508 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[No. 186- 



According to tlie construction and analogy of our 

 language, a punter or boater would be the person 

 who worked or managed the boat. I consider that 

 painter — like halter and tether, derived from Gothic 

 words signifying to hold and to tie — is a corruption 

 of bynder, from the Saxon bynd, to bind. If the 

 Anglo-Norman word panter, a snare for catching 

 and holding birds, be a corruption of bynder, we 

 are brought to the word at once. Or, indeed, we 

 may go no farther back than panter. 



J. C. G. says that derrick is an ancient British 

 word : perhaps he will be kind enough to let us 

 know its signification. I always understood that 

 a derrick took its name from Derrick, the noto- 

 rious executioner at Tyburn, in the early part of 

 the seventeenth century, whose name was long a 

 general term for a hangman. In merchant ships, 

 the derrick, for hoisting up goods, is always placed 

 at the hatchway, close by the gallows. The der- 

 rick, however, is not a nautical appliance alone ; it 

 has been long used to raise stones at buildings; but 

 the crane, and that excellent invention the handy- 

 paddy, has now almost put it out of employment. 

 What will philologists, two or three centuries 

 hence, make out of the word handy-paddy, which 

 is universally used by workmen to designate the 

 powerful winch, traversing on temporary rails, 

 employed to raise heavy weights at large buildings. 

 For the benefit of posterity, I may say that it is 

 very handy for the masons, and almost invariably 

 worked by Irishmen. 



As a collateral evidence to my opinion, that 

 painter is derived from the Saxon bynder, through 

 the Anglo-Norman panter, and that derrick is from 

 Derrick the hangman, I may add that these words 

 are unknown in the nautical technology of any 

 other language. W. Pinkerton. 



Ham. 



Pepys's '■'■ Morena" (Vol. vii., p. 118.). — Mr. 

 Warden may like to be informed that his con- 

 jecture about the meaning of this word is fully 

 confirmed by the following passage in the Diary, 

 6th October, 1661, which has hitherto unaccount- 

 ably escaped observation : 



" There was also my pretty black girl, Mrs. Dekins, 

 and Mrs. Margaret Pen this day come to church." 



Braybrooke. 



Pylades and Corinna (Vol. vii., p. 305.). — If 

 your correspondent's question have reference to 

 the two volumes in octavo published under this 

 title in 1731, assuredly Defoe had nothing to do 

 with them, as must be evident to any one on the 

 most cursory glance. The volumes contain me- 

 moirs of Mrs. Elizabeth Thomas, on whom Dryden 

 conferred the poetical title of Corinna, and the 

 letters which passed between her and Richard 

 Gwinnett, her intended husband. A biography 

 of this lady, neither whose life nor poetry were of 



the best, may be found in Chalmers's Biog. Dict.f 

 vol. xxix. p. 281., and a farther one in Cibber's- 

 Lives, vol. IV. The Dunciad, and her part in the 

 publication of Pope's early correspondence, have 

 given her an unhappy notoriety. I must say, 

 however, that, notwithstanding his provocation, I 

 cannot but think that he treated this poor woman 

 ungenerously. James Crossley, 



Judge Smith (Vol. vii., p. 463.). — I must con- 

 fess my ignorance of any Judge Smith flourishing 

 in the reign of Elizabeth. I know of only three 

 judges of that name. 



1. John Smith, a Baron of the Exchequer 

 during the last seven years of the reign of 

 Henry VIII. From him descended the Lords 

 Carrington of Wotton Waven, in Warwickshire^ 

 a title which became extinct in 1705. 



2. John Smith, who was also a Baron of the 

 Exchequer in the reign of Anne. He became 

 Chief Baron of the Exchequer in Scotland in 

 1708, and died in 1726. He endowed a hospital 

 for poor widows at Frolesworth in Leicestershire. 



3. Sidney Stafford Smythe, likewise a Baron of 

 the Exchequer under George II. and IH., and 

 Chief Baron in the latter reign. He was of the. 

 same family as that of the present Viscount 

 Strangford. 



If Z. E. R. would be good enough to send a 

 copy of the inscription on the monument in Ches- 

 terfield Church, and give some particulars of the. 

 family seated at Dunston Hall, the difliculty will 

 probably be removed. Edward Foss. 



Grindle (Vol. vii., pp. 107. 307. 384.). —As one 

 at least of the readers of " N. & Q." living near 

 Grindle (Greendale is modern), allow me to say 

 that from the little I know of the places, they 

 appear to me " to possess no traces of those na- 

 tural features which would justify the demoniacal 

 derivation proposed by I. E." However, as my 

 judgment may be of little worth, if "I.E. of 

 Oxford " should ever migrate into these parts, and 

 will favour me with a call, with credentials of 

 being the veritable I. E. of " N. & Q.," I shall 

 have much pleasure in assisting him to examine 

 for himself all the local knowledge which a short 

 walk to the spots may enable him to acquire. 



H. T. Ellacombe. 



Rectory, Clyst St. George. 



Simile of the Soul and the Magnetic Needle 

 (Voh vi., pp. 127. 207. 280. 368. 566.). — Dr. 

 Arnold, with more religion than science, thus 

 employs this simile : 



" Men get embarrassed by the common cases of a 

 misguided conscience ; but a compass may be out of 

 order as well as a conscience, and the needle may point 

 due south if you hold a powerful magnet in that 

 direction. Still the compass, generally speaking, is a 

 true and sure guide, and so is the conscience ; and you 



