inform me as to the fact, or refer me to any ornithological work
in which I can find it?

In answer to "F.S. Martin"--Calamity (_calamitas_), not from
_calamus_, as it is usually derived, but perhaps from obs.
_calamis_, i.e. _columis_, from [Greek: kholo, kolhao, kolhazo] to
maim, mutilate, and so for _columitas_. (See Riddle's _Lat.-Eng.
Dictionary_.)

AUGUSTINE.

_Inquisition in Mexico._--"D." wishes to be furnished with references
to any works in which the actual establishment of the Inquisition in
Mexico is mentioned or described, or in which any other information
respecting it is conveyed.

_Masters of St. Cross_.--"H. EDWARDS" will be obliged by information
of any work except _Dugdale's Monasticon_, containing a list of the
names of the Master of the Hospital of St. Cross, Winchester; or of
the Masters or Priors of the same place before Humphry de Milers;
and of the Masters between Bishop Sherborne, about 1491, and Bishop
Compton, about 1674.

_Etymology of "Dalston."_--The hamlet of Hackney, now universally
known only as _Dalston_, is spelt by most topographists _Dorleston_
or _Dalston_. I have seen it in one old Gazette _Darlston_, and
I observed it lately, on a stone let in to an old row of houses,
_Dolston_; this was dated 1792. I have searched a great many books in
vain to discover the etymology, and from it, of course, the correct
spelling of the word, the oldest form of which that I can find is
_Dorleston_.

The only probable derivations of it that I can find are the old words
_Doles_ and _ton_ (from Saxon _dun_), a village built upon a slip of
land between furrows of ploughed earth; or _Dale_ (Dutch _Dal_), and
_stone_, a bank in a valley. The word may, however, be derived from
some man's name, though I can find none at all like it in a long list
of tenants upon Hackney Manor that I have searched. If any of your
readers can furnish this information they will much oblige.

H.C. DE ST. CROIX.

_"Brown Study"_--a term generally applied to intense reverie. Why
"brown," rather than blue or yellow? _Brown_ must be a corruption of
some word. Query of "barren," in the sense of fruitless or useless?

D.V.S.

_Coal Brandy_.--People now old can recollect that, when young, they
heard people then old talk of "coal-brandy." What was this? _Cold_?
or, in modern phase, _raw_, _neat_, or _genuine_?

CANTAB.

_Swot_.--I have often heard military men talk of _swot_, meaning
thereby mathematics