2*t S. IX. JaU. 9& 'CO.] 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



57 



LONDON, SATURDAY, JANUARY 28. 1800. 



N». 213. — CONTENTS. 



NOTES : — The Lion in Greece, 57 — Shakspeare and Henry 

 Willobie, 59 — Amesbury, 60 — Life of Mrs. Sherwood: 

 Fictitious Pedigrees of Mr. Spence, 61. 



Minor Notes: — Henry VI. and Edward IV. — Mariner's 

 Compass — " Walk your Chalks " — Malsh — The a-Becket 

 Family — Lord Nelson and Lady Hamilton, 62. 



QUERIES : — Radicals in European Languages — Church 

 Chests — Rifle Pits — Classical Claqueurs at Theatres — 

 "Thinks I to Myself" — Hooper — Ballad against Inci- 

 sures — Robert Keith — Baptismal Font in Breda Cathe- 

 dral: Dutch-born Citizens of England— "Antiquitates 

 Britannicse et Hibernic* " — Noah's Ark — British Society 

 of Dilettanti — Acrostic — Henry VII. at Lincoln in 1486 



— Rev. John Genest — Hotspur — Henry Constantine 

 Jennings — Pye-Wype, 63. 



Quehies with Answers : — "Put into Ship-shape" — 

 Anna Cornelia Meerman — Rev. J. Plumptre's Dramas — 

 Rev. W. Gilpin on the Stage — Quotation — " The Voy- 

 ages, &c. of Captain Richard Falconer" — MS. Literary 

 Miscellanies — St. Cyprian — Benet Borughe — Topogra- 

 phical Excursion, 65. 



REPLIES :— Archiepiscopal Mitre, 67 — Bunyan Pedigree, 

 69 — Donnellan Lectures, 70 — The " Incident in the '15 ' " 



— Dr. Shelton Mackenzie — Hymns — Song of the Doug- 

 las — Wreck of the Dunbar — Othobon's Constitutions — 

 Sympathetic Snails — Scotch Clergy deprived in 1689 — 

 Curious Marriage — Holding up the Hand — Derivation of 

 Rip, " a Rake or Libertine—" My Eye and Betty Martin " — 

 Nathaniel Ward — Family of Constantine — King James's 

 Hounds — Longevity of Clerical Incumbents — The Elec- 

 tric Telegraph half a Century ago, 70. 



Notes on Books. 



iiatei. 

 THE LION IN GREECE. 



In a former article upon this subject (2 nd S. viii. 

 81.) I called attention to the improbability of the 

 supposition that Aristotle should have received 

 upon trust from Herodotus a false statement re- 

 specting the occurrence of the lion in Northern 

 Greece. It is worthy of note that in one of the 

 passages of the History of Animals in which Ari- 

 stotle mentions this fact, he introduces it on the 

 oceasion of a fabulous story that the lioness pro- 

 duces only once in her life, because she casts her 

 womb in the act of parturition. This foolish 

 fable (jivBos Ai)pu»57jj) was, he says, invented by 

 eome one who wished to account for the rarity of 

 the lion (H. A. vi. 31.). Now the author of this 

 "foolish fable" is no other than Herodotus him- 

 self, who relates it at length (iii. 108.) ; and it 

 seems very unlikely that Aristotle should have 

 been able to correct the historian's account of the 

 parturition of the lioness, but should not have 

 thought it worth his while to verify the more ob- 

 vious and patent fact, of the occurrence of the 

 lion in Northern Greece. (Concerning this fable, 

 compare Gell. N. A. xiii. 7. ; JElian, V. H. x. 3. ; 

 N. A. iv. 34.; and Antigon. Caryst. 21.). 



In another passage of the History of Animals, 

 Aristotle states that birds with crooked talons do 

 not drink. He then proceeds to remark inciden- 

 tally : &AA' 'HaloSot i)yv6ti tovto' 7re7roi'j)K« yap rhv ttjs 



jxavreias irpi'ieSpov aerbv if rfj 8«)77)<rei tj? irepi rr)v 

 iroKiopniav tt)v Nifou iriVocra, viii. 18. 



Out of the four manuscripts of this treatise col- 

 lated by Bekker, three give 'HaloSos ; one, a Vati- 

 can MS., of inferior authority, has 'HpSaoros. The 

 reading, 'HuioSos, is received by Bekker. Now 

 Herodotus twice refers to his Assyrian history, and 

 promises to relate in it some facts omitted in his 

 general history. One of these is the taking of 

 Ninus by the Medes under Cyaxares (i. 106. 

 184.). Hence it has been conjectured that Ari- 

 stotle in this passage referred to the separate 

 Assyrian history of Herodotus : and Wesseling 

 (on Herod, i. 106.) and other critics have preferred 

 the reading "HpiSoTOQ in the passage of Aristotle, 

 who have been followed by Muller (Hist, of Gr. 

 Lit. c. 19. § 2.). Mr. Rawlinson, in his recent 

 edition of Herodotus (vol. i. 249.), gives his rea- 

 sons for adopting the same view. On the other 

 hand, nothing is known of any poem of Hesiod in 

 which a narrative of the siege of Ninus could 

 have been introduced; and assuming that the 

 siege of Ninus intended by Aristotle is that of 

 Cyaxares, the date of this event would, according 

 to Clinton, be 606 B.C., which is long subsequent 

 to the time assigned to the life of "Hesiod. If, 

 therefore, 'HpSftoros be received instead of 'Ha-ioSos 

 in the passage of Aristotle, this would be another 

 correction by Aristotle of a statement of Herodo- 

 tus respecting a point of natural history. 



It must, however, be admitted that the substitu- 

 tion of the name of Herodotus in this passage is 

 open to powerful objections. There is no proof that 

 the Assyrian history of Herodotus was ever pub- 

 lished. The traces of it which Mr. Rawlinson 

 attempts to find cannot be relied on ; Col. Mure 

 thinks that it was never composed (Hist, of Lit. of 

 Anc. Gr. vol. v. p. 332.). The phrase iren-oiVe and the 

 introduction of the words rhv ttjs /xavreius ■wpAtSpov 

 seem likewise to imply a quotation from some 

 poet ; and the mention of so minute a circum- 

 stance as an eagle drinking is more suited to a 

 poet than to a historian. Hence it appears that 

 the context requires the name of a pout who 

 might have introduced a narrative of the siege of 

 Ninus by Cyaxares. Such a poet may be found 

 in Choerilus of Samos, whose epic poem on the 

 Persian war of Xerxes (called Uiparih), consisting 

 of several books, may not unnaturally be sup- 

 posed to have contained an episode on the siege of 

 Ninus. The words /xavrelas irp6e8pos would suit 

 hexameter verse. rip<k5pos and irpoeSpia are not 

 ancient forms : they are quoted from no writer 

 prior to Herodotus and Aristophanes. We know 

 that the poems of Choerilus were in great repute 

 in the time of Plato (Procl. in Tim. p. 28.) ; Ari- 

 stotle twice cites Choerilus in his Rhetoric (iii. 14. 

 § 4. 6.), and once, with censure, in the Topics, 

 (viii. 1.). He flourished about the year 404 

 (Plut. Lys. 18.), and was originally placed in the 



