74 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[No. 65. 



Mole (Vol. ii., p. 225.).— This story is of course 

 much older than the form in which it now appears. 

 Sir Bevil Grenville is the great hero of the N. W. 

 coast of Cornwall; most of the floating legend 

 has been gathered about him. 



Legends referring to the origin of different 

 animals are common. Mrs. Jamieson (Canada) 

 has a very beautiful Chippewa story of the first 

 robin. 



It is believed in Devonsliire that moles begin 

 to work with the flow, and leave oS' with the ebb 

 of the tide. The same thing is asserted of the 

 beaver. 



Pillgarlicli (Vol. ii., p. 393. ; Vol. iii., p. 42.).— 

 The word is given by Todd, in his edition of 

 Johnson, under the forms Pilgarlick and Pilled- 

 garlick. The same ortliography is adopted by 

 other lexicographers. The spelling, concerning 

 which your querist desires information, is, how- 

 ever, the least important point. I trust that the 

 question will elicit information of a valuable kind 

 as to the origin of the term, by which I have 

 myself been "sorely puzzled, and which, I think, 

 has not been satisfactorily cleared up by_ any of 

 those viho have attempted it. Following the 

 authority of Skinner, our philologists are s.atisfied 

 with assuring us, that pilled means bald (French, 

 pelc) : and about this there can be no dispute. 

 Thus Chaucer (Eeve's Tale) says : — 



" Round was his face, and camuse was his nose, 

 And pilled as an ape was his skull." 



Shakspeare also has : — 



" Pieled priest ! doost thou cominand me to be shut 

 out ? " 

 for " shaven priest." But pilled, in other cases, 

 as might be shown by quotations, which for the 

 sake of brevity I omit, means pillaged, robbed, and 

 also peeled, of which last sense the quotations 

 above given seem oi.ly to be a figurative applica- 

 tion. The diificidlies which arise from these ex- 

 planations are, first, if bald be the true meaning, 

 why must we, with Todd, limit it to baldness, 

 resulting from disease, or more especially (as Grose 

 will have it) from a disgraceful disease ? 



Secondly, if peeled be taken as the equivalent 

 to ])illed, why is peeled garlick a more perfect 

 type of misery than any other peeled root or 

 fruit? 



Thirdly, if pillage is an essential ingredient in 

 the true meaning of the term " pilled garlick," 

 what has the stolen garlick to do with wretched- 

 ness ? Anil, 



Lastly, how will any one, or all of these ex- 

 planations together, tally with the following pas- 

 sage from Skelton : — 



" Wyll, Wyll, Wyll, Wjll, Wyll, 

 He ruletli always styll. 

 Good reason and good skyll. 

 They may garlyck pyll, 



Cary sackes to the myll, 



Or pescoddes they may slw/ll, 



Or elles go rost a stone?" 



JF/iy come ye not to Courte 9 ] 03-109. 



Without further elucidation of this pilling, the 

 existing definitions are pills which defy the de- 

 glutition of F. S. Q. 



A Recent Novel (Vol.i., pp.231. 28.5.). — May 

 I be permitted to correct an error in a communi- 

 cation from one of your correspondents ? Adol- 

 PHUS (p. 231.) puts a Query respecting the title of 

 a recent novel ; and J. S. (p. 28.5.) informs hinr 

 that the title is Le Mm'ne an Diable, by Eugiino 

 Sue. The fact is, that " La Morne au Diable" is 

 the principal scene of the events described, and 

 nothing more. The title is U Aventiirier, ou la 

 Barhe-bleue ; and an English translation, styled 

 the Female Blue Beard, or the Adeenturer, was 

 published in 1845 by AV. Strange, 21. Paternoster 

 liow. Henky II. Breen. 



St. Lucia, W. I,, Nov. 1850. 



Tablet to Napoleon (Vol.i., p. 461.). — The 

 form and punctuation given to this inscription by 

 C. suggest its true meaning. Napoleon is called 

 the Egyptian, the Italian, for reasons similar to 

 those for which Publius Cornelius Scipio obtained 

 the name of " Africanus." There is, however, 

 another sense in which the epithet " bis Italicus " 

 is applicable to Napoleon : lie was an Italian by 

 birth as well as by conquest. It is in this sense 

 that Voltaire has applied to Henri Quatre the 

 second line of the following couplet : — 



'' Je chante ce heros qui regna sur la Fiance 

 Et par droit de conqucte, et par droit de naissaiice." 



As to the "lingual purity" of the inscription, 

 there is not much to be said about it, one way or 

 the other. It is on a level with most modern in- 

 scriptions and epitaphs in the Latin language; 

 neither so elegant as the Latinity of Dr. Johnson, 

 or Walter Savage Landor, nor yet so hackneyed 

 as our " Latin de cuisine." 



Henet H. Breen. 



St. Lucia, W. I., Nov. 1850. 



North Sides of Clmrchyards (Vol. ii., pp.55. &c.) 

 — In a chapter on the custom of burying on the 

 south side of churches, in Thompson's History of 

 Sivine, published 1824, I find the following men- 

 tion of the north side being appropriated to felons : 



" The writer hereof remembers, that between fifty 

 and sixty years ago, a man who was executed at Lin- 

 coln, was brought to Swine, and buried on the north 

 side of the church, as the proper place in which to bury 

 a felon." 



I have heard it stated by several inhabitants of 

 the parish, that it is only within a few years that 

 burials began to be made irrespectively on the 

 north side. Whilst speaking of things in connec- 

 tion with this church, I may mention for the in- 



