_Madagascar Poetry._--Can any of the readers of "N. & Q." throw any light upon the origin of the following lines? I found them among family papers, written about the year 1805, where they are described as the "Invocation of Madagascrian Spirit;" by which, I imagine, we are to infer that they are a translation of some native lay from the island of Madagascar: "Spirit that art flown away, Listen to our artless lay. Teach us, Spirit, to do well; Teach us, Spirit, to excel. Stoop, O Spirit! and be kind, Teaching those you left behind: Listen to our artless lay, Spirit that art flown away." C. S. _Ink._--From the following lines by Whitehead, which I find in my note-book, I am induced to ask who was the inventor of ink? "Hard, that his name it should not save, Who first pour'd forth the sable flood." PHILIP S. KING. _Hamilton Queries_ (Vol. vi., p. 429.).--LORD BRAYBOOOKE says, in writing of Lord Spencer Hamilton, that he "was a younger son of James, third Duke of Hamilton." I find, on referring to a Peerage, date about 1720 (I cannot quote it more particularly, as it has no title-page), that the third inheritor of the dukedom of Hamilton was Anne, daughter of the first and niece of the second Duke of Hamilton; and that she married William, Earl of Selkirk, eldest son of the Marquis of Douglas. The date would better accord with Lord Spencer's being a son of James, _fifth_ Duke of Hamilton. Was it not so? _Sir William Hamilton._--Who was the first wife of Sir W. Hamilton, the celebrated ambassador, and when did he marry her? Who was the second, who has attained such notoriety in connexion with Nelson's name; and when and where were they married? Was Single-speech Hamilton a member of the ducal family of Hamilton? If so, his lineage from that house? TEE BEE. _Derivation of Windfall._--Arvine, in his _Cyclopædia_, gives the following plausible reason for the origin of this term, now in such common use. Query, Is he correct? "Some of the nobility of England, by the tenure of their estates, were forbidden felling any trees in the forests upon them, the timber being reserved for the use of the royal navy. Such trees as fell without cutting, were the property of the occupant. A tornado was therefore a perfect god-send, in every sense of the word, to those who had occupancy of extensive forests; and the _windfall_ was sometimes of very great value." W. W. Malta. _Do the Sun's Rays put out the Fire?_--There is a current and notorious idea, that the admission of the sun-light into a room puts the fire out; and, {286} after making every deduction for an apparent effect in this matter, I confess I am disposed to think that the notion is not an erroneous one. Can any of your correspondents account for it on philosophical principles, or disprove it experimentally? C. W. B.