But the Shepherd made answer, "This of mine
Has wandered away from me;

And although the roads be rough and steep,
I go to the desert to find my sheep."

But none of the ransomed ever knew
How deep were the waters crossed;

Nor how dark the night that the Lord passed through
Ere he found His sheep that was lost.
Out in the desert He heard its cry,
Sick, and helpless, and ready to die.

"Lord, whence are those blood drops all the way
That mark out the mountain's tracks?"
"They were shed for one who had gone astray

Ere the shepherd could bring him back."
"Lord, whence are Thy hands so rent and torn?"
They were pierced to night by many a thorn."

And all through the mountains thunder riven,
And up from the rocky steep,

There rose a cry to the gates of heaven.
"Rejoice, I have found my sheep!"

And the angels echoed around the throne,

Rejoice, for the Lord brings back His own!"-Little Sower.

NOTES ON SURNAMES.

BY REV. J. H. DUBBS.

"What is your name?" There is probably no question which we have been asked more frequently, and none which we are more ready to answer. The man who declines to reply to such a question, when properly asked, is suspected of being a knave, while he who does not know his own name is regarded as an idiot. So rare are instances of ignorance in this important matter, that we still laugh at the eccentricity of Sydney Smith, in having on one occasion forgotten his own name. We suspect, however, that the great humorist was only playing a part for the amusement of people who were not sharp enough to see through his tricks.

Certain as we are as to our respective surnames, it would be easy to ask us questions concerning them which we would not find it so easy to answer. Suppose some one were to begin to catechise us by inquiring, "Why is this your name?" is it likely that our answer would be very satisfactory? We would probably throw the responsibility on our progenitors, knowing that our surnames have come down to us as a legacy from remote ages; but

why the first of the family was called Brown, or Jones, or something else, is to most of us an unfathomable mystery.

We could not, indeed, essay to write upon a more confused and difficult subject. Surnames took their rise during the darkness and gloom of the Middle Ages, and the events or circumstances which caused them to be applied to particular individuals have long since been forgotten. Family traditions are, in this respect, of very little value. Grandmothers too often thought it no sin, to invent wonderful stories concerning their ancestors, for the purpose of appeasing the curiosity of the little ones, who in turn handed them down to their descendants, as veritable history.

We are, however, wonderfully attached to our surnames. Some of us would not change our names for "a house full of gold," even though they were as uncouth and twisted as the stick which is said to have been so crooked that it would never lie still. Hence, anything which concerns their origin is directly interesting to every individual, and we, therefore, venture to offer our readers a few notes on the subject, gathered in the course of our miscellaneous reading. We have no books of reference at hand, writing principally from memory, and can therefore lay no claims to critical exactness.

ORIGIN OF SURNAMES.

One thousand years ago very few people had more than a single name-the name which they had received in Baptism. There are, indeed, traces of family-names in the history of ancient Rome, but these seem to have entirely disappeared with the downfall of the empire; and for hundreds of years afterwards the great were distinguished by their titles and estates, while the poor were called, Jack, or Jill, or some other simple name, and that was the end of it.

In the course of time, as men grew more intelligent, there arose a desire even among the humbler classes to be remembered after death in the persons of their descendants. With this object they at first attempted to preserve the first syllable of their own names in the names of their children. Thus, for instance, a man named Oslaf called his children Oslac, Oswald, Oswin, and Osbeorth. In the days of Charlemagne, about A. D., 775, a man called Hildebardus named his two sons Hildoardus and Hildebodus, and his daughter Hildeberga. This custom, however, for obvious reasons, never became universal.

In England, we find but few traces of settled surnames before the Norman conquest, which occurred in A. D., 1066. Camden, the celebrated antiquary, however, claims to have discovered several instances of persons who bore two names a few years earlier. One

of these was a man called Whyte Hatte, all of whose children were also called Hatte. This is a peculiar name, and would now be written, WHITE HAT! With William the Conqueror surnames became fashionable. The members of his royal household whose offices were generally hereditary, accepted their titles as family names, while others of the nobility and gentry assumed the names of their castles, or manors. Of the former character are, probably, such names as Falconer, Chamberlain, and others-of the latter such as Buckingham, Huntingdon and Washington.

For a long time after this date, the great body of the people remained destitute of surnames; but by degrees almost every individual received a nick-name from his neighbors. There were John on the Hill, and Tom in the Dale; Dick in the Forest, and Will by the Waters. There were also the Smith and the Tailor; the Butcher and the Baker; the Carpenter and the Gardener, with many others in whose families similar employments were hereditary, and who consequently at last assumed them as permanent surnames. Some men were called after some physical or moral quality. An old Anglo-Saxon warrior was said to be praet, or crafty, and from him the Pratts were said to be descended. In the same way we have Good, Strong, Wise, Sharp, as well as Craven, a Coward, Cowan, an eve's dropper, and a host of others. Some of these were named after some peculiarity in their personal appearance, and then we derive such names as Longfellow, Broadhead, Crookshanks, and others which at first-sight appear somewhat ludicrous.

