Stone Chisels.—I saw recently an oviform stone implement which had been found on the granite moors of North Cornwall, and apparently had been used as a pickaxe in mining. The following notice shows that such implements were used by the ancient miners in the Lake Superior district:

"The explorers are now much aided by these guiding features, also by pits, which indicate where an ancient race—probably the Aztecs or Toltecs—have carried on their superficial operations on the veins. Some of those I saw were twenty or thirty feet deep, which must have been the result of much labour, considering their tools—the only trace of which we find in the shape of oviformed stones, with a groove round the centre for the purpose of securing a handle, then to be used as a hammer to shatter the vein-stone after it probably had been reduced by the action of fire and water on the calcareous matter entering into its composition. In favour of this conjecture, quantities of charcoal have been found in the bottom of some of these pits, which are almost effaced by the accumulation of timber decayed and foliage of ages past."—From a letter in the Mining Journal, Jan. 7, 1854.

S. R. Pattison.

Acrostic.—I send you a very curious acrostic, copied from a monument in the Church of St. Germans, Cornwall. You will perceive that it is in memory of "Johannes Glanvill, Minister;" and it is surmounted with the arms of that ancient family:

W. D. F.

Walton.

Simmels.—The Vienna correspondent of The Times, whose letter from "Vienna, March 5th," appeared in that paper on Friday the 10th, mentions a Viennese loaf, the name of which so strongly resembles the simmel of our ancestors as to deserve a Note:

"The Viennese witlings, who are much inclined to abuse the hyperbole, affirm that a magnifying glass will soon be requisite in order to discover the whereabouts of the semmeln, the little wheaten loaves for which Austria is famous."

W. J. T.

Ogborne's History of Essex.—I lately fell in with (at a marine store-shop in Somers Town) some scattered materials in Mrs. Ogborne's handwriting for the above highly interesting but unfinished work. I have not yet sorted them, but I perceive that the MSS. contain some information that was never published, relating to Rochford Hundred, &c. The shopkeeper stated that she had used the greater part of Mrs. Ogborne's papers as waste-paper, but I am not without hopes that she will find more. There is a letter from Mr. Leman of Bath, which is published in the work. I am aware that Mr. Fossett has Mrs. Ogborne's MSS.; but those now in my possession are certainly interesting, and might be, to some future historian of Essex, even valuable. Should I discover anything worth inserting in "N. & Q." on examining the MSS. I will send it.

G. I. S.

Fleas and Bugs.—Has the following explanation of an old saying ever been brought forward, and is it satisfactory? When a person is sent off "with a flea in his ear," the luckless applicant is peremptorily dismissed with an imperative "flee," with the word "flee" sounding in his ear, or, facetiously, "with a flea in his ear."

Apropos of proverbial domestic entomology, is there more than lies on the surface in the elegant simile "As snug as a bug in a rug?" A rough variety of dog was termed a "rug" in Shakspeare's time; quartered on which, the insect might find good entertainment—a plentiful board, as well as a snug lodging. It appears, however, that the name has not long been applied to the Cimex, so that the saying may be of greater antiquity, and relate to bugbears.

C. T.

Zeuxis and Parrhasius.—In the Preface to Mr. Grote's History of Greece, there occurs the following passage:

"If the reader blame me for not assisting him to determine this—if he ask me why I do not undraw the curtain, and disclose the picture?—I reply in the words of the painter Zeuxis, when the same question was addressed to him on exhibiting his master-piece of imitative art: 'The curtain is the picture.'"

Compare this with Pliny, Nat. Hist. XXXV. 36. § 3.; from which it appears that Parrhasius, not Zeuxis, painted the curtain.

Arch. Weir.

Cure for Hydrophobia.—A gentleman named Monsell, who lived at Kilrush in the county Clare, possessed a cure for hydrophobia which was never known to fail. He required that the patient should be brought to him within nine days from the time of being bitten, and his first proceeding was to cause the person to look in a looking-glass or pail of water: if the patient bore that trial without showing any uneasiness, he declared that there was no doubt of his being able to effect a cure. He then retired to another room, leaving the patient alone for a short time; and when he returned, he brought two bits of cheese which he said contained the remedy, and caused the person to swallow them. He then desired that the patient should return home, and for nine days frequently drink a few sips of water; and also take opportunities to look at water or a looking-glass, so as to accustom the nerves to be under control. I knew a case of a peasant girl, who was bitten by a mad dog, and who had to be brought to him tied on a car, whom he cured. The dog, before he was killed, bit several valuable dogs, all of which had to be destroyed; he also bit two pigs, which, after showing most frightful symptoms of hydrophobia, had to be shot and their flesh burned. Mr. Monsell always refused to declare what his remedy was, "lest it might be used for anything but a human being." It would appear that in a great measure he worked on the imagination of his patients: still some other means may have been used, and, as he has been dead some time, it is to be hoped he did not let his secret die with him. He never would take any remuneration from those he cured, or their friends. I never heard any person in that part of the country express the least doubt of the efficacy of the remedy he used.

Francis Robert Davies.

The "Fusion."—Is it generally known that there exists, between the two branches of the Bourbons, a much nearer relationship than that which arises from their common descent from Louis XIII.? The Duchess de Berri was niece to Louis-Philippe's queen: so that the Duc de Bordeaux and the Comte de Paris are second cousins.

E. H. A.