24 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[No. 32. 



derived from 7wxa or noxia in Latin, meaning 

 "stril'e." They quote : — 



" S^pe in conjugiis fit noxia, cum nimia est dos." 



Ausonius. 

 " In median! noxiam perfeitur." 



Petrnnius. 

 " Diligerent alia, et noxas bellun^que movercnt." 



^Iimilins. 



It is a great pity that we have no book of 

 reference for English analogy of language. C. B. 



Why should Mr. Hickson (Vol. i., p. 428 ) 

 attempt to derive "news" indirectly from a Ger- 

 man adjective, when it is so directly attributable 

 to .an English one ; and that too without depart- 

 ing from a practice almost indigenous in the 

 language ? 



Have we not in English many similar adjective 

 substantives? Are we not continually slipping 

 into our slwiis^ or sporting our tights, or par.ading 

 our heavies, or counter-ni.arching aur lights, or 

 conimiseraling hhicks, or leaving whites to starve; 

 or calculating the odds, or making expositions for 

 goods ? 



Oh ! but, says Mr. Hickson, " in that case 

 the '«' would be the sign of the plural." Not 

 necessarily so, no more than an "s" to "mean" 

 furnishes a "means" of proving the same thing. 

 But granting that it were so, what then ? The 

 word " news" is undoubtedly plural, and has been 

 so used from the earliest times ; as (in the exam- 

 ple I sent for publication last week, of so early 

 a date as the commencement of Henry VIll.'s 

 reign) may be seen in " thies newes." 



But a flight still more eccentric would be the 

 identification of " noise" with "news!" "There 

 is no process," Mr. Hickson says, "by which 

 noise could be manufactured without making a 

 plural noun of it ! " 



Is not Mr. Hickson aware that la noise is a 

 French noun-singular signifying a contention or 

 dispute? and that the same word exists in the 

 Latin nisus, a struggle ? 



If mere plausibility be sufficient ground to jus- 

 tify a derivation, where is there a more plausible 

 jone tlian that " news," intelligence, ought to be de- 

 rived from vovs, understanding or jcommon sense f 



A. E. B. 



Leeds, May 5tb. 



Further evidence (see Vol. i., p. .^eO.) of the 

 existence and common rise of the word " newes " 

 in its present signification but ancient orthography 

 anterior to tlie introduction of newspapers. 



In a letter from the Cardinal of York (Bain- 

 bridge) to Henry VUI. (Rynier's i^cet/era, vol. vi. 

 p. 50.), 



" After that thies Newes affoxcsalde ware dyvulgate 

 in the Citie here." 



Dated from Rome, September, 1513. 



The 'Newes was of the victory just gained by 

 Henry over the French, commonly 'known as " The 

 Battk of the Spurs." A. E. B. 



THE DODO QUERIES. 



I beg to thank Mr. S. "W. Singee for the fur- 

 ther notices he has given (Vol. i., p. 48^5.) in connec- 

 tion with this subject. I was well acquainted with 

 the passage which he quotes from Osorio, a pas- 

 sjige which some writers have very inconsiderately 

 connecte<l with the Dodo history. In reply to 

 Mr. Singers Queries, I need only make the fol- 

 lowing extract from the Dodo and its Kindred, 

 p. 8.:- 



"The statement that Vasco de Gama, in 1497, dis- 

 covared, sixty leagues beyond tlie Cape of Good Hojie, 

 a bay called after San Blaz, near an island full of birds 

 with wings like bats, which the sailors called solititries, 

 (De Blainville, Nouv. Ann. Mus. Hist. A'af., and Penny 

 Ct/clopccdia, Dono, p. 47.), is wholly irrelevant. The 

 birds are evidently penguins, and their wings were 

 compared to those of bats, from being without deve- 

 loped feathers. De Gama never went near Mauritius, 

 but hugged the African coast as far as Melinda, and 

 then crossed to India, returning by the same route. 

 This small island inhabited by penguins, near the Cape 

 of Good Hope, has been gratuitously confounded with 

 Mauritius. Dr. Hamcl, in a memoir in the Bulletin 

 de la Classc Pliijsico- Mdthcmalique de VAcademie de 

 St. Petersbimrg, vol. iv. p. 5:5., has devoted an unneces- 

 sary amount of erudition to the refutation of this ob- 

 vious mistake. He shows that the name solitaires, as 

 applied to penguins by De Gama's companions, [I 

 should have said, 'by later compilers,'] is corrupted 

 from sotilicuiros, which appears to be a Hottentot 

 word." 



I may add, that Dr. Hamel shows Osorio's state- 

 ment to be taken from Castanheda, who is the 

 earliest authority for the account of De Gama's 

 voyage. H. E. Stricisxand. 



BOHN S EDITION OF MILTON. 



Mr. Editor, — I have just seen an article in 

 your " Notes and Queries " referring to my 

 edition of Milton's prose works. It is stated that, 

 in my latest catalogue, the book is announced as 

 complete in 3 vols., although the contrai-y appears 

 to be the case, juiiging by the way in which the 

 third volume ends, the absence of an index, &c. 



I reply, I beg to say that the insertion of the 

 word " complete," in somfi of .my catalogues, has 

 taken place without my privity, and is now ex- 

 punged. The fourth volume h.as long been in 

 prejjaration, but the time of its appearance depends 

 on the health and leisure of a prelate, whose name 

 I h.ave no right to announce. Tliose gentlemen 

 who have taken the trouble to make direct in- 



