wamme, wam; the f, v, and w, being interchanging aspirates. Women, as the sex indefinitely, is perhaps in no other way the plural of woman, than as the Anglo-Saxon wimman, and so the sex in a general or plural import; and this accounts for the different pronunciation of the same substantive in a language, for women sounds wimmen. Our doe and the French daine (female deer) belong to the same thema as dam, as given above.

"The Pelican then axid right;
For my writing if I have blame

Who then wol for me fight of* flighte+?
Who shullin shielde me from shame ?

He that yhad a maide to DAME

And the lambe that slaine y was

Shall shieldin me from gostly blame,

For erthely harm is Godd' is grace."-CHAUCER.

"And let us shewe our fantasies in soche wordes as we lerneden of our DAME's tonge."-Chaucer.

Beldam, is sometimes used with a wider extension of meaning than that above given, and then implies a witch, as she who predicts the fate of others, and so a fortune-telling female. I believe such import is connected with the poetical phrase weird women, as three witches, figured as three old females; the parcæ of the Latins.

Banquo. Thou hast it now, King, Cawdor, Glamis, all, As the WEIRD WOMEN § promised; and I fear, &c. &c. Macbeth. Act III. Sc. I.

*As the Dutch of in the sense of or.

+ As the Dutch vleghten, vlechten, vlichten, to weave, to braid, and so to combine, interpose, or come between. Shakespeare employs the verb to weave in the same import as the last. + Mother.

The fates. Parce. But at bottom, I suspect, the same with the freesish wird as our term word, which is as something said, or an idea expressed or brought out from within the mind. The fates and Parca, are as synonymous terms; and fatum (in the plural fata) is as the neuter of the past participle of for, fari, to say, to speak, and so a word; and for

"Folle WIRDEN follen nin seck; q. e. as many WORDS as will, but they won't fill the sack; much talk won't fill a sack." Frees. proverb.

"But, O! fortune executrice of WIERDES

O! influencis of these hevins hie,
Soth is, that ondir God ye ben our hierdes
Though to us bestis ben the causes wrie +."

you

CHAUCER.

AS DRUNK AS A LORD.

In the meaning of plainly drunk, visibly intoxicated, drunk enough for not to leave any doubt about the state of the case. Die ronck als el hoord; q. e. any man hears that this one snores; any one may know, by the way he fetches his breath and by the kind of his sleep, the condition he is in; implying we must all know by his startling struggling broken efforts to breathe and his semi-asphixiated state how it goes with him. Die, this one. Roncken, to snore, to sleep aloud, to make the noise of one in an unsound disturbed state of sleep or stupor, in French ronfler. Als, as. El, another, and so any one. Hooren, to hear. The expression, even in the original form, is at least jocular, in the travesty burlesque.

DEAD DRUNK.

As supremely drunk, surprisingly drunk, remarkably drunk, wonderfully so. D'heet dronck ; q. e. well! this is what you must call being drunk; if any state is to be called so, this is it; this is what you may properly call being drunk; and we say familiarly "such a one is properly drunk," in the same direction of sense; and we say also," this is something like being drunk." The form of the

Ito tell his

is evidently connected with fortuna; we say, fortune," in the sense of to foresay what is to happen.

* Words, sentences; so that executrice of wierdes is as the carrier into effect (the accomplisher) of that which has been said before (foretold). + Hidden, put aside.

original phrase is that of personification and as coming from a supposed bystander. D', die, this. Heeten, to name, to specify by name, to call. D'heet, (die heet) sounds as we pronounce dead.

TO DINE.

To make the principal or substantial meal of the day; in French diner. Te dyen [dijen]; q. e. to become better; to be bettered by, to feel better from, to improve by food, to refresh by additional means; and don't we, almost proverbially, say, I feel the better for my dinner, in opposition to the feel from the want of it; to thrive by internal supply of nourishment. It is in this import the French call the keepers of eating-houses restaurateurs, and a nutritive [fortifying] article of diet, un restaurant. The word has no relation to the quality of the food we dine from, nor to the time we take it at. To dine off a leg of mutton, is to better by it. Breakfast and supper, are comparatively inconsequential refections, in regard, both to the articles of food used at them, and to the importance attached to them by society. To dine upon bread and cheese, is, to be better after eating it. The ancient term, with us, for dinