2° d S. IX. Jan. 14. '60.] 



NOTES AND QUEKIES. 



29 



rb Sk \Cuov oTr(pn<LTl£ov, and Vulg., "et linum jam folliculos 

 germinaret." Other interpreters have understood that 

 the flax was in that state when it had the corollas of 

 flowers; and others, again, that it was in the stalk or 

 haulm. Something may be said in favour of either view; 

 but we incline to that first given, both as respects the 

 English word boiled, and the true meaning of the original 

 passage in Exodus.] 



Angi.o- Saxon Literature. — I should be obliged 

 if you would name one or more books giving gra- 

 phic accounts of Anglo-Saxon manners and insti- 

 tutions. S. P. 



[The following works will help our correspondent to 

 an acquaintance with Anglo-Saxon manners and institu- 

 tions: — Sharon Turner's History of the Anglo- Saxons, 4 vols. 

 8vo. 1802-5 ; Palgrave's Rise and Progress of the English 

 Commonwealth, Anglo-Saxon Period, 4to 1832; Palgrave's 

 History of England, Anglo-Saxon Period (Family Li- 

 brarj'), 1831; Lappenberg's History of England under the 

 Anglo- Saxon Kings, translated by B. Thorpe, 2 vols. 

 8vo. 18-15 ; The Saxons in England, by J. M. Kemble, 

 2 vols. 8vo. 1840 ; Polydore Vergil's English History, by 

 Sir Henry Ellis (Camden Society), 4to. 1846 ; Strutt's 

 Chronicle of England, 4to. 2 vols. 1777-8; Strutt's Corn- 

 pleat View of the Manners, Customs, Arms, §"C. of the In- 

 habitants of England, 3 vols. 4to. 1775-6; Strutt's Sports 

 and Pastimes, 4to. 1801 ; and Miller's History of the An- 

 glo-Saxons (Bohn's Illustrated Library), 1856; while for 

 Anglo-Saxon literature generally he may consult Mr. 

 Thomas Wright's Coup d'CEil sur le Progres et sur VEtat 

 de la Litte'rature Anglo- Saxonne en Angleterre, 8vo. 1836.] 



The Coan. — In Chambers's Annals of Scotland, 

 under the date of Oct. 1602 (vol. i. p. 369.), there 

 is a notice of a feud between the clans of Mac- 

 kenzie of Kintail and Macdonald of Glengarry. 

 After a number of outrages on both sides, Mr. 

 John Mackenzie, parson of Dingwall, taking ad- 

 vantage of Glengarry's absence on the Continent, 

 accused him, before the Lords of Council at Edin- 

 burgh, of being instigator of a certain murder ; 

 and also " he proved him to be a worshipper of 

 the Coan, which image was afterwards brought to 

 Edinburgh, and burned at the Cross." What 

 was the Coan f Dorricks. 



[As authors who mention " the Coan," appear to write 

 under the impression that their readers understand the 

 phrase, we trusted that there were some who knew more 

 about it than we do, and that a former Query on the 

 subject (2 nd S. vii. 277.) would bring us a speedy answer 

 from our friends in the North. In the hope that we may 

 yet receive a reply from those who are best able to give 

 it, we shall content ourselves for the present with offering 

 a conjecture. 



As " the Coan " was " an image used in witchcraft," and 

 as it was also " worshipped"— an "object of idolatry " — 

 we know not what to understand by it but an image of 

 the devil. The devil was, by general repute and consent, 

 the object of witch-worship ; and we are not aware that 

 there was any other. The term Coan may on this sup- 

 position correspond to the old kuhni, or hueni, which, ac- 

 cording to Grimm (Deut. Mylhol, 1835, p. 562.), is still a 

 provincial term applied in Schweitz (one of the Swiss 

 Cantons) to the devil: — quasi der hiihne, verwegene, the 

 audacious, the daring one? In Lowland Scotch, also, we 

 find " Cowman" the devil ; we suspect, however, that the 

 relation between Cowman and Coan is more in sound than 

 in etymology. 



The worship of the devil by witches is a practice, 

 though essential to our theory, too notorious to need 

 more than a passing notice here. In the 14th century, a 

 woman confessed "se adorasse diabolum illi genua flec- 

 tendo." (Grimm, p. 600.) Some of the rites, indeed, are 

 better told in Latin than in English. " Ibi conveniunt 

 cum candelis accensis, et adorant ilium caprum osculantes 

 eum in ano suo" (p. 601.). The image, or form in which 

 the devil was worshipped, was generally that of a goat; 

 and a wooden goat, very likely meaning no harm, may 

 have been the identical Coan that wa8 burnt at Edin- 

 burgh. The alleged custom of worshipping the devil by 

 lighting candles before him has led to the German phrase 

 " dera Teufel ein Licht anstecken " (p. 566.), which elu- 

 cidates our own "holding a candle to the devil." And in 

 allusion to the practice of honouring the evil one with 

 drink-offerings or libations (Cf. •' deofles cuppan," the 

 devil's cup, Ulfilas, 1 Cor. x. 21.), it is still usual in Ger- 

 many to say that a man leaves an offering for the devil 

 (" lasse dem Teufel ein Opfer "), when he does not empty 

 his glass. Hence our own vernacular phrase, when a 

 man finishes the tankard, of " not leaving the devil a drop." 

 Thus many of our commonest expressions have a latent 

 connexion with remote antiquity ; for German mythology 

 is as old as the hills. 



In connecting "Coan" (through " kueni," the devil,) 

 with the modern Ger. kiihn, it should be borne in mind 

 that among the old forms of kiihn we find kian, chuen, 

 and chuan. Adelung."] 



"Parliamentary Portraits." — Who was the 

 author of an 8vo. volume, published in London in 

 1815, and entitled Parliamentary Portraits; or, 

 Sketches of the Public Character of some of the 

 most distinguished Speakers of the House of Com- 

 mons ? Abhba. 



£ These parliamentary sketches are by Thomas Barnes, 

 late principal editor of The Times, who died 7 May, 1841. 

 They were contributed to The Examiner, at the time it 

 was edited by Leigh Hunt. Moore and Hunt were 

 Barnes's intimate companions in youth, and differed from 

 him in nothing but the politics of his later life. Leigh 

 Hunt, speaking of his imprisonment in 1815, says, 

 "There came my old friend and schoolfellow, Thomas 

 Barnes, who always reminds me of Fielding. It was he 

 that introduced me to Alsager, the kindest of neighbours, 

 a man of business, who contrived to be a scholar and a 

 musician." Barnes was unquestionably the most accom- 

 plished and powerful political writer of the day, and par- 

 ticularly excelled in the portraiture of public men.] 



lUpUgtf, 



ANNE POLE. 

 (2 nd S. viii. 170. 259.) 



The ladies to whom Notsa referred in reply to 

 my Query, were not descended from the same 

 branch of the Pole family, and could render me 

 no assistance. I write now to give all the inform- 

 ation I can, in the hope that it may lead to more. 

 Anne Pole was apparently the youngest daughter 

 and eleventh child of Sir " Geffrye Poole" (as he 

 wrote his own name on the walls of the Beau- 

 champ tower in 1562), the brother of Cardinal, 

 and second son of Sir Richard Pole, K.G. All 

 the Pole or Poole pedigrees, and lives of Arthur 



