2»* S. No 115., Mar. 13. '68.] 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



213 



opportunity of consulting Dares Phrt/gius, of 

 which there is extant (but unpublished) an old 

 Welsh translation or paraphrase. Perhaps the 

 paraphrase may contain some allusion to the 

 matter in question, even if the original does not. 

 This document, intitled Ystoria Dared, is In 

 the Red Book of Hergest in Jesus College, Ox- 

 ford, being the first article in the volume, and 

 possibly there may be a copy among the MSS. 

 formerly belonging to the Welsh school in Lon- 

 don, but now deposited in the British Museum. 



The story of the Trojan descent of the Britons 

 is now pretty generally abandoned, though it has 

 lately found a champion in the Rev. R. W. Mor- 

 gan, the author of Venedotia and other interesting 

 works relating to Wales. I am myself inclined 

 to think with Carnhuonawe, the most candid and 

 judicious of Welsh historians, that it is a fiction 

 which sprung up during the Roman domination in 

 Britain, constructed in imitation of the account 

 which the conquerors of the world gave of their 

 own origin. This supposition is countenanced by 

 the fact of other nations on the Continent ,of 

 Europe, when conquered by the Romans, having 

 advanced a similar claim to descent from the Tro- 

 jans ; and it is all the more probable in the case 

 of the Britons, who were, as we are informed, 

 cQuversant with the literature of their con- 

 querors, and ambitious of excelling in Latin com- 

 position. 



If this very probable theory of the Trojan 

 fable be admitted (and I can see no alternative 

 for those who cannot swallow it as true history), 

 it will be found to militate in no small degree 

 against the hypothesis, so distasteful to patriotic 

 Welshmen, first put forth by the late Sir W. Be- 

 tham, and adopted by others, with various degrees 

 of modification, respecting the origin of the Welsh 

 people ; viz. That they are not the descendants 

 of the Britons of Ctesar's day, but the progeny, of 

 the Picts, who, on the departure of the Romans 

 from the island, burst through the wall of Se- 

 Tcrus, and in an incredibly short period for such 

 a series of achievements conquered and overran, 

 not only the whole western half of south Britain, 

 from the Solvvay Frith to the Landsend, but also 

 the province of Brittany in France ; extirpating 

 the old inhabitants, repeopling the countries, and 

 perpetuating their own language — a theory open 

 to many grave objections, in addition to the most ob- 

 vious one of its having no historical foundation ; 

 but of which I will only remark here that it ne- 

 cessarily supposes the Picts endowed with an as- 

 tonishing amount of what some ethnologists call 

 spawning force (thus will philosophers make fish 

 of us!). 



The custom of cutting the Caerdroia on the 

 turf is known to have been practised in Wales in 

 commemoration of the Trojan origin of the race ; 

 and it is adduced by Welsh writers in proof of the 



constant belief of the people in that tradition. If 

 found to prevail in the districts which I have 

 mentioned above it would be an interesting fact, 

 and would furnish strong presumptive evidence 

 that Nenuius, when he related the Trojan story, 

 did not record merely a tradition of Wales, but 

 the unanimous belief of all the Cymry in Britain. 

 That the Southern Britons of the Roman province 

 should have been willing to adopt a genealogy 

 which gave them a claim to relationship with their 

 conquerors, in whose civilisation and literature 

 they were emulous of partaking, is quite consis- 

 tent with probability; but it is extremely unlikely 

 that the savage Caledonian Picts, to the north of 

 the walls, who were continually at war with their 

 southern countrymen during the period of the 

 Roman domination, should have had either the 

 wish to claim such a descent, or the information 

 requisite to fabricate it. No : I cannot believe 

 that King Ungus, or any of his predecessors or 

 successors, ever read a line of Virgil, or acted as 

 Maecenas to any of the Romanised literati of the 

 south. I think we may venture to conclude that the 

 whole Pictish nation was as little acquainted with 

 classical literature and traditions as the herdsmen 

 of RockliflF Marsh, and as guiltless of claiming a 

 descent from ^neas, as the latter are of attempt- 

 ing to trace their pedigree to Pope Gregory the 

 Great, or the Prophet Mohammed. W. H. M. 



Llangian. 



Judges* Whistles. — The reviewer of Mr. Foss's 

 fifth and sixth volumes of The Judges of England 

 in the January number of the Gentleman s Maga- 

 zine, suggests to that gentleman (see note to p. 

 62.) that he should give some account of the first 

 use and ultimate disuse of the boatswain's whistles, 

 which he says are " suspended from the necks of 

 the judges (Coke for example) of this period." If 

 the reviewer should chance to be a reader of " N. 

 & Q.," will he have the goodness to name any 

 other instance besides Coke that he has met with, 

 bearing this curious appendage; and to state 

 whether he has seen any portrait of Coke in his 

 robes as a judge so ornamented ? The only print 

 of him that 1 have seen, with anything like a 

 whistle, is in a private dress, and evidently taken 

 after he was discharged from the bench. 



ENaUIBEB. 



I'he Apostle Mass at St. Paul's. — In the Chro- 

 nicle of the Grey Friars of London, at p. 88., occurs 

 this entry : — " Item, the epestylle masse begane 

 agayne the ij. day of Aprille," 1554. And in an- 

 other brief chronicle, MS. Harl. 419. f. 131., is a 

 corresponding passage : — " The second daie of 

 Aprill this yeare beganne the postle masse agalne 

 at Poules." In Machyn's Diary, p. 61., the same 



