500 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[No. 239. 



which the tenants pay ten shillings a year to a 

 person for keeping order in the church during 

 divine service. . . t> - „„ 



There is an acre of land m the parish of Peter- 

 church, Herefordshire, appropriated to the use ot 

 a person for keeping dogs out of the church. 



In the parish of Christchurch, Spitalfields, there 

 is a charity fund called " cat and dog money, the 

 interest on which is now divided annually amongst 

 six poor widows of weavers of the names of * abry 

 or Ovin^ton. There is a tradition in the parish 

 that this°money was originally left for the support 

 of cats and dogs, but it is more probable that it 

 was originally intended, as in the cases above 

 mentioned, to " whip dogs and cats out of the 

 church during divine service, and that on the un- 

 foreseen increase in the fund after a lapse of years, 

 it became appropriated in the present way. _ lhis 

 money was the subject of a chancery suit m the 

 last century, and the decree therein directed the 

 present division. . . 



Many of your readers will call to mind the yelp 

 of some poor cur who had strolled through the 

 open door of a country church on some sultry 

 dav, and been ejected by the sexton. I myseli 

 have often listened to the pit-a-pat in the quiet 

 aisle, and I once remember a disturbance in 

 church caused by the quarrel of two dogs, buch 

 scenes, and the fact that dogs were considered 

 unclean animals, most likely gave rise to the occu- 

 pation of dog-whipper as a function of the sexton. 

 It will also be remembered that some dogs cannot 

 forbear a howl at the sound of certain musical in- 

 struments; and besides the simple inconvenience 

 to the congregation, this howl may have been 

 considered a manifestation of antipathy to ho y 

 influences, as the devil was supposed to fear holy 

 water. , , „ 



Landseer's well-known picture of "The -tree 

 Church " proves to us that amongst the Highland 

 shepherds the office does not now at least exist : 

 and amongst other instances of the regular at- 

 tendance at church of these " unclean animals, 1 

 know one in Wales where a favourite dog always 

 accompanied his master to church, and stood up 

 in the corner of the pew, keeping watch over the 

 congregation with the strictest decorum. 



" ° A Notary. 



That persons bearing an office described by 

 such a name were attached to great houses in the 

 sixteenth century, is clear from the well-known 

 passage in The Two Gentlemen of Verona, Act IV. 

 Sc. 4., where Launce says, — 



" I, having been acquainted with the smell before, 

 knew it was Crab; and goes me to the fellow that whips 

 the dogs : ' Friend/ quoth I, « you mean to whip the 

 dog ? ' ' Ay, marry do I,' quoth he," &c. 



b W. B. R. 



Derby. 



CEPHAS, A BINDER, AND NOT A ROCK. 



(Vol. ix., p. 368.) 



I hope you will allow me to give a few reasons 

 for dissenting from Mr. Margoliouth. I will 

 promise to spare your space and avoid contro- 

 versy. 



1. The Hebrew word Caphis is only to be found 

 in Hab. ii. 11. Hence it has been regarded as of 

 somewhat uncertain signification. However, by 

 comparison with the Syriac verb DS3 (c"phas), we 

 infer that it may denote that which grasps, gathers, 

 or holds together; it is therefore not synonymous 

 with Sew, which is to hind, and is used in Matt. xvi. 



19. 



2. Proper names from the Hebrew, Chaldee, 

 and Syriac, are generally written in Greek, with 

 the terminations of that language, as e.g. Jesus, 

 John, James, Thomas, Judas, &c, and these ter- 

 minations are added to the radical letters of the 

 name, which are all retained. It is easy to see 

 that Caphis would become Caphisus, while Cepho 

 (Syriac for rock) would become Cephas, just as 

 Ehudo (Syriac, Jude) becomes Judas. 



3. Still less likely would the name Caphis be to 

 lose a radical in its transfer to th e< Syriac, where 

 Cephos is represented by Cepho, without »,*_ 



4. The paronomasia exhibited in the Latin, 

 "Tu es Petrus, et super hanc petram" also appears 

 both in the Greek and the Syriac. 



5. The difference of gender between the words 

 Petrus and petra, moreover, is preserved in the 

 Syriac and appears in the Greek. > ■' ~ • 



6 The figure of binding and loosing (v. W.) 

 is one which was common to the three languages, 

 Greek, Chaldee, and Syriac, in all of which it 

 denotes "to remit or retain" sins, "to confirm or 

 abolish" a law, &c. . ... 



7. The occurrence of this figure in ch. xvm. lb., 

 where the reference is not special to Peter, but 

 general to all the apostles. (Compare John xx. 



23 ) 



8 The Syriac uniformly translates the name 

 Peter by Cepho (i.e. Cephas), except once or 

 twice in Peter's epistles. This at least indicates 

 their view of its meaning. 



On the whole I see no reason to suppose that 

 Cephas means anything but stone; certainly there 

 is much less reason for the proposed signification 



of blllClGV 



In John i. 42., the clause which explains the 

 name Cephas is absent from the Syriac version m 

 accordance with the regular and necessary prac- 

 tice of the translators to avoid tautology : inou 

 shalt be called Stone; which is by interpretation 

 Stone t n (See the Journal of Sacred Literature 

 for January last, p. 457., for several examples of 

 this.) There is here surely sufficient reason to 

 account for the omission of this clause, which, it 



