82 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[2nd s. No 83., Aug. 1, '57. 



have been passed over by Johnson and Richardson be 

 carefully noticed and recorded, the collector adding, if 

 possible, one parallel instance from every other language 

 in which he knows the idiom to exist. This rule is not 

 intended to apply to mere grammatical or syntactical 

 idioms. 



III. That any quotation specially illustrative of the 

 etymology or first introduction or meaning of a word shall 

 be cited. 



IV. That in every case the passage in which the par- 

 ticular Avord or idiom is found shall be cited, and where 

 any clauses are for brevity necessarily omitted, such 

 omissions shall be designated bj' dots. 



V. That the edition made use of shall be stated and 

 throughout adhered to, and that, in the references, page, 

 chapter and section, and verse, where existing, shall be 

 given. 



VI. That the words registered shall be written only 

 on one side of the paper (ordinary small quarto letter 

 paper), and with sufficient space between each to allow 

 of their being cut apart for sorting. N.B. It is particu- 

 larly requested that this rule may be strictly observed. 



The following examples, illustrative of the preceding 

 Rules, are submitted as specimens of the manner and 

 form in which the Committee are desirous that the col- 

 lections should be made. 



Rule I. «■• ?7ms/roAe = circumference. 

 " Such towns as stand (one may saj') on tiptoe, on the 

 very umstrohe, or on any part of the utmost line of 

 an3' map .... are not to be presumed placed ac- 

 cording to exactness, but only signify them there or 

 thereabouts." — Fuller, A Pisgah Sight of Palestine, 

 London, 1650, Part I. b. i. c. 14. p. 46. 

 Rule I. p. Fashionist. 



" We may conceive many of these ornaments were only 

 temporarj', as used by the fashionists of that age." — 

 Fuller, A Pisgah Sight of Palestine, Part II. p. 113. 

 The word is given in Todd's Johnson and in Richard- 

 son, but without an example in either. 

 Rule I. V. Yacht. 



" I sailed this morning with his Majesty in one of his 

 Yachts (or pleasure boats), vessels not known among 

 us till the Dutch East India Company presented that 

 curious piece to the King, being very excellent sail- 

 ing vessels." — Evelyn's Diary, Oct. 1, 1661. The 

 earliest example given in Johnson or Richardson is 

 from Cook's Voyages. 

 Rule I. 5. Baby = 00. engraving or picture in a book. 

 (Common in the North at the present day.) 

 " We gaze but on the babies and the cover. 

 The gaudy flowers and edges painted over, 

 And never further for our lesson look 

 Within the volume of this various book." 

 Sylvester's Dubartas, ed. London, 1621, fol. p. 5. 

 Halliwell mentions this sense, but gives no authority. 

 Rule I. «. Unease. 

 " What an unease it was to be troubled with the hum- 

 ming of so many gnats!" — Hacket, Life of Abp. 

 Williams, Part II. p. 88. Not found in Todd's John- 

 son. The latest, indeed only, example in Richardson 

 is from Chaucer. 

 Rule I. ^. Interstice. 

 " Besides there was an interstitium or distance of 

 seventy years between the destruction of Solomon's 

 and the erection of Zorobabel's temple." — Fuller, A 

 Pisgah Sight of Palestine, Part I. b. iii. c. 6. p. 421. 



Rule 11. Phrases. — Grass. At the next grass = at the 

 next summer. (Common in the North at the pre- 

 sent day.) 

 " Whom seven years old at the next grots he guest " 



(speaking of a horse). — Sylvester's Dubartas, p. 228. 

 Compare Johnson's later quotation from Swift. 



Constructions. Satisfy in = of or as to. 



" I was latelj-- satisfied in wliat I heard of before .... 

 that the mj'stery of annealing glass is now quite lost 

 in England." — Fuller, 3Iixt Contemplations on these 

 Times — in Fuller's Good Thoughts, Pickering, 1841, 

 p. 221. 

 [The Rev. J. J. S. Perowne, in a paper contained in the 

 Philological Transactions for 1856, " On some English 

 Idioms," quotes (p. 148.) Latimer's * not to flatter with 

 anybod}-,' and Roger Ascham's ' changing a good 

 word with a worse.'] 



Bass, in music. 



" Lend me your hands, lift me above Parnassus 

 With your loud trebles, help my lowly bassus." 



Sylvester's Dubartas, p. 73. 



Rule III. Fanatic. 

 " There is a new word coined within a few months (of 

 Maj', 1660,) called /anaa'cs, which by the close stick- 

 ling thereof seemeth well cut out and proportioned 

 to signify what is meant thereby, even the sectaries 

 of our age. Some (most forcedly) will have it 

 Hebrew, derived from the word ' to see ' or * face 

 one,' importing such whose piety consisteth chiefly 

 in visage looks and outward shows ; others will have 



it Greek, from <^a>'o/otai, to show and appear 



But most certainly the work is Latin, from fanum 

 a temple, and fanatici were such who, living in or 

 attending thereabouts, were frighted with spectra or 

 apparitions which they either saw or fancied them- 

 selves to have seen." — Fuller, Mixt Contemplations in 

 Better Times, L. p. 212., ed. 1841. 



Sack. — " They were well provided with that kind of 

 Spanish wine^hich is called ' sack,' though the true 

 name of it be Xeque, from the province whence it 

 comes." — Mandelsho, Travels into the Indies, London, 

 1669, p. 5. 



Damson. — " Modern Damascus is a beautiful city. The 

 first Damask rose had it's root here and it's name 

 hence. So all Damask silk, linen, poulder, and 

 plumbes called Damascenes." — Fuller, A Pisgah 

 Sight of Palestine, Part II. b. iv. c. 1. p. 9. 



The following works and authors are suggested for 

 examination, though it is not by any means intended to 

 limit the discretion of collectors in this respect. A mul- 

 titude of other books quite as good might easily be named. 

 Those marked with an asterisk have been already under- 

 taken. 



♦Andrews's Works. (By Mr. Brodribb.) 

 *Roger Ascham. (By Mr. A. Valentine.) 



Barrow's Works. 

 •Becon's Works. (By Mr. J. Furnivall.) 

 ♦Burton's Anatomy of Melancholy. (By Mr. Coleridge,) 

 ♦Fuller's Works. (By Mr. Perowne.) 



Fenton's Historic of Guicciardin. 



♦Hacket's Life of Archbishop Williams. (By the Rev. 

 J. Davies.) 



Holland's Translation of Livy. 



Plutarch. 



Ammianus Marcellinus. 



* Pliny. (By Mr. Kennedy.) 



Suetonius. 



* The Cyropaidia. (By the Dean of 



Westminster.) 



Gabriel Harvey's Works. 



Henry More's Works. 



Adam Harsnet's Works. 



Pilkington's Works. 



Urquhart's Translation of Rabelais. 



Lodge's Translation of Seneca. 



