by 

 me O'Donovan's Annals of the Four Masters^ the 



