500 



NOTES AND QUERIES. [2'"» s. v. 129., Ju™ 19. '68. 



pursue the same plan more uniformly; I mean, 

 that adverbs in the positive degree are still given 

 in his work which exist in the comparative or 

 superlative only. This is a remnant of the absurd 

 practice, which was once so prevalent, of invent- 

 ing words, known not to exist, according to cer- 

 tain supposed laws of analogy ; a practice which, 

 whatever may be said in its defence for gramma- 

 tical purposes, is certainly quite indefensible in 

 Dictionaries. 



Your correspondent next attacks " the smaller 

 Lexicon," on the ground that in it " there are oc- 

 casional deficiencies of meaning," and that " some 

 words used by authors little read are given, not 

 others." Now, if F. J. L. had condescended to 

 read the preface to the smaller Dictionary, he 

 would have found this latter objection satisfac- 

 torily disposed of as follows : — 



" But while this Dictionary is mainly intended to 

 explain the writings of the authors comprised in the 

 first list only, j'et it contains many words and meanings 

 of words which do not occur in such authors, but a know- 

 ledge of which is necessary to the full understanding of 

 other words and meanings of words which are met with 

 in their works." 



Let us see the application of this to F. J. L.'s 

 instance. '■^Emundo, used by Seneca, is omitted, 

 though the meaning of bestiarius ludus, occuriing 

 in the same chapter (Ep. 70. 17.), is given." 

 First, let me correct this corrector as to his re- 

 ference. Bestiarius ludus occurs, not in the 17th, 

 but in the 19th chapter. To proceed : emundo is 

 omitted, because the only authors who appear to 

 use it are Seneca and Columella, and the Dic- 

 tionary does not profess to contain words employed 

 by those writers exclusively ; but bestiarius, as a 

 substantive, occurs in Cicero, and therefore could 

 not be omitted ; it is originally and properly, 

 however, an adjective ; and the words are quoted 

 from Seneca to show this fact. " Deficiencies of 

 meaning" may no doubt be found in both Dic- 

 tionaries ; and on such points it would be in vain 

 to attempt to please every one ; some persons 

 think that it is impossible to explain too much, 

 others hold that it is injurious to young scholars 

 to give them assistance at every turn. Here I 

 may remark that it would have been only fair in 

 F. J. L., when complaining of the defects of Dr. 

 S.'s smaller Dictionary, to inform your readers 

 that, as some compensation, it contains an appen- 

 dix of forty closely-printed pages of proper names 

 with their derivatives, the omission of which from 

 the larger work he regards as so "unfortunate." 



The paragraph, "Fourthly," touches upon the 

 much-debated question as to the kind of acknow- 

 ledgment which is due from authors of such works 

 of compilation as Dictionaries to their predeces- 

 sors. This question has long ago been settled in 

 the minds of all impartial and sensible men, 

 though it is every now and then revived by per- 

 sons of greater vanity than judgment, who are 



annoyed to find that their overweening estimate 

 of themselves and their labours is not accepted 

 by others, who therefore decline to minister to 

 their love. of praise and notoriety. It seems to 

 me that your correspondent has most unfairly 

 represented Dr. S. as claiming " as his own " all 

 those derivations which he inserts " without any 

 special acknowledgment." His words on this point 

 are these (Pref. p. x.) : — 



" In etymology little assistance has been derived from 

 my predecessors [that this means preceding lexicographers 

 is plain from what follows]. In working out this depart- 

 ment, I have consulted every book upon the subject that 

 seemed likely to prove useful ; and to scholars both in 

 this country and abroad I am under considerable obli- 

 gations, which have been acknowledged in their proper 

 places : if I have omitted to notice the source from which 

 I have derived any particular etymology, it has been 

 through inadvertence, and not from any desire to claim 

 the merit of what belongs to another." 



So far from advancing any claim of this kind, 

 Dr. S. actually leaves the reader to infer, if he 

 pleases, that there is no original etymological 

 matter at all in his work, and that his only merit 

 is that of selecting suitable materials for his pur- 

 pose. To suppose that it is necessary, even if it 

 were possible, to assign every adopted derivation 

 to the writer who first published it, is perfectly 

 absurd ; and it would not be difficult, if it were 

 worth while, to prove that the very persons who 

 make so loud an outcry about their own rights of 

 discovery, constantly, and indeed unavoidably, 

 neglect those of others. In fact these exigencies 

 of reference and acknowledgment are simply ri- 

 diculous, and compliance with them would be 

 childish. 



These remarks have extended to a greater 

 length than I intended ; but the exposure of 

 mistatements necessarily occupies more space 

 than that v^ich is exposed. Reckless assertions 

 may easily have the merit of brevity, while the 

 proof that they are unfounded must consist of 

 details that are in themselves tedious. Still as 

 you, Mr. Editor, have inserted the attack, I rely 

 upon your sense of justice to admit the defence ; 

 and the more so, as what I have written is really 

 a proof that your favourable critique on Dr. S.'s 

 Dictionaries is fully justified by their merits. 



Fair Play. 



ORIENTATION. 



(2°* S. v. 378.) 



In the lately-published Report of the Bedford- 

 shire Architectural and Archasological Society, 

 there is a valuable paper " On Festival Orienta- 

 tion," read at the Annual Meeting of the Society, 

 Nov. 11, 1856, by Wm. Airy, M.A., Vicar of 

 Keysoe, Rector of Swynshed, and Rural Dean. He" 

 enumerates, as the chief difficulties in the way of 

 determinipg the " Festival Orientation " (t. e. the 



