152 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[No. 69. 



predilection for the liuiulred merry tales among 

 the " black relations of the Jesuits ?" Spes. 



Meaning of Cefn. — What is the meaning of the 

 Welsh word " Cefn" used as a prefix ? 



JOSEPHUS. 



1. The first meaning of the word "Cefn" is, 

 " the back ; " e. g. " Cefn dyn," " the back of a 

 man." 



2. It also signifies " the upper part of the ridge 

 of some elevated and exposed land." As a prefix, 

 its meaning depends upon the fiict whether the 

 word attached to it be an adjective or a substan- 

 tive. If an adjective be attached, it has the second 

 signification ; /. e. it is the upper part of some ex- 

 posed land, having the particular quality involved 

 in tlie adjective, such as, " Cefndu," " Cefngwyn," 

 "Cefncoch," the black, white, or red headland. 



When a substantive is attached, it has the first 

 signification ; i. e. it is the hack of the thing signi- 

 fied by the substantive ; such as, " Cefnllys," the 

 back of the court. E. L. 



Pori?-ait of Archbishop Williams (Vol. iii., p. 8.). 

 — There is a portrait of this prelate in the library 

 of the Dean and Chapter of Westminster, in the 

 Cloisters. The greater part of the archbishop's 

 library was given to this library, but only one 

 volume of it seems to have been preserved. It is 

 of this library the remark is made in J. Beeverell, 

 Dclices dc la Grande Bi etagne, p. 847., 12mo., 1 707 : 



" II se trouve dans le cloistre line bibliotheque 

 puhUque, qui s'ouvre soir et matin pendant les stances 

 dt's Cours de Justice dans AVcstminstre." ;u. 



Sir Alexander Cumming (Vol. iii., p. 39.). — In 

 answer to an inquiry relative to Sir Alexander 

 Cumming, of Culter, I may refer to the Scottish 

 Journal (Menzies, Edin. 1848) of Topography, 

 Antiquities, Traditions, cVc, vol. ii. p. 254., where 

 an extract from a MS. autobiography of the baro- 

 net is given. The work in which this occurs is 

 little known ; but, as a repertory of much curious 

 and interesting information, deserved a more ex- 

 tensive circulation than it obtained. It stopped 

 with the second volume, and is now somewhat 

 scarce, as the unsold copies were disposed of for 

 waste paper. 



Pater-noster Tackling (Vol. iii., p. 89.). — Pater- 

 noster fishing-tackle, so called in the shops, is used 

 to catch fish (perch, for instance) which take the 

 bait at various distances between the surface and 

 the bottom of the water. Accordingly, hooks are 

 attached to a line at given intervals throughout its 

 length, with le.aden shots, likewise regularly dis- 

 tributed, in order to sink it, and keep it extended 

 perpendicularly in the water. 



This regularity of arrangement, and the re- 

 semblance of the shots to beads, seems to have 

 caused the contrivance to have been, somewhat 

 fancifully, likened to a chaplet or rosary. In a 



rosary there is a bead longer than the rest, for 

 distinction's sake called the Pater-noster; from 

 whence that name applies to a rosary ; and, there- 

 fore, to anything likened to it ; and, therefore, to 

 the article oi" fishing-tackle in question. 



The word pater-7ioster, i. e. pater-noster-icise, is 

 an heraldic term (vide Ash's Dictionary), applied 

 to beads disposed in the form of a cross. 



KoBERT Snow. 



Welsh Words for Water (Vol. iii., p. 30.). — 

 " It Is quite surprising'," says Sharon Turner ( Trans, 

 of the lioyal Society of Literature, vol. i. pt. i. p. 97. ), 

 "to observe that, in all the four quarters of the world, 

 many nations signify this liquid by a vocable of one or 

 more syllables, from the letter M." 



He mentions the Hebrew word for it, mim ; in 

 Africa he finds twenty-eight examples, in Asia 

 sixteen, in South America five, in North America 

 three, in Europe three ; and elsewhere, in Canary 

 Islands one, in New Zealand one. He adds — 



" We trace the same radical in the Welsh more, the 

 sea, and in the Latin marc, humor, humidus* 



" All these people cannot be supposed to have de- 

 rived their sound from each other. It must have de- 

 scended to them from some primitive source, common 

 to all." 



From the expression used by J. W. H., '' the 

 connexion of the Welsh dicr with the Greek uScop 

 is remarkable," he appeal's not to have known that 

 Vezron found so many resemblances in the Doric 

 or Laconic dialect, and the Celtic, that he there- 

 upon raised the theory that the Lacedajmonians and 

 the Celts were of the same — the Titanic — stock. 



T.J. 



Early Culture of the Imagination (Vol. iii., p. 38.). 

 — Tiie germ of the thought alluded to by Mr. 

 fiATTY is as ancient as the time of Plato, and may 

 be found in the Bepublic, book ii. c. 17. If this 

 will aid Mr. Gatty iu his research, it is gladly 

 placed at his disjjosal by 



Kenneth E. H. Mackenzie. 



January £0. 1851. 



Venville (Vol. iii., p. 38.). — E. E. G. inquires 

 respecting the origin of this word, as applied to 

 certain tenants round D.artmoor Forest. The 

 name is peculiar to that district, and is applied 

 chiefly to certain vills or villages (for the most 

 part also parishes), and to certain tenements 

 within them, which p.ay fines to the Lord of Lid- 

 ford and Dartmoor, viz. the Prince of Wales, as 

 Duke of Cornwall. The fines are supposed to be 

 due in respect either of rights of common on the 

 forest, or of trespasses committed by cattle on it ; 

 for the point is a vexata qiMstio between the lord 

 and tenants of Dartmoor and the tenants of the 

 Venville lands, which lie along the boundaries of it. 



* He may have added the Armoric or Breton m.or, 

 mar ; and the Irish muir, ^lara. 



