Chapter C: I. R

_Gotch_ (Vol. vi., p. 400.).--The _gotch cup_, described by W. R., must have been known in England before the coming of the present royal family, as it is given in Bailey's _Dictionary_ (1730) as a south country word: it is not likely to have become provincial in so short a time, nor its origin, if German, to have escaped the notice of old ~Philologos~. The A.-S. verb _geotan_ seems to have had the sense of to cast metals, as _giessen_ has in German. In Bosworth's _Anglo-Saxon Dictionary_ is _leadgota_, a plumber. In modern Dutch this is _lootgieter_. Thus, from _geotan_ is derived _ingot_ (Germ. _einguss_), as well as the following words in Halliwell's _Dictionary: yete_, to cast metals (_Pr. Parv._), _belleyetere_ and _bellyatere_, a bell-founder (_Pr. Parv._); _geat_, the hole through which melted metal runs into a mould; and _yote_, to pour in. Grose has _yoted_, watered, a west country word.

E. G. R.

_Passage in Thomson: "Steaming"_ (Vol. vii., pp. 87. 248.).--This word, and not _streaming_, is clearly the true reading (as is remarked by the former correspondents), and is so printed in the editions to which I am able to refer. The object of my Note is to point out a parallel passage in Milton, and to suggest that _steaming_ would there also be the proper reading:

"Ye mists and exhalations, that now rise,
From hill or _streaming_ lake, dusky or gray,
Till the sun paint your fleecy skirts with gold,
In honour to the world's great Author, rise."
_Paradise Lost_, Book v.

CUTHBERT BEDE, B.A.

[The reading is _steaming_ in the 1st edition of _Paradise
Lost_, 1667.--ED.]

_The Word "Party"_ (Vol. vii., pp. 177. 247.).--The use of this word for a particular person is earlier than Shakspeare's time. It no doubt occurs in most of our earliest writers; for it is to be found in Herbert's _Life of Henry VIII._, in his translation of the "Centum Gravamina" presented to Pope Adrian in 1521, the 55th running thus:

"That, if one of the marryed couple take a journey either to the
warres, or to perform a vow, to a farre countrey, they permit
the _party_ remaining at home, if the other stay long away, upon
a summe of money payd, to cohabite with another, not examining
sufficiently whether the absent party were dead."

It may also be found in Exodus xxii. 9., where, though it occurs in the plural, it refers to two individuals:

"For all manner of trespass, whether it be for ox, for ass, for
sheep, for raiment, or for any manner of lost thing, which
another challengeth to be his, the cause of both _parties_ shall
come before the judges; and whom the judges shall condemn, _he_
shall pay double unto his neighbour."

H. T. ELLACOMBE.

Clyst St. George.

_Curious Fact in Natural Philosophy_ (Vol. vii., p. 206.).--In reply to ELGINENSIS I send you a quotation from Dr. Golding Bird's _Natural Philosophy_ in explanation of this well-known phenomenon:

"One very remarkable phenomenon connected with the escape of a
current of air under considerable pressure, must not be passed
over silently. M. Clement Desormes (_Ann. de Phys. et Chim._,
xxxvi. p. 69.) has observed, that when an opening, about an inch
in diameter, is made in the side of a reservoir of compressed
air, the latter rushes out violently; and if a plate of metal or
wood, seven inches in diameter, be pressed towards the opening,
it will, after the first repulsive action of the current of air
is overcome, be apparently attracted, rapidly oscillating within
a short distance of the opening, out of which the air continues
to emit with considerable force. This curious circumstance is
explained on the supposition, that the current of air, on
escaping through the opening, expands itself into a thin disc,
to escape between the plate of wood or metal, and side of the
reservoir; and on reaching the circumference of the plate, draws
after it a current of atmospheric air from the opposite side....
The plate thus balanced between these currents remains near the
aperture, and apparently attracted by the current of air to
which it is opposed."

Dr. G. B. then describes the experiment quoted by ELGINENSIS as "a similar phenomenon, and apparently explicable on similar principles." (Bird's _Nat. Phil._, p. 118.)

COKELY.

_Lowbell_ (Vol. vii., p. 272.).--I may add to the explanation of this word given by M. H., that _low_, derived from the Saxon _loeg_, is still commonly used in Scotland for a flame; hence the derivation of _lowbell_, for a mode of birdcatching by night, by which the birds, being awakened by the bell, are lured by the light into nets held by the fowlers. In the ballad of _St. George for England_, we have the following lines:

"As timorous larks amazed are
With light and with a _lowbell_."

The term _lowbelling_ may therefore, from the noise, be fitly applied to the rustic _charivari_ described by H. T. W. (Vol. vii., p. 181.) as practised in Northamptonshire.

