he bestowed his blessing upon a soul which had no faith in its efficacy; on one who was lost to all sense of its value; on a person who did not care one farthing for such things. Implying, he might as well have saved himself the doing it, the giving it. Seijen, seghenen, to make the sign of the cross as the catholic priest does in his benediction; for it is not the heartfelt genuine blessing uttered by the [parent, the friend, or the lover] to the object of his affection, but the indiscriminate and mechanical mummery of the monk, which is here intended. Siel, soul, individual, as when we say, there was not a soul present, Lijfloos, lijveloos, lifeless, lost to all feeling, insensible to. Her aen, hier aen, in this respect, here upon. Siel lijveloos sounds

sleeveless.

"Gode childe, quoth she, what echeth soche renome to the conscience of a wise man, that loketh and mesureth his godenesse, not by SLEVELESS wordes of the peple, but by sothefastenesse of conscience? By God, nothinge.'

CHAUCER.

AS DRUNK AS CHLOE.

Thoroughly drunk. Als dronck als kloe; q. e. as moist as a oleft; as full of wet as a place whence sun and air are excluded by the nature of it. Drunk, as drenched [saturated] wiih liquid, has been explained above. Klove, kloe, a fissure cleft. A cleft is as the emblem of a state of moisture; a place never dry. Drunk, was formerly spelt donkin.

"Aaron that had the temple in governance,
And eke the othir Prestis everychone,
Into the Temple when thei shuldin gon,
To pray for the pepill, and do servise,

Thei n'olde drinkin in no manner wise

* To eche, to add, to increase, and the same word with the Dutch oecken in the same sense.

ti.e. Heartless, senseless, not the effect of feeling.

No kind of drink, that DRONKEN might 'hem make.
But ther in abstinence did praye and wake,
Lest that thei deidin*."

CHAUCER,

PUG.

The ellipsis of pug-dog; a lap-dog, pet-dog. I take the word to be as the maso-gothic pugy, a pocket, a pouch, a purse; in another dialect pong, bong. To knip the bung, was a slang phrase at one time, for to pick the pocket. The pocket then worn by the females was of considerable dimensions, and fastened to a girdle from which it hung before them, so as to form the lap. It was in this pocket they deposited the little favourite; usually, at that time, the Dutch Mastiff, and called the lap-dog from the circumstance of being carried about by its mistress in this pouch or lap. Pug nose is evidently from the nose natural to this species of dog.

TATTERDEMALLION.

As one whose general appearance prognosticates his being in a destitute state; one whose look announces the want of necessary means, Dat er de mael lije aen: q, e, that there which [he who] is suffering in the viaticum (provision store); one who is in want of necessaries; one who seems wandering in an unprovided state; in a beggarly condition. Mael answers to viaticum as the traveller's storebag; and still more closely to bulga, budget, wallet, in another shade of the same sense,--Cum bulgá canat, dormit, lavat, omnis in und spes hominis bulga. The phrase, like so many others of this class with us, has become a substantive by travesty. Mael in the shape of male had once with us the same import. Lije is the third person of the potential mood of lijden, lijen, to suffer, to be in distress,

Yes once I was herberd, quoth he, with a hepe of chapmen, I rose when they were at rest, and rifled their MALES.

* Died.

That was no restitucion, quoth Repentance, but robers theft;
Thou hadst been better worthy been hanged therefore
Than for all that thou hast here shewed.

I toke rifling for restitucion, quoth he, for I never red boke,
I can no French in fayth, but of the fer ende of Norfolke."
Vis. Pier. Plowm
"Our hoste lough and sware, so mote I gone,

This goith aright, and unboklid is the MALE*,

Let se now who shall tell another tale."-CHAUCER. HE LOOKED AS IF BUTTER WOU'D NOT MELT IN

HIS MOUTH.

