Hobson's Choice.-No alternative.

Tobias

Hobson was the first man in England that let out hackney horses. When a man came for a horse, he was led into the stable, where there was a great choice, but he obliged him to take the horse which stood next to the stable door; so that every customer was alike well served according to his chance, from whence it became a proverb, when what ought to be your election was forced upon you, to say "HOBSON'S CHOICE." -Spectator, No. 509.

Hocus-Pocus.-Legerdemain.

According to Tillotson, this is a cor

ruption of hoc est corpus, as used in the service of the Mass.

Hog.-The fattest HOG in Epicurus' sty.-W. MASON, Heroic Epistle.

Holidays. If all the year were playing HOLIDAYS,
To sport would be as tedious as to work.

SHAKESPERE, Henry IV.

Home. The soul's dark cottage, battered and decayed,
Lets in new light through chinks that time has made.
Stronger by weakness, wiser men become,

As they draw near to their eternal HOME.

E. WALLER, Verses upon his Divine Poesy. 'Tis sweet to hear the watch dog's honest bark Bay deep-mouthed welcome as we draw near HOME; 'Tis sweet to know there is an eye will mark Our coming, and look brighter when we come.

BYRON, Don Juan.

'Mid pleasures and palaces though we may roam,
Be it ever so humble, there's no place like HOME.

J. H. PAYNE, from the opera of Clar.

Our wives are as comely;

And our HOME is still home, be it ever so homely.-C. DIBDIN. Homeless.-And HOMELESS near a thousand homes I stood, And near a thousand tables pined and wanted food.

WORDSWORTH, Guilt and Sorrow.

Homer.-Read HOMER once, and you can read no more,
For all books else appear so mean, so poor;
Verse will seem prose; but still persist to read,
And Homer will be all the books you need.

SHEFFIELD, Duke of Buckingham.

Seven cities warr'd for HOMER being dead;
Who living had no roofe to shrowd his head.

T. HEYWOOD, The Hierarchie of the Blessed Angells

Seven wealthy towns contend for HOMER dead,

Through which the living Homer begged his bread.-ANON.

Honest. To be HONEST as this world goes, is to be one man picked out of ten thousand.-SHAKESPERE, All's Well.

Honesty.-HONESTY is the best policy.-Don Quixote. BYRON, The Nimmer's.

HONESTY is the best policy. But he who acts on that principle is not an honest man.—Archbishop WHateley.

HONESTY'S a fool, and loses that it works for.

SHAKESPERE, Othello.

No legacy is so rich as HONESTY.—Ibid., All's Well.

Honey-dew. He on HONEY-DEW hath fed,

And drunk the milk of Paradise.-COLERIDGE, Kubla Khan.

Honour.-HONOUR and shame from no condition rise;
Act well your part, there all the honour lies.

POPE, Essay on Man.

HONOUR pricks me on. Yea, but how if honour prick me off when I come on? how then? Can honour set to a leg? No. Or an arm? No. Or take away the grief of a wound? No. Honour hath no skill in surgery, then? No. What is honour? A word. What is that word, honour? Air. A trim reckoning. Who hath it? He that died o' Wednesday. Doth he feel it? No. Doth he hear it? No. Is it insensible, then? Yea, to the dead. But will it not live with the living? No. Why? Detraction will not suffer it: therefore, I'll none of it: honour is a mere scutcheon, and so ends my catechism.—SHAKESPERE, King Henry IV.

HONOUR, riches, marriage-blessing,

Long continuance, and increasing,
Hourly joys be still upon you!

Juno sings her blessings on you.-Ibid., Tempest.

'If I lose mine HONOUR I lose myself.-Ibid., Antony and Cleo.

Life every man holds dear; but the dear man

Holds HONOUR far more precious dear than life.-Ibid., Pericles.
Take HONOUR from me and my life is done.

Ibid., Richard II.

That chastity of HONOUR which felt a stain like a wound.

ED. BURKE,

Hookey Walker. The popular name of a Londoner, whose real name was John Walker, and who often forms a subject of allusion when the testimony of a person of tried and well-known veracity is impeached.

"John Walker was an out-door clerk at Longman, Clementi, & Co.'s, in Cheapside, where a great number of persons were employed; and 'Old Jack,' who had a crooked or hooked nose, occupied the post of a spy upon their aberrations, which were manifold. Of course it was for the interest of the surveillants [sic] to throw discredit upon all

Jack's reports to the head of the firm; and numbers could attest that those reports were fabrications, however true. Jack, somehow or other, was constantly outvoted, his evidence superseded, and of course disbelieved; and thus his occupation ceased, but not the fame of 'HOOKEY WALKER.'"-JON BEE (i.e., JOHN BADCOCK).

Hope.-HOPE deferred maketh the heart sick.—Proverbs xiii. 12.
HOPE, for a season, bade the world farewell,
And Freedom shriek'd-as Kosciusko fell!

THOMAS CAMPBELL, Pleasures of Hope.

HOPE springs eternal in the human breast:
Man never is, but always to be blest.
The soul, uneasy, and confin'd from home,
Rests and expatiates in a life to come.
Lo, the poor Indian! whose untutored mind
Sees God in clouds, or hears him in the wind.