J. S. C.

{368} _Life and Correspondence of S. T. Coleridge_ (Vol. vii., p. 282.).--There can be but one opinion and feeling as to the want which exists for a really good biography of this intellectual giant; but there will be many dissentients as to the proposed biographer, whose life of Hartley Coleridge cannot be regarded as a happy example of this class of composition. A life from the pen of Judge Coleridge, the friend of Arnold and Whateley, is, we think, far more to be desired.

~Theta~.

_Coniger, &c._ (Vol. vii., pp. 182. 241.).--At one extremity, the picturesque range of hills which forms the noble background of Dunster Castle, co. Somerset, is terminated by a striking conical eminence, well-wooded, and surmounted by an embattled tower, erected as an object from the castle windows. This eminence bears the name of _The Coniger_, and is now a pheasant preserve. Mr. Hamper, in an excellent notice of Dunster and its antiquities, in the _Gentleman's Magazine_, October, 1808, p. 873., says:

"The _Conygre_, or rabbit-ground, was a common appendage to
manor-houses."

Savage, however, in his _History of the Hundred of Carhampton_, p. 440., is of opinion that

"_Coneygar_ seems to be derived from the Anglo-Saxon _Cyning_,
King; and the Moeso-Gothic _Garas_, the same as the Latin
_Domus_, a house, that is, the king's house or residence. Mr.
Hamper has some notion that _Conygre_ means a rabbit-ground,
&c., but Mr. H. does not go high enough for his etymology;
besides, how does it appear that a rabbit-ground was at any time
an appendage to manor-houses? There is no authority for the
assertion."

I give you this criticism on Mr. Hamper _valeat quantum_, but am disposed to think he is right. At all events there are no vestiges of any building on the Coniger except the tower aforesaid, which was erected by the present Mr. Luttrell's grandfather.

BALLIOLENSIS.

In the Irish language, _Cuinicear_, pronounced "Keenèkar," is a rabbit-warren. _Cuinin_ is the diminutive of _cu_, a dog of any sort; and from the Celtic _cu_, the Greeks took their word ~kyôn~, a dog. I am of opinion that the origin of rabbit is in the Celtic word _rap_, i. e. a creature that digs and burrows in the ground.

FRAS. CROSSLEY.

_Cupid crying_ (Vol. i., p. 172.).--I had no means (for reasons I need not now specify) of referring to my 1st Vol. of "N. & Q." until yesterday, for the pretty epigram given in an English dress by RUFUS and as the writer in the _Athenæum_, whose communication you quote on the same subject (Vol. i., p. 308.), observes "that the translator has taken some liberties with his text," I make no apology for sending you a much closer rendering, which hits off with great happiness the point and quaintness of the original, by a septuagenarian, whose lucubrations have already been immortalised in "N. & Q."

"DE CUPIDINE.

Cur natum cædit Venus? arcum perdidit, arcum
Nunc quis habet? Tusco Flavia nata solo:
Qui factum? petit hæc, dedit hic, nam lumine formæ
Deceptus, matri se dari crediderat."

"CUPID CRYING.

Wherefore does Venus beat her boy?
He has mislaid or lost his bow:--
And who retains the missing toy?
Th' Etrurian Flavia. How so?
She ask'd: he gave it; for the child,
Not e'en suspecting any other,
By beauty's dazzling light beguil'd,
Thought he had given it to his mother."

F. T. J. B.

_Westminster Assembly of Divines_ (Vol. vii., p. 260.).--Dr. Lightfoot's interesting and valuable "Journal of the Assembly of Divines," from January 1, 1643, to December 31, 1644, will be found in the last volume of the edition of his _Works_, edited by Pitman, and published at London, 1825, in 13 vols. 8vo. I believe a few copies of the 13th volume were printed to be sold separately.

The MS. Journal in three thick folio volumes, preserved in Dr. Williams's library, Redcross Street, London, is attributed to Dr. Thomas Goodwin.

A MS. Journal, by Geo. Gillespie, from Feb. 2, 1644, to Oct. 25, 1644, in 2 vols., is in the Advocates' Library, Edinburgh.

The Rev. W. M. Hetherington published a tolerably impartial _History of the Westminster Assembly_, Edinburgh, 1843, 12mo.

The most important work, as throwing light upon the proceedings of the Assembly, is the _Letters and Journals of Robert Baillie_. The only complete edition of these interesting documents is that edited by David Laing, Esq., and published in 3 vols. royal 8vo., 1841-2.

JOHN I. DREDGE.

MR. STANSBURY will find the "Journal of the Assembly of Divines," by Lightfoot, in the new edition of his _Works_, vol. xiii. pp. 5. _et seq._ Some further light is thrown upon the subject by a parliamentary paper, printed "for the service of both Houses and the Assembly of Divines." A copy of it is preserved in our University library (Ff. xiv. 25.). I have referred to both these documents in _A History of the Articles, &c._, pp. 208-9.