Feb. 18. 1854.] 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



151 



dences. (1.) In their occurrence, (i.) To the same 

 person several times, (ii. ) In the same form to several 

 persons. (a.) Simultaneously. (h. ) Successively. 

 (2.) With facts, (i.) Past. (a.) Previously un- 

 known, (b.) Formerly known, but forgotten, (ii.) 

 Present, but unknown, (iii.) Future. — V. Feelings. 

 A definite consciousness of a fact. (1.) Past: an 

 impression that an event has happened. (2.) Present : 

 sympathy with a person suffering or acting at a dis- 

 tance. (3.) Future : presentiment. — VI. Physical 

 effects. (1.) Sounds, (i.) With the use of ordinary 

 means (e. g. ringing of bells), (ii.) Without the use of 

 any apparent means (e. g. voices). (2.) Impressions 

 of touch (e. g. breathings on the person). 



"Every nar^itive of 'supernatural' agency which 

 may be communicated, will be rendered far more in- 

 structive if accompanied by any particulars as to the 

 observer's natural temperament (e. g. sanguine, nervous, 

 &c), constitution (e. g. subject to fever, somnambulism, 

 &c), and state at the time (e.g. excited in mind or 

 body, &c.)." 



As I have no authority to give names, I can do 

 no more than say that, though not a member of 

 the Society, I shall be happy to receive communi- 

 cations and forward them to the secretary. 



C. Mansfield Inglebt. 



Birmingham. 



[ The Night Side of Nature would seem to indicate 

 that its ingenious, yet sober and judicious, authoress 

 had forestalled the " Folk-lore" investigations of the 

 projected Cambridge Society. Probably some of its 

 members will not rest satisfied with a simple collection 

 of phenomena relating to communications with the un- 

 seen world, but will exclaim with Hamlet — 



" Thou com'st in such a questionable shape, 

 That I will speak to thee !" 



and will endeavour to ascertain the philosophy of those 

 communications, as Newton did with the recorded data 

 and phenomena of the mechanical or material universe. 

 Whether the transcripts of some of the voluminous 

 unpublished writings of Dionysius Andreas Freher, 

 deposited in the British Museum (Add. MSS. 5767 — 

 5792.), will assist the inquirer in his investigations, we 

 cannot confidently state : but in them he will find 

 continual references to what Jacob Bohme terms " the 

 eternal and astral magic, or the laws, powers and 

 properties of the great Universal Will-Spirit of the two 

 co-eternal worlds of darkness and light, and of this 

 third or temporary principle." Freher was the prin- 

 cipal illustrator of the writings of the celebrated Jacob 

 Bbhme, now exciting so much interest among the 

 German literati ; and, if we may credit William Law, 

 it was from the principles of this remarkable man that 

 Sir Isaac Newton derived his theory of fundamental 

 powers. (See " N. & Q.," Vol. viii., p. 247.) But on 

 this and other matters we may doubtless expect to be 

 well informed by Sir David Brewster, in his new "Me- 

 moir of the Life, Writings, and Discoveries of Sir Isaac 

 Newton." According to Law, the two-fold spiritual 

 universe stands as near, and in a similar relation to this 

 material mixed world, of darkness and light, evil and 



good, death and life, or rather the latter to the former, 

 as water does to the gases of which it is essentially com- 

 pounded. — Ed.] 



STARVATION. 



(Vol. ix., p. 54.) 



Until your correspondent Q. designated the 

 word starvation as " an Americanism," I never had 

 the least suspicion that it was obtained from that 

 source. On the contrary, I remember to have 

 heard some thirty or forty years ago, that it was 

 first employed by Harry Dundas, the first Viscount 

 Melville, who might have spoken with a brogue, 

 but whose despatches were in good intelligible 

 English. I once asked his son, the second Vis- 

 count, whose correctness must be fresh in the re- 

 collection of many of your readers, if the above 

 report was true, and he seemed to think that his 

 father had coined the word, and that it immediately 

 got into general circulation. My impression is, 

 that it was already current during the great 

 scarcity at the end of the last, and the commence- 

 ment of this century ; but the dictionary makers, 

 those "who toil at the lower employments of 

 life," as old Sam Johnson termed it, are not apt 

 to be alert in seizing on fresh words, and " starv- 

 ation " has shared in the general neglect. 



If you permit me I will, however, afford them 

 my humble aid, by transcribing some omitted 

 words which I find noted in a little Walker's 

 Dictionary, printed in 1830, and which has been 

 my companion in many pilgrimages through many 

 distant lands. Many of them may by this time 

 have found their way even into dictionaries, but I 

 copy them as I find them. 



Fiat. 



Lichen. 



Dawdle. 



Compete (verb). 



Starvation. 



Cupel (see test). 



Stationery (writing mate- 

 rials). 



Chubby. 



Mister (form of address). 



Iodine. 



Disorganise. 



Growl (substantive). 



A vadavat ( School for Scan- 

 dal). 



Apograph. 



Flange. 



Effete. 



Jungle. 



Celt (formed of touch- 

 stone). 



Minivar. 



Unhesitating. 



Remittent. 



Tannin. 



Curry (substantive). 



Uncompromised. 



Duchess. 



Resile (verb). 



Gist. 



Nascent. 



Dictum. 



Retinence. 



Phonetic. 



Lacunae. 



Extradition. 



Laches. 



Fulcrum. 



Statics. 



iEsthetical. 



Complicity. 



N. L. Melville. 



However " strange it may appear, it is never- 

 theless quite true," that this word, " Starvation 



