^$ 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[No. 169. 



There cannot be a doubt that many valuable 

 antiquities will yet be discovered, and In support 

 of this presumption I would only refer to those 

 now known to exist ; the Giant's Tower at Gozo, 

 the huge tombs in the Bengemma Hills, and those 

 extensive and remarkable ruins at Krendi, which 

 were excavated by order of the late Sir Henry 

 Bouverie, and remain as a lasting and honourable 

 memento of his rule, being among the number. 



An antiquary, being at Malta, cannot pass a 

 portion of an idle day move agreeably than in 

 visiting some singular sepulchral chambers not far 

 from Notabile, which are built in a rocky emi- 

 nence, and with entrances several feet from the 

 ground. These are very possibly the tombs of the 

 earliest Christians, who tried in their erection " to 

 imitate that of our Saviour, by building them in 

 tlie form of caves, and closing their portals with 

 marble or stone." When looking at these tombs 

 from a terrace near the Cathedral, we were strongly 

 reminded of those which were seen by our lately 

 deceased friend Mr. John L. Stephens, and so well 

 described by him in his Incidents of Travel in 

 eastern lands. Had we time or space, we should 

 more particularly refer to several other interest- 

 ing remains now scattered over the island, and, 

 among them, to that curious sepulchre not a long 

 time ago discovered in a garden at Rabato. We 

 might write of the inscription on its walls, " In 

 pace posita sunt," and of the figures of a dove 

 and hare which were near it, to show that the 

 ashes of those whom they burled there were left in 



f)eace. We might also make mention, more at 

 ength, of a tomb which was found at the point 

 BeniTsa in 1761, having on its face a Phoenician 

 inscription, which Sir William Drummond thus 

 translates : 

 ' " The interior room of the tomb of ^nnibal, illus- 

 trious in the consummation of calamity. He was be- 

 loved. The people, when they are drawn up in order 

 of battle, weep for iEnnibal the son of Bar Malek." 



Sir Grenville Temple remarks, that the great 

 Carthaginian general is supposed, by the" Maltese, 

 to have been a native of their island, and one of 

 the Barchina family, once known to have been 

 established in Malta ; while some writers have 

 stated that his remains were brought from Bi- 

 thynla to this island, to be placed in the tomb of 

 his ancestors ; and this supposition, from what 

 we have read, may be easily credited. 



Might I ask if there is any writer, ancient or 

 modern, who has recorded that Malta was not the 

 burial-place of Hannibal? W. W. 



Malta. 



Waterloo. — I do not know whether, in any of 

 the numerous lives of the late Duke of Welling- 

 ton, the following fact has been noticed,,. In, 



Strada's History of the Belgian war (a work which 

 deserves to be better known and appreciated than 

 it is at present), there occurs a passage which 

 shows that, about three hundred years since, 

 Waterloo was the scene of a severe engagement ; 

 so that the late sanguinary struggle was not the 

 first this battle-ground had to boast of. The pass- 

 age occurs in FamiancB Slradce dc Hello Selscico, 

 Decas prima, lib. vi. p. 256., edit. Romse, 1653 ; 

 where, after describing a scheme on the part of 

 the insurgents for surprising Lille, and Its dis- 

 covery by the Eoyalists, he goes on : 



" Et Ilassinghemius de Armerterieiisi milite inaudi- 

 erat ; nihilqve moratvs selectis centvmqvinqvaginta 

 peditibvs et equitibus sclopetariis ferme qvinqveginta 

 prope Wuterlocvm pagvm pvgnam committit." 



What makes this more curious Is, that, like the 

 later battle, neither of the contending parties on 

 this occasion were natives of the country In which 

 the battle was fought, they being the Trench Cal- 

 vinists on one side and the Spaniards on the other. 



Philobiblion. 



" Tuchr — In " The Synagogue," attached to 

 Herbert's Poems, but written by Chr. Harvie, 

 M.A., is a piece entitled "The Communion Table," 

 one verse of which is as follows : 



" And for the matter whereof it is made, 

 The matter is not much, 

 Although it be o( tuck. 

 Or wood, or mettal, what will last, or fade ; 



So vanitie 

 And superstition avoided be." 



S. T. Coleridge, in & note on this passage, 

 printed in Mr. Pickering's edition of Herbert, 

 1850 (fcap. 8vo.), says : ' ' ■ ' 



" Tach rhyming to much, from the German tuch, 

 cloth : I never rhet with it before as an English word.., 

 So I find platt, for foliage, in Stanley's Hist, of Pkilo^ 

 snphi/, p. 22." 



Whether Coleridge rightly appreciated Stanley's 

 use of the word platt, I shall not determine ; but 

 with regard to touch, it Is evident that he went (it 

 was the tendency of his mind) to Germany for 

 error, when truth might have been discovered 

 nearer home. The context shows that cloth could 

 not have been intended, for who ever heard of a 

 table or altar made of cloth ? The truth is that 

 the poet meant touchstone, which the author of the 

 Glossary of Architecture (Srd edit., text and ap- 

 pendix) rightly explains to be " the dark-coloured 

 stone or marble, anciently used for tombstones. 

 A musical sound" (it is added) "may be pro- 

 duced by touching It sharply with a stick." And 

 tills is In fact the reason for Its name. The author 

 of the Glossary of Architecture cites Ben Jonson 

 by GIfibrd, vlii. 251., juad ArchcBol.., xvl. 84. 



.1 •>! .'-fj' Alphage. 



. Lincoln's Inn. • « 