POPE, Essay on Man.
For HOPE is but the dream of those that wake.-PRIOR.
The miserable have no other medicine,

But only HOPE.-SHAKESPERE, Measure for Measure.

HOPE! thou nurse of young desire.-BICKERSTAFF.
HOPE to the end.-1 Peter, i. 13.

HOPE withering fled, and Mercy sighed Farewell!

The wretch condemn'd with life to part,
Still, still on HOPE relies;

And every pang that rends the heart

BYRON, The Corsair.

Bids expectation rise.-GOLDSMITH, The Captivity.

HOPE, like the gleaming taper's light,
Adorns and cheers the way;

And still, as darker grows the night,
Emits a brighter ray.—Ibid.

Thus heavenly HOPE is all serene,

But earthly hope, how bright soe'er,
Still fluctuates o'er this changing scene,
As false and fleeting as 'tis fair.

HEBER, On Heavenly Hope and Earthly Hope.

True HOPE is swift, and flies with swallow's wings;
Kings it makes gods, and meaner creatures kings.

SHAKESPERE, Richard III.

Where peace

And rest can never dwell, HOPE never comes,
That comes to all.-MILTON, Paradise Lost.

While there is life there's HOPE, he cried.

GAY, The Sick Man.

Horrors.

And my fell of hair

Would at a dismal treatise rouse, and stir,
As life were in 't. I have supp'd full with HORRORS.

SHAKESPERE, Macbeth

Horse.-A HORSE! a horse! My kingdom for a horse!

Ibid., Richard III.

To look a gift HORSE in the mouth.-RABELAIS. BUTLER, Hu·

dibras. Also quoted by ST. JEROME.

Hospitable. So saying, with despatchful looks in haste
She turns, on HOSPITABLE thoughts intent.

MILTON, Paradise Lost.

Hospitality.-HOSPITALITY grows best where it is most needed.

HUGH MILLER.

Small cheer and great welcome make a merry feast.

SHAKESPERE, Comedy of Errors.

Be not forgetful to entertain strangers, for thereby some have entertained angels unawares.-Hebrews xiii. 2.

Hour. It is the HOUR when from the boughs

The nightingale's high note is heard;
It is the hour when lovers' vows

Seem sweet in every whisper'd word.-BYRON, Parisina.

Some wee short HOUR ayont the twal.

BURNS, Death and Dr. Hornbook.

Hours. Seven HOURS to law, to soothing slumber seven,
Ten to the world allot, and all to heaven.-SIR W. JONES.

What peaceful HOURS I once enjoyed!

How sweet their memory still!

But they have left an aching void

The world can never fill.-CowPER, Walking with God.

House. A man's HOUSE is his castle, et domus sua cuique tutissimum refugium.—SIR E. COKE, Third Institute.

The HOUSE of everyone is to him as his castle and fortress, as well for his defence against injury and violence, as for his repose, Ibid., Semayne's Case

Huggins and Muggins.—A jocular embodiment of vulgar pretension.

Whitford and Mitford joined the train,
HUGGINS AND MUGGINS from Chick Lane,

And Clutterbuck, who got a sprain

Before the plug was found.-Rejected Addresses.

Huggins and Muggins.-It has been suggested that these names are a corruption of Hooge en Mogende (high and mighty), words occurring in the style of the States-General of Holland, much ridiculed by English writers of the latter part of the 17th century, as, for example, in the following couplet:

Although we have never felt the least inclination to indulge in conjectural etymology, we cannot refrain, for once, from noticing the curious coincidence between the name of Odin's ravens, Hugin and Munin, Mind and Memory, and those two personages who figure so often in our comic literature as Messrs. HUGGINS AND MUGGINS.-BLACKWELL.

Humanity.

Hearing oftentimes

The still, sad music of HUMANITY.

WORDSWORTH, Tintern Abbey.

Humility.-HUMILITY is a virtue all preach, none practise, and yet everybody is content to hear. The master thinks it good doctrine for his servant, the laity for the clergy, and the clergy for the laity.-SELDEN, Table Talk.

Hundredth Psalm.

The musical voice of Priscilla
Singing the HUNDREDTH PSALM, the grand old Puritan anthem;
Music that Luther sang to the sacred words of the psalmist;
Full of the breath of the Lord, consoling and comforting many.
LONGFELLOW, Miles Standish.

Hurt. Rom. Courage man; the HURT cannot be much,

Mer. No, 'tis not so deep as a well, nor so wide as a church. door; but 'tis enough. —SHAKESPERE, Romeo and Juliet.

Husband..

She's adorned

Amply that in her HUSBAND's eye looks lovely,

The truest mirror that an honest wife

Can see her beauty in.-JOHN TOBIN, The Honeymoon.

She who ne'er answers till a HUSBAND Cools,
Or, if she rules him, never shows she rules.

POPE, Moral Essays.

Hypocrisy.-HYPOCRISY is a sort of homage that vice pays to virtue. ROCHEFOUCAULD.

HYPOCRISY is the necessary burden of villainy.-DR. JOHNSON.

Some that smile have in their hearts, I fear, millions of mischiefs
SHAKESPERE, Julius Cæsar.