ese, as is well
known, are a very superstitious people. The employment of _Judas
candles_ would, no doubt, if properly explained, turn out to mean to
imply execration against the memory of Judas, wherever they may be
used. But in the expression _Judas bell_, the greatest conceivable
amount of _discord_ is that which is intended to be expressed.
ROBERT SNOW.
6. Chesterfield street, Mayfair, March 23. 1850.
[To this we may add, that the question at present pending
between this country and Greece, so far as regards the
claim of M. Pacifico, appears, from the papers laid before
Parliament, to have had its origin in what Sir Edward Lyon
states "to have been the custom in Athens for some years, to
burn an effigy of Judas on Easter day." And from the account
of the origin of the riots by the Council of the Criminal
Court of Athens, we learn, that "it is proved by the {358}
investigation, that on March 23, 1847, Easter Day, a report
was spread in the parish of the Church des incorporels,
that the Jew, D. Pacifico, by paying the churchwarden of the
church, succeeded in preventing the effigy of Judas from
being burnt, which by annual custom was made and burnt in
that parish on Easter Day." From another document in the same
collection it seems, that the Greek Government, out of respect
to M. Charles de Rothschild, who was at Athens in April, 1847,
forbid in all the Greek churches of the capital the burning of
Judas.]
_Grummett_ (No. 20. p. 319.).--The following use of the word whose
definition is sought by "[Greek: Sigma]" occurs in a description of
the _members_ or adjuncts of the Cinque Port of Hastings in 1229:--
"Servicia inde debita domino regi xxi. naves, et in qualibet
nave xxi. homines, cum uno garcione qui dicitur _gromet_."
In quoting this passage in a paper "On the Seals of the Cinque Ports,"
in the _Sussex Archaeological Collections_ (Vol. i. p. 16.), I applied
the following illustration:--
"_Gromet_ seems to be a diminutive of '_grome_', a
serving-man, whence the modern groom. The provincialism
_grummet_, much used in Sussex to designate a clumsy, awkward
youth, has doubtless some relation to this cabin-boy of the
Ports' navy."
I ought to add, that the passage above given is to be found in Jeake's
_Charters of the Cinque Ports_.
MARK ANTONY LOWER.
Lewes, March 18. 1850.
_Grummett_.--Baile
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