the anonymous pamphlet which, he
informs us, was published by Dr. John Wallis {477} in defence of the Oxford
decree of 1695, on the subject of the Trinity?

TYRO.

Dublin.

_Mrs. Cobb's Diary._--Can any of your readers give me any information as to
the following book, _Extracts from the Diary and Letters of Mrs. Mary
Cobb_: London, printed by C. and R. Baldwin, 1805, 8vo., pp. 324.; said to
be _privately printed_?

JOHN MARTIN.

Roxfield, Bedfordshire.

_Compass Flower._--

"Look at this delicate flower that lifts its head from the meadow--
See how its leaves all point to the north, as true as the magnet;
It is the compass flower, that the finger of God has suspended
Here on its fragile stalk, to direct the traveller's journey
Over the sea-like, pathless, limitless waste of the desert."
_Evangeline_, Part II. IV. line 140., &c.

Where can I find a description of this flower, and what is its scientific
name?

In Abercrombie's _Intellectual Powers_, p. 49. edit. 1846, I find the
following passage:

"The American hunter finds his way in the trackless forests by
attention to minute appearances in the trees, which indicate to him the
points of the compass."

Can any one tell me what these "minute appearances" are?

A. H. BATTIER.

East Sheen, Surrey.

_Nuns of the Hotel Dieu._--What is the religions habit of the nuns at the
hospital of the Hotel Dieu in Paris at the present day?

M. L.

_Purlieu._--Some of your correspondents seem afraid that an attempt to
repair the deficiencies of our English dictionaries, by research into
disputed etymologies in "N. & Q.," would tend to produce too much and too
tedious discussion, and fill its space too much. Could _this_, at least,
not be done without much objection? Could we not co-operate in finding the
earliest known mention of words, and thus perhaps trace the occasion and
manner of their introduction?

At any rate, this word _purlieu_ is certainly in want of some examination.
Johnson has adopted the wretched etymology of _pur_, Fr. for pure, and
_lieu_, Fr. for place; and he defines it as a place on the outskirts of a
forest free of wood.

The earliest record in which this word occurs, so far as I have seen, is in
an act of Edward III., quoted by Manwood, and it is there spelt _puraley_;
and it relates to the disafforested parts which several preceding kings
permitted to be detached from their royal forests.

Might I ask