32 HISTORY of the SOCIETF. 



dent that this is not the fenfe of the language. He, in a jocu- 

 lar way, reprehended the Earl for not drinking to him ; " deQ- 

 ring him to take it forth, '(that is, the drink formerly mention- 

 ed) and drink to the reft of the company." Therefore, even 

 admitting that the expreOion his f coll means the king's fcoU, we 

 cannot with propriety fuppofe that any thing more is meant, 

 than that Gowrie went to the antichamber, to convey to the no- 

 blemen and gentlemen who were there, his Majefty's faluta- 

 tion ; or, as exprefled in the narrative, " to drink to the reft of 

 the company, and in his Majefty's name" to give them that 

 welcome, which he had negledled to give them in his own. 



Thus it appears, that the term, primarily denoting a vefTel for 

 containing liquor, was, in confequence of the cuftoms connecfl- 

 ed with drinking, at length ufed to fignify the mutual expref- 

 fions of regard employed by thofe engaged in compotation, or 

 their united wilhes for the health and profperity of one indivi- 

 dual, diftinguiftied in rank, or peculiarly endeared to them all, 

 whether he were prefent or abfent. 



I HAVE met with one paffage in which that expreflion, the king's 

 jkohy is diftindlly ufed in the fenfe which has been improperly 

 attached to the phrafe already confidered. After the Bridge of 

 Berwick had been rebuilt in the year 1621, " Sir William 

 Beyer, mayor of the town, ftayed the taking away of the cen- 

 tries, and putting in the keyftone, till the king' s Jkole were drunk 

 at that part of the bridge." Calderwood's Hijh p. 787. But 

 the expreflion, although equivalent to what is now called drink- 

 ing the king's health, feems ftridlly to fignify, drinking the king's 

 cup, or a cup in honour of the king. 



For we are not to fuppofe, that the word Jkoll has any primary 

 or proper relation to health or profperity. This would be to- 

 tally repugnant to analogy ; as will appear from a comparifon 

 of our term with its cognates in the other Northern languages. 



ISL. 