Used in regard to some Judas-faced libertine, foremost to revile the shadows of vice as a saving to his practice of its substantial forms; or in relation to some judicial hypocrite [official ruffian] as notorious for his constant appeals to religion, conscience, honesty, &c. as he is for his disregard of them all in practice. Hie lucht als heffe botter woed nae 't meld; hin ijse moed; q. e. with him it looks as if the ruffian boiled up with rage to display himself in practice; but fear [dread] restrains the giving vent to the fit; he would lay aside all cloak and show himself openly to be the villain he is, if he had but courage, and thus implying the ruffian, the impostor, and the coward. Hie, hier, in this instance here. Luchten, to have the appearance of, to look like. Heffen, to ferment, to fume, to boil up, and here used in the subjunctive mood. Botter, impostor, hypocritical scamp, rake, villain. Meld, melde, as the participle present of melden, to make known, to mention. Ijse as the subjunctive form of ijsen to alarm, to fill with dread [horror]. Moed, self-possession, confidence, spirit, courage, and the same word with our mood, sometimes spelt moud, in which form it approaches nearer to the travesty of mouth. Hin, hence, away. Woeden, to rave.

"For when we herd a man within he was almost wood* And bicause the cost was his, no marvel tho the Mount Were turned into vengeance." CHAUCER.

"For vices ben so cruell that thei persen and thorowpassen the courage within, and thoughe thei ne anoye not the body, yet vices to wODEN to destroyen men by wounde of thought.” CHAUCER.

A SCAMP.

In the sense of, one who is a disgrace to society, to his family and connections. Er schamp; q. e. a contumely; disgrace, reproach, slur to nature; one who disgraces the human form. Evidently of the same stock as the Italian scempio in an analogous

sense.

NUTS.

As in the expression, that was nuts to him, and in the sense of, it gave him pleasure; rejoiced him. Nuts; q.e. of use, of profit to; and thus as something that gives pleasure to. Utilis, utor, usus, &c. are of the same stock.

A HUMBUG.

A deception; a take in; moonshine. Er ham b'oog; q. e. a taking hold of by the eye; taking to the eye; a catch for the eye; engaging the eye; implying an appearance and nothing more; in appearance only. Hame, ham, the contraction of haing, the participle present of the antiquated ha-en, to lay hold of, to take by, to grasp; and the root of hand, ham, and other terms to be observed on by and by. Bij oog, b'ooy, by the eye to the sight. So that humbug is a taking by appearance; and we say he was taken in by appearances, in the sense of, he was deceived by his eyes; implying his reason had no share in the consequence. To humbug is the verb of this substantive. JOHNSON omits the word, although as genuine English as any in his Dictionary. To hum, to deceive, is the familiar contraction of to humbug. Hum, sound has quite a different source.

TO SET THE TEETH ON EDGE.

An expression perfectly understood, but not accounted for. Its literal import has been lost sight

of by the disuse of the worde edge in the sense here used. Edge, in this expression, is as egge, the contraction of the still older egging, the participle present of egghen, eggen, to harrow up, to stir up to excite violently, and the same verb with our to egg, in the sense of to excite. So that to set the teeth on edge, is to set them in a state of excitement, one of pain, uneasiness,; and is as the disturbance of a state of rest and ease to harrassing urgent excitement; to rouse from quiescent ease to a state of disquietude. The cause which brings this peculiar sensation has no share in the meaning of the expression, whether that cause be the seeing another eat a sour apple, the creaking of a door, the cutting a cork, &c., it is not referred to. Nor indeed is there, apparently, any universal and uniform originator of this feel; for the circumstance, which brings it into life in one constitution, has often no effect in another. The Dutch term for teeth in this state is egge tandem; egghe being in the sense above given. Ic at de suere druuen ende dyn tande worde eghick (egghe) daer af; q. e. I eat the sour grapes and thy tooth was set on edge thereby. Eghich, edgy. But this sentence is in a very old form of the Dutch language. The French equivalent phrase is agacer les dents; that is to excite the teeth, to disturb them painfully, to provoke a feeling where there was none before, to awaken to a sense of pain. In Italian it is allegare, i denti; and evidently in a same import. Edge is a word of very extensive connections; including acutus, angulus, acidus, and others still more distant in form of letters, to be accounted for in another page.

"So ben they parted, with harts ON EDG*
To be avenged each on his enimy."--CHAUCER.

* i. e. Eager in a state of excitement, provoked.