In most instances, however, where there was no salient point in the history or character of the individual, on which a nick-name would hang, it was but natural that he should be designated by adding the name of his father to his own. Thus if the name of John's father had also been John, he was called John Johnson, or Johns, and in Wales, Jones. In this way all conceivable Christian names have become patronymics, and as these have since endured every possible variation of orthography and pronunciation, they account for a vast number of modern surnames. The prefix Mac, so often found in Irish and Scotch names, means son, and thus the son of Donald would in Scotland be Mac Donald and not Donaldson. Sometimes the trade or profession is indicated. Thus, Mac Pherson is said to signify the son of the parson; and Mac Intyre, the son of the carpenter. The Irish prefix O' means nearly the same thing, but is supposed to refer in more general terms to the race from which the individual is descended. Thus, if a man's name is O'Brien, it would be held to indicate that he is of the "rale ould stock" of the Briens-perhaps descended from the great King of Ireland, Brian boru, himself. Many ancient

Christian names have now become entirely obsolete, and we no longer recognize Sigimer in Seymour, and Sigimund in Sigmund and Simmons.

GERMAN NAMES.

In Germany the variety of surnames is probably greater than in any other country in Europe. This may, in part, be owing to the fact that whole communities did not, as for instance, in Scotland, assume the name of their feudal master, but that each individual seems to have received a name for himself alone. In some instances, it is said, when surnames had been legalized by the government, the nobles amused themselves by naming their dependents, and in this way originated many of those whimsical and amusing names which are so common among the Germans. There are many respectable families in Pennsylvania whose names are so peculiar, that we can hardly suppose them to have been voluntarily assumed by their respective ancestors, as, for instance, Ochsenreiter (Ox-rider), Breivogel (Pap-bird), Haberfeld (Oats-field), Truckenmiller (Dry-miller), Butterfass (churn), Schlangenlauf (Snaketrack), Teufelbiss (Devil-bite) and many others.

Names derived from Geographical localities, such as countries, cities, mountains and rivers, are proportionally more numerous among the Germans than in any other nation. Thus, we have Deutch, Deutscher, and Deutschland. Preuss (Prussian), Baier (Bavarian), Hess, Auspach, Pommer (from Pomerania), Sachs (Saxon), Schwab and Schwabenland. Among the names derived from cities are Basler, Strassburger, Bamberger, Metz, Kehl, Cassel, Damstädter, Bingenman, Danenberger, Muench and many others. Then, we have a vast multitude of names ending in berg (mountain), au (plain or meadow), heim (home-a very common termination of the names of villages), and bach (brook), to all of which we may confidently assign a local origin.

Trades and professions play an important part in German surnames. We have these names, not only in their simple form, such as Schmidt (Smith), Schneider (Tailor or Cutter), Becker (Baker) Metzenger (Butcher), etc., but most of these occur in innumerable combinations. Thus we have Messerschmidt, Klingenschmidt, Kaltschmidt, Goldschmidt, and so on almost ad infinitum.

Names ending in son, or sohn, though not rare, do not appear to be as common among the Germans as they are elsewhere. They are most numerous among the Jews, who were probably led to adopt them by the fact that it was an ancient Hebrew custom to mention the name of the father in connection with that of the son. Hence, we find among them such names as Jacobsohn, Mendelsohn, and Wolfsohn.

It is said that the great body of the Jews refused to adopt surnames until they were forced to do so by the civil government. They were then allowed, for a brief period, to adopt names to suit themselves, and many of them improved the opportunity by selecting those eminently beautiful surnames for which the German Jews are celebrated. Among the names of this kind, some of which in the great cities we hear almost daily, are Blumenthal (Flower-vale), Rosengarten (Rose-garden), Lilienbach (Lily-brook), Vogelsang (Birdsong), Honigseim (Honey-comb), and many others, which are so sweet as almost to cloy upon our taste. A few Jews were so wedded to their ancient customs that they refused to accede to the wishes. of the government, and the officials subsequently amused themselves by assigning them the most horrible names they could think of. Some of these were afterwards changed on the payment of a large sum of money, but a few remain to the present day to torment their unfortunate possessors.

CORRUPTED NAMES.

Very few surnames have preserved their original orthography. Languages are constantly changing, and it would be strange if surnames were not subject to the same law.

Foreign names are everywhere liable to alterations, which entirely destroy their identity. If not translated into the language of the country, their original meaning is soon forgotten, and an attempt will probably be made to make sense out of them, generally with the most unfortunate results. An English writer says, that many of the Danish names in England, were, in this way, shockingly mangled. Asketil, was transformed into Ashkettle, Guthlac, into Goodluck, and Gundbald, into Gumboil!

Similar instances have frequently occurred in this country. There was a German family in Pennsylvania, named Hochmeier, which signifies High-bailiff, or High-steward-a prominent civil office in Germany. Removing to Virginia, this family, of course, forgot its mother-tongue, and their descendants now write their name HOGMIRE! "O, what a fall was there, my countrymen!" Many amusing changes have occurred in attempting to translate German names into English. One of these is recorded by Mr. I. D. Rupp, and he must vouch for its genuineness. He says: "Upwards of thirty years ago, a German family named Feuerstein, settled near Dayton, Ohio. The schoolmaster was abroad there too; he translated the name into Flint-a stone used in fire-arms, before percussion caps were introduced. The Flints were proud, as every one ought to be, of this advance in literature. One of the young Flints settled afterwards in Marion county, Indiana,