Part 4

It is satisfactory to all interested in this matter to know that "the incontestable action of our satellite on atmospheric pressure, aqueous precipitations, and the dispersion of clouds, will be treated in the latter and purely telluric portion of the _Cosmos_" (vol. iii. p. 368., and note 596, where an interesting illustration is given of the effects of the radiation of heat from the moon in the upper strata of our atmosphere).

JNO. N. RADCLIFFE.

Dewsbury.

Not being quite satisfied with MR. INGLEBY'S answer to W. W.'s Query, I beg to refer inquirers to the _Nautical Magazine_ for July, 1850, and three subsequent months, in which will be found a translation by Commander L. G. Heath, R.N., of a paper published by M. Arago in the _Annuaire du Bureau des Longitudes_ for the year 1833, entitled "Does the Moon exercise any appreciable Influence on our Atmosphere?" This treatise enters fully into the subject, and gives the results of several courses of experiments extending over many years; which go to prove that in Germany, at all events, there is more rain during the waxing than during the waning moon. Several popular errors are shown to have arisen in the belief that certain appearances in the moon, really the _effect_ of peculiar states of the atmosphere, were the _cause_ of such atmospheric peculiarities; but we are allowed some ground for supposing that this "vulgar error" may have some foundation in "vulgar truth."

G. WILLIAM SKYRING.

* * * * *

LATIN RIDDLE.

(Vol. viii., p. 243.)

The enigma of Aulus Gellius (_Noctes Atticæ_, lib. xii. cap. vi.), though transmitted to us in a corrupt form, is solved at once by the story mentioned by Livy (lib. i. cap. lv.). When Tarquinius {323} Superbus was about to build the Temple of Jupiter Capitolinus, it was found necessary to "exaugurate" or dispossess the other deities whose shrines had previously occupied the ground. All readily gave way to Father Jupiter with the exception of _Terminus_; and the point of the riddle lies in the analogy between "_Semel_ minus," "_Bis_ minus," and "_Ter_ minus."

I extract a note from the copy of Aulus Gellius before me:

Barthius (_Adv._, lib. xvi. cap. xxii.) hos versus ita legebat:

'Semel minus? Non. Bisminus? Non. Sat scio. An utrumque? Verum; ut quondam audivi dicier, Jovi ipsi regi noluit concedere.'

"Ita et trimetri sua sibi constant lege, et acumen repetitis interrogatiunculis. Alioquin frigidum responsum. Potest tamen ita intelligi, ut semel, bis, imo ter Jove minus sit, et noluerit tamen Jovi cedere."--Page 560. N.: Lugd. Batav., 1706, 4to.

Lactantius, "the Christian Cicero," thus tells the story:

"Nam cum Tarquinius Capitolium facere vellet, eoque in loco multorum deorum sacella essent: consuluit eos per augurium; utrum Jovi cederent, et cedentibus cæteris, solus Terminus mansit. Unde illum Poeta 'Capitoli immobile Saxum' vocat (Virg., _Æn._ ix. 441.). Facto itaque Capitolio, supra ipsum Terminum foramen est in tecto relictum: ut quia non cesserat, libero cœlo frueretur."--_De Falsa Relig._, lib. i. cap. xx. _ad fin._

Livy, in a subsequent book (v. 45.), Dionysius of Halicarnassus (_Antiqu. Rom._, lib. iii. cap. lxix.) and Florus assert that _Juventas_ also refused to move; and St. Augustine tells the same story of _Mars_. I may as well quote his words:

"Cum Rex Tarquinius Capitolium fabricare vellet, eumque locum qui ei dignior aptiorque videbatur, ab Diis aliis cerneret præoccupatum, non audens aliquid contra eorum facere arbitrium, et credens eos tanto numini suoque principi voluntate cessuros; quia multi erant illic ubi Capitolium constitutum est, per augurium quæsivit, utrum concedere locum vellent Jovi: atque ipsi inde cedere omnes voluerunt, præter illos, quos commemoravi, Martem, Terminum, Juventatem: atque ideo Capitolium ita constitutum est, ut etiam iste tres intus essent tam obscuris signis, ut hoc vix homines doctissimi scirent."--_De Civit. Dei_, lib. iv. cap. xxiii. 3.

Nor must I omit the following from Ovid:

"Quid, nova quum fierent Capitolia? Nempe Deorum Cuncta Jovi cessit turba, locumque dedit, Terminus ut memorant veteres, inventus in æde, Restitit, et magno cum Jove templa tenet. Nunc quoque, se supra ne quid nisi sidera cernat, Exiguum templi tecta foramen habent."

_Fast._, lib. ii. 667., &c.

Much more information may be found in Smith's _Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography_, &c., sub voc. TERMINUS. Servius, _ad Aen._ ix. 448. Politiani, _Miscell._ c. 36. _Histoire Romaine_, par Catrou et Rouille, vol. i. p. 343. &c., N.: à Paris, 1725, 4to. Grævii, _Thesaur. Antiqu. Rom._, vol. ix. 218. N., and vol. x. 783. Traject. ad Rhen., 1699, fol. Plutarch, in _Vit. Numæ_.

ROBERT GIBBINGS.

* * * * *

"HURRAH!"

(Vol. viii., p. 20. &c.)

In two previous Numbers (Vol. vi., p. 54.; Vol. vii., p. 594.) Queries have been inserted as to the derivation of the exclamations _Hurrah!_ and _Hip, hip, hurrah!_ These have elicited much learned remark (Vol. vii., p. 633.; Vol. viii., pp. 20. 277.), but still I think the real originals have not yet been reached by your correspondents.

As to _hip, hip!_ I fear it must remain questionable, whether it be not a mere fanciful conjecture to resolve it into the initials of the war-cry of the Crusaders, "Hierosolyma est perdita!" The authorities, however, seem to establish that it should be written "hep" instead of _hip_. I would only remark, _en passant_, that there is an error in the passage cited by MR. BRENT (Vol. viii., p. 88.) in opposition to this mediæval solution, which entirely destroys the authority of the quotation. He refers to a note on the ballad of "Old Sir Simon the King," in which, on the couplet--

"Hang up all the poor _hep_ drinkers, Cries Old Sir Sim, the king of skinkers."

the author says that "_hep_ was a term of derision applied to those who drank a weak infusion of the hep (or _hip_) berry or sloe: and that the exclamation 'hip, hip, hurrah!' is merely a corruption of 'hip, hip, away!'" But, unfortunately for this theory, the hip is not the sloe, as the annotator seems to suppose; nor is it capable of being used in the preparation of any infusion that could be substituted for wine, or drunk "with all the honours." It is merely the hard and tasteless _buckey_ of the wild dog-rose, to the flower of which Chaucer likens the gentle knight Sir Thopas:

"As swete as is the bramble flour, That beareth, the red _hepe_."

This demurrer, therefore, does not affect the validity of the claim which has been set up in favour of an oriental origin for this convivial _refrain_.

As to _hurrah!_ if I be correct in my idea of its parentage, there are few words still in use which can boast such a remote and widely extended prevalence. It is one of those interjections in which sound so echoes sense, that men seem to have adopted it almost instinctively. In India and Ceylon, the Mahouts and attendants of the baggage-elephants cheer them on by perpetual repetitions of _ur-ré, ur-ré!_ The Arabs and camel-drivers {324} in Turkey, Palestine, and Egypt encourage their animals to speed by shouting _ar-ré, ar-ré!_ The Moors seem to have carried the custom with them into Spain, where the mules and horses are still driven with cries of _arré_ (whence the muleteers derive their Spanish appellation of _arrieros_). In France, the sportsman excites the hound by shouts of _hare, hare!_ and the waggoner turns his horses by his voice, and the use of the word _hurhaut!_ In Germany, according to Johnson (_in verbo_ HURRY), "_Hurs_ was a word used by the old Germans in urging their horses to speed." And to the present day, the herdsmen in Ireland, and parts of Scotland, drive their cattle with shouts of _hurrish, hurrish!_ In the latter country, in fact, to _hurry_, or to _harry_, is the popular term descriptive of the predatory habits of the border reivers in plundering and "driving the cattle" of the lowlanders.

The sound is so expressive of excitement and energy, that it seems to have been adopted in all nations as a stimulant in times of commotion; and eventually as a war-cry by the Russians, the English, and almost every people of Europe. Sir Francis Palgrave, in the passage quoted from his _History of Normandy_ ("N. & Q.," Vol. viii., p. 20.), has described the custom of the Normans in raising the country by "the cry of _haro_," or _haron_, upon which all the lieges were bound to join in pursuit of the offender. This _clameur de haron_ is the origin of the English "hue and cry;" and the word _hue_ itself seems to retain some trace of the prevailing pedigree.

This stimulating interjection appears, in fact, to have enriched the French language as well as our own with some of the most expressive etymologies. It is the parent of the obsolete French verb _harer_, "to hound on, or excite clamour against any one." And it is to be traced in the epithet for a worn-out horse, a _haridelle_, or _haridan_.

In like manner, our English expressions, to _hurry_, to _harry_, and _harass_ a flying enemy, are all instinct with the same impulse, and all traceable to the same root.

J. EMERSON TENNENT.

The following extract frown Mr. Thos. Dicey's _Hist. of Guernsey_ (edit. Lond. 1751), pp. 8, 9, 10., may be worth adding to the foregoing notes on this subject:

"One thing more relating to _Rollo_ Mr. Falle, in his account of Jersey, introduces in the following manner, not only for the singularity of it, but the particular concern which that island has still in it, viz.--

"Whether it began through Rollo's own appointment, or took its rise among the people from an awful reverence of him for his justice, it matters not; but so it is, that a custom obtained in his time, that in case of incroachment and invasion of property, or of any other oppression and violence requiring immediate remedy, the party aggrieved need do no more than call upon the name of the Duke, though at never so great a distance, thrice repeating aloud _Ha-Ro_, &c., and instantly the aggressor was at his peril to forbear attempting anything further.--_Aa!_ or _Ha!_ is the exclamation of a person suffering; _Ro_ is the Duke's name abbreviated; so that _Ha-Ro_ is as much as to say, _O! Rollo, my Prince, succour me._ Accordingly (says Mr. Falle) with us, in Jersey, the cry is, _Ha-Ro, à l'aide, mon Prince!_ And this is that famous _Clameur de Haro_, subsisting in practice even when Rollo was no more, so much praised and commented upon by all who have wrote on the Norman laws. A notable example of its virtue and power was seen about one hundred and seventy years after Rollo's death, at William the Conqueror's funeral, when, in confidence thereof, a private man and a subject dared to oppose the burying of his body, in the following manner:

"It seems that, in order to build the great Abbey of St. Stephen at Caen, where he intended to lie after his decease, the Conqueror had caused several houses to be pulled down for enlarging the area, and amongst them one whose owner had received no satisfaction for his loss. The son of that person (others say the person himself) observing the grave to be dug on that very spot of ground which had been the site of his father's house, went boldly into the assembly, and forbid them, _not in the name of God_, as some have it, but _in the name of Rollo_, to bury the body there.

"Paulus Æmylius, who relates the story, says that he addressed himself to the company in these words:--'He who oppressed kingdoms by his arms has been my oppressor also, and has kept me under a continual fear of death. Since I have outlived him who injured me, I mean not to acquit him now he is dead. The ground whereon you are going to lay this man is mine; and I affirm that none may in justice bury their dead in ground which belongs to another. If, after he is gone, force and violence are still used to detain my right from me, I APPEAL TO ROLLO, the founder and father of our nation, who, though dead, lives in his laws. I take refuge in those laws, owning no authority above them.'

"This uncommonly brave speech, spoken in presence of the deceased king's own son, Prince Henry, afterwards our King Henry I., wrought its effect: the _Ha-Ro_ was respected, the man had compensation made him for his wrongs, and, all opposition ceasing, the dead king was laid in his grave."

J. SANSOM.

* * * * *

PHOTOGRAPHIC CORRESPONDENCE.

_Process for Printing on Albumenized Paper._--The power of obtaining agreeable and well-printed positives from their negatives being the great object with all photographers, induces me to communicate the following mode of preparing albumenized paper; a mode which, although it does not possess any remarkable novelty, seems to me deserving of being made generally known, from its giving a uniformity of results which may at all times be depended upon.

{325}

Independently of the very rich and agreeable tones which may be produced by the process which I am about to describe, it has the property of affording permanent pictures, not liable to that change by time to which pictures produced by the use of the ammonio-nitrate solution are certainly liable. I have upon all occasions advocated the economical practice of photography, and the present process will be found of that character; but at the same time I can assure your readers that a rapidity of action and intensity are hereby obtained with a 40-grain solution of nitrate of silver, fully equal to those gained from solutions of 120, or even 200, grains to the ounce, as is frequently practised.

In eight ounces of water (distilled or not) dissolve forty grains of common salt, and the same quantity of muriate of ammonia.[6] Mix this solution with eight ounces of albumen; beat[7] the whole well together, allow it to stand in tall vessel from twenty-four to forty hours, when the clear liquor may be poured off into a porcelain dish rather larger than the paper intended to be albumenized.

Undoubtedly the best paper for this process, and relative quantity of chemicals, is the _thin_ Canson Frères' but a much cheaper, and perhaps equally suitable paper, is that made by Towgood of St. Neots. Neither with Whatman's nor Turner's papers, excellent as they are for some processes, have I obtained such satisfactory results. If the photographer should unfortunately possess some of the thick paper of any inferior makers, he had far better throw it away than waste his chemicals, time, and temper upon the vain endeavour to turn it to any good account.

The paper, having first been marked on the right-hand upper corner of the smooth side, is then to be floated with that marked side on the albumen. This operation, which is very easy to perform, is somewhat difficult to describe. I will however try. Take the marked corner of the sheet in the right-hand, the opposite corner of the lower side of the paper in the left; and bellying out the sheet, let the lower end fall gently on to the albumen. Then gradually let the whole sheet fall, so as to press out before it any adherent particles of air. If this has been carefully done, no air-bubbles will have been formed. The presence of an air-bubble may however soon be detected by the puckered appearance, which the back of the paper assumes in consequence. When this is the case, the paper must be carefully raised, the bubble dispersed, and the paper replaced. A thin paper requires to float for three minutes on the albumen, but a thicker one proportionably longer. At the end of that time raise the marked corner with the point of a blanket pin; then take hold of it with the finger and thumb, and so raise the sheet steadily and _very slowly_, that the albumen may drain off at the lower left corner. I urge this raising it very slowly, because air-bubbles are very apt to form on the albumen by the sudden snatching up of the paper.

Each sheet, as it is removed from the albumen, is to be pinned up by the marked corner on a long slip of wood, which must be provided for the purpose. In pinning it up, be careful that the albumenized side takes an inward curl, otherwise, from there being two angles of incidence, streaks will form from the middle of the paper. During the drying, remove from time to time, with a piece of blotting-paper, the drop of fluid which collects at the lower corner of the paper.

In order to fix the albumen, it is necessary that the paper should be ironed with an iron as hot as can be used without singeing the paper. It should be first ironed between blotting-paper, and when the iron begins to cool, it may be applied directly to the surface of each sheet.

To excite this paper it is only needful to float it carefully from three to five minutes, in the same way as it was floated on the albumen, upon a solution of nitrate of silver of forty grains to the ounce. Each sheet is then to be pinned up and dried as before. It is scarcely necessary to add, that this exciting process must be carried on by the light of a lamp or candle.

This paper has the property of keeping good for several days, if kept in a portfolio. It has also the advantage of being very little affected by the ordinary light of a room, so that it may be used and handled in any apartment where the direct light is not shining upon it; yet in a tolerably intense light it prints much more rapidly than that prepared with the ammonio-nitrate.

The picture should be fixed in a bath of saturated solution of hypo. The hypo. never gets discoloured, and should always be carefully preserved. When a new bath is formed, it is well to add forty grains of chloride of silver to every eight ounces of the solution.

A beautiful violet or puce tint, with great whiteness of the high lights, may be obtained by using the following bath as a fixing solution:

Hyposulphite of soda 8 ounces. Sel d'or 7 grains. Iodide of silver 10 grains. Water 8 ounces.

It may be as well to add, that although the nitrate of silver solution used for exciting becomes {326} discoloured, it acts equally well, even when of a dark brown colour; but it may always be deprived of its colour, and rendered sufficiently pure again, by filtering it through a little animal charcoal.

HUGH W. DIAMOND.

[Footnote 6: The addition of one drachm of acetic acid much facilitates the easy application of the albumen to the paper; but it is apt to produce the unpleasant redness so often noticeable in photographs. The addition of forty grains of chloride of barium to the two muriates, yields a bistre tint, which is admired by some photographers.]

[Footnote 7: Nothing answers so well for this purpose as a small box-wood salad spoon.]

* * * * *

Replies to Minor Queries.

_Anderson's Royal Genealogies_ (Vol. viii, p. 198.).--In reply to your correspondent G., I may be permitted to remark that it is generally understood that _no_ "memoir or biographical account" is extant of Dr. James Anderson; but _short notices_ of him and his works will be found on reference to the _Gentleman's Magazine_, vol. liii. p. 41.; Chalmers' _General Biographical Dictionary_, 1812; Chambers' _Lives of Illustrious Scotsmen_, 1833; _Biographical Dictionary of the Society of Useful Knowledge_, 1843; and also in Rose's _New Biographical Dictionary_, 1848.

T. G. S.

Edinburgh.

_Thomas Wright of Durham_ (Vol. viii., p. 218.).--It may interest MR. DE MORGAN to be referred to a manuscript in the British Museum, marked "Additional, 15,627.," which he will find to be one of the original "note-books," if not the very note-book itself, from which the notice of the life of Thomas Wright was compiled for the _Gentleman's Magazine_. It is, in fact, an autobiography by Wright, written in the form of a journal; and although containing entries as late as the year 1780, it ceases to be continuous with the year 1748, and has no entries at all between that year and 1756. This break in the journal sufficiently accounts for the deficiency in the biography given by the _Gentleman's Magazine_.

I may mention, also, that the Additional MS. 15,628. contains Wright's unpublished collections relative to British, Roman, and Saxon antiquities in England.

E. A. BOND.

_Weather Predictions_ (Vol. viii., p. 218. &c.).--The following is a Worcestershire saying:

"When Bredon Hill puts on his hat, Ye men of the vale, beware of that."

Similar to this is a saying I have heard in the northern part of Northumberland:

"When Cheevyut (_i. e._ the Cheviot Hills) ye see put on his cap, Of rain ye'll have a wee bit drap."

There is a saying very common in many parts of Huntingdonshire, that when the woodpeckers are much heard, rain is sure to follow.

CUTHBERT BEDE, B.A.

_Bacon's Essays_: _Bullaces_ (Vol. viii., pp. 167. 223.).--"Bullace" (I never heard Bacon's plural used) are known in Kent as small white tartish plums, which do not come to perfection without the help of a frost, and so are eaten when their fellows are no more found. They have only been cultivated of late years, I believe, but how long I cannot tell.

G. WILLIAM SKYRING.

Somerset House.

"Bullaces" are a small white or yellow plum, about the size of a cherry, like very poor kind of greengage, which, in ordinary seasons, when I was a boy, were the common display of the fruit-stalls at the corners of the streets, so common and well known that I can only imagine MR. HALLIWELL to have misdescribed them by a slip of the pen writing black for white.

FRANK HOWARD.

"Gennitings" are early apples (_quasi June-eatings_, as "gilliflowers," said to be corrupted from July flowers). For the derivation suggested to me while I write, I cannot answer; but for the fact I can, having, while at school in Needham Market, Suffolk, plucked and eaten many a "striped genniting," while "codlins" were on a tree close by. And many a time have I been rallied as a Cockney for saying I had gathered "enough" instead of "enow," which one of your Suffolk correspondents has justly recorded as the county expression applied to number as distinguished from quantity.

FRANK HOWARD.

_Nixon the Prophet_ (Vol. viii., p. 257.).--MR. T. HUGHES mentions Nixon "to have lived and prophesied in the reign of James I., at whose court, we are farther told, he was, in conformity with his own prediction, starved to death." I have an old and ragged edition, entitled _The Life and Prophecies of the celebrated Robert Nixon, the Cheshire Prophet_. The "life" professes to be prepared from materials collected in the neighbourhood of Vale Royal, on a farm near which, and rented by his father, Nixon was born--

"on Whitsunday, and was christened by the name of Robert in the year 1467, about the seventh year of Edward IV."

Among various matters it is mentioned,--

"What rendered Nixon the most noticed was, that the time when the battle of Bosworth Field was fought between King Richard III. and King Henry VII., he stopped his team on a sudden, and with his whip pointing from one land to the other, cried 'Now Richard! now Henry!' several times, till at last he said, 'Now Harry, get over that ditch and you gain the day!'"

This the plough-holder related; it afterwards proved to be true, and in consequence Robert was required to attend Henry VII.'s court, where he was "starved to death," owing to having been locked in a room and forgotten. The Bosworth Field prophecy, which has often been repeated, {327} carries the time of Nixon's existence much before the period named by T. HUGHES, namely, James I.'s reign.

A HERMIT AT HAMPSTEAD.