July 27. 1850.] 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



141 



Boswell, in his Life of Johnson (siib 15th April, 

 1775), says that Johnson, in allusion to the un- 

 happy failure of pious resolves, said to an acquain- 

 tance, " Sir, hell is paved with good intentions." 

 Upon which Malone adds a note : 



" Tliis is a proverbial saying. ' Hell,' says Her- 

 btTt, 'is full of gjod meanings and wishings.' — Ja- 

 cula Priuleiitam, \i. 1 1. ed. 1631." 



but he does not say where else the proverbial say- 

 ing is to be found. The last editor, Croker, 

 adds, — 



" Johnson's phrase has become so proverbial, that it 

 may seem rather late to ask wliat it means — wliy 

 ' paved 9' perhaps as making the road easy, facilis 

 descensus Averiii." 



c. 



The Plant " Hamony" (Vol. ii., p. 88.).— I think 

 IMr. Bash am, who asks for a reference to the plant 

 " hajniony," referred to by Milton in his Co?niis, 

 will find the information which he seeks in the fol- 

 lowing extract from Henry Lyte's translation of 

 R ember t Dodoen's Herbal, at page 107. of the 

 edition of 1578. The plant is certainly not called 

 by the name of " hasniony," nor is it described as 

 having prickles on its leaves ; but they are plenti- 

 fully shown in the engraving which accompanies 

 the description. 



" Allysson. — The stem of this herbe is right and 

 straight, parting itself at the top into three or foure 

 small branches. The leaves be first round, and after 

 long whitish and rough, or somewhat woolly in hand- 

 ling. It bringeth foorth at the top of the branches 

 little yellow floiires, and afterward small rough whitish 

 and flat fiuskes, and almost round fasliioned like 

 bucklers, wlierein is contained a flat seede almost like 

 to tlie seed of castell or stocke gilloflers, but greater. 



" Alysson, as Uioscorides writeth, groweth upo 

 rough mountaynes, and is not found in this countrey 

 but in the gardens of some herl)oristes. 



" The same hanged in the house, or at tlie g:ite or 

 entry, kcepeth man and beast from encliantnients and 

 wilckiity." 



K.P.D.E. 



As a "Xote" toDR.BAsriAM's "Query," Iwoukl 

 quote Ovid's Metamorjih., lib vii. 1. -204-5. : 

 " Illic ff<enionid radices valle resectas, 

 Seniinaque, et flores, et succos incoquit acres." 



Practice of Sc<tlpin:r amongst the Scijthians — 

 Scundiiinvinn Mijtholoiiii. — fn Vol. ii., p. 12., I de- 

 sired to be iiir()rnu.Ml wln^tlier this practice has ])re- 

 vailed amongst any jicople besides the American 

 Imlians. As yon have ('slablisiieil no rule against 

 an in(piii-ei'« replying to his own (^uery, (though, 

 unfortunately for oilier inijuii-i-i-.s, self-im|)ose(l bv 

 soiue of your correspondents) I shall avail myself 

 ofyour permission, and refer tlio.se who are inter- 

 CBled in the sul^jeet to Herodotus, Melpomene C4, 



where they will find that the practice of scalping 

 prevailed amongst the Scythians. This coincidence 

 of manners serves greatly to corroborate the hypo- 

 thesis that America was peopled originally from 

 the northern parts of the old continent. He has 

 recorded also their horrid custom of drinking the 

 blood of their enemies, and making drinking vessels 

 of their skulls, reminding us of the war-sono- of the 

 savage of Louisiana : — 



" I shall devour their (my enemies') hearts, dry their 

 flesh, drink their blood ; I shall tear ofl' their scalps, and 

 makecupsof their skulls." (Bossu's Travels.) " Tliose," 

 says this traveller tlirough Louisiana, " who think the 

 Tartars have chiefly furnished America with inha- 

 bitants, seem to have hit the true opinion ; you cannot 

 believe how great the resemblance of the Indian man- 

 ners is to those of the ancient Scythians ; it is found in 

 their religious ceremonies, tlieir customs, and in their 

 food. Hornius is full of characteristics that may 

 satisfy your curiosity in this respect, and I desire you 

 to read him." — Vol. i. p. 400. 



But the subject of the "Origines Americanse" is 

 not what I now beg to projiose for consideration : 

 it is the tradition-falsifying assertion of Mr. Gren- 

 ville Pigott, in his Mamial of Scandinavian Mytho- 

 logy (as quoted by DTsraeli in the Amenities of 

 English Literature, vol. i. p. 51, 52.), that the 

 custom with which the Scandinavians were Ion" 

 reproached, of drinking out of the skulls of their 

 enemies, has no other foundation than a blunder of 

 Olaus Wormius, who, translating a passage in the 

 death-song of Begner Lodbrog, — 



" Soon shall we drink out of the curved trees of ttie 

 head," 



turned the trees of the head into a skull, and the 

 skull into a hollow cup ; whilst the Scald merely 

 alluded to the branching horns, growin"- as trees 

 from the heads of animals, that is, the curved horns 

 which formed tlieir drinking cups. T. J. 



Cromu'clVs Estates. — Magor (Vol. ii., p. 126.). 

 — I have at length procured the following infor- 

 mation respecting Magor. It is a parish°in the 

 lower division of the hundred of Caldicot, Mon- 

 mouthshire. Its church, which is dedicated to 

 St. Mary, is in the patronage of the Duke of 

 Beaufort. Selkucus. 



" Incidh in Scyllam," &,'c. (Vol. ii., p. 85.). — 

 Mr. C. FoRiiES says he " should be .sorry this tine 

 old proverb should be passed over with no hotter 

 notice than seems to have been assigned to it in 

 BoswcH's Johnson," and then he quotes some 

 account of it from the Gentleman's Magazine. I 

 beg leave to apjirise Mb. Forbk.s that there is no 

 notice whatsoever of it in l^oswell's Johnson, 

 though it is iutroduci'd (inter alia) in a note of 

 Air. M(donii's in the later editions of Boswell : but 

 that note contains in sulistance all that Mr. 

 FoKuus's communication repeats. See the later 



