9 bh) 
340 NOTES AND QUERIES. 
[No. 21. 
Emerald (No. 14. p. 217.). — Before we puzzle 
ourselves with the meaning of a thing, it is well to 
consider whether the authority may not be very 
loose and inaccurate. This emerald cross, even if 
it was made of emeralds, might have been in 
several pieces. But we are told generally, in 
Phillips’s Mineralogy, that “the large emeralds 
spoken of by various writers, such as that in the 
Abbey of Richenau, of the weight of 28 lbs., and 
which formerly belonged to Charlemagne, are 
believed to be either green fluor, or prase. The 
most magnificent specimen of genuine emeralds 
was presented to the Church of Loretto by one of 
the Spanish kings. It consists of a mass of white 
quartz, thickly implanted with emeralds, more 
than an inch in diameter.” 
The note to the above exemplifies what I have 
just said. It is called emerald, he says, because it 
is green, from the Greek. I might make a query 
of this; but it is clearly a mistake of some half- 
learned or ill-understood informant. The name 
has nothing to do with green. Emerald, in 
Italian smeraldo, is, I dare say, from the Greek 
smaragdus. It is derived, according to the Oxford 
Lexicon, from paipw, to shine, whence papuapuyf. 
In looking for this, I find another Greek word, 
smiris, which is the origin of emery, having the 
same meaning. It is derived from cudw, to rub, 
or make bright. I cannot help suspecting that 
the two radical verbs are connected. 
Ancient Motto — Barnacles. — In reference to 
your querist in No. 6., respecting the motto which 
“some Pope or Emperor caused to be engraven in 
the centre of his table,” and the correspondent 
in No. 7. who replies to him by a quotation from 
Horace, I beg to observe, that honest Thomas 
Fuller, in The Holy State, 275. ed. Lond. 1648, 
tells us, that St. Augustine “had this distich 
written on his table :” — 
“ Quisquis amat dictis absentem rodere famam, 
Hane mensam indignam noverit esse sibi. 
He that doth love on absent friends to jeere, 
May hence depart, no room is for him here.” 
With respect to the Barnacle fowl, it may be 
an addendum, not uninteresting to your corre- 
spondent “ W. B. MacCase,” to add to his ex- 
tract from Giraldus another from Hector Boece, 
History of Scotland, “imprentit be Thomas 
Davidson, prenter to the Kyngis nobyll grace 
[James VI.].” He observes, that the opinion of 
some, that the “Claik geis growis on treis be the 
nebbis, is vane,” and says he “maid na lytyll 
lauboure and deligence to serche the treuthe and 
virite yairof,” having “ salit throw the seis quhare 
thir Clakis ar bred,” and assures us, that although 
they were produced in “ mony syndry wayis, thay 
ar bred ay allanerly be nature of the seis.” ‘These 
fowls, he continues, are formed from worms which 
are found in wood that has been long immersed 
in salt water, and he avers that their transformation 
was “notably provyn in the zier of God 1480 
besyde the castell of Petslego, in the sycht of mony 
pepyll,” by a tree which was cast ashore, in which 
the creatures were seen, partly formed, and some 
with head, feet, and wings; “bot thay had na 
faderis.” Some years afterwards, a tree was 
thrown on the beach near Dundee, with the same 
appearances, and a ship broken up at Leith ex- 
hibited the same marvel; but he clinches the 
argument by a “notable example schawin afore 
our eyne. Maister Alexander Galloway Person, 
of Kynkell, was with us in thir Illis (the Hebride), 
and be adventure liftet up ane see tangle, hyng 
and full of mussil schellis,” one of which he opened; 
“bot than he was mair astonist than afore, for he 
saw na fische in it bot ane perfit schapin foule. 
This clerk, knawin us richt desirous of sic uncouth 
thingis, came haistely, and opinit it with all cir- 
cumstance afore rehersit.” So far the venerable 
“Chanon of Aberdene.” The West Highlanders 
still believe in the barnacle origin of this species 
of fowl. James Loan. 
Tureen (No. 16. p. 246.; No. 19. p. 807.).—I 
have seen old-fashioned silver tureens which 
turned on a pivot attached to the handles, and 
always concluded that it was to this form that 
Goldsmith alluded in the line quoted by “ G. W.” 
SELEvcUs. 
Hudibrastic Couplet (No. 14. p. 211.). — These 
lines do not occur in the reprint of the Musarum 
Delicie (Lond. 1817. 8vo. 2 vols.). Lowndes 
(Bibliogr. Manual) states that they are to be 
found in the 2nd ed. of the work (London, 1656. 
12mo.). F.C. B. 
Topography of Foreign Printing-presses (No. 
18. p. 277.) — About twelve years ago, Valpy pub- 
lished a vol. of Supplements to Lempriére’s Dic- 
tionary, by E. H. Barker. One of these contained 
a complete list of all the foreign towns in which 
books had been printed, with the Latin names 
given to them, in alphabetical order. W. and N. 
Your correspondent “P H. F.” will find, in Cot- 
ton’s Typographical Gazetteer (8vo. Clarendon 
Press, 1831), every information he will ordinarily 
require. J.M.S. 
Islington, March 7. 1850. 
Dr. Hugh Todd's MSS. (No. 18. p. 282.).— 
The only MS. in the library of University Col- 
lege, Oxford, is that mentioned by “IF. M.”; and 
it is described in the Catalogue, compiled by the 
Rev. H. O. Coxe, of the MSS. belonging to the 
College, p. 47. No. clxx. There is a note stating 
it was “‘ex dono Hugonis Todd, Socii, a.p. 1690.” 
C. 1. R. 
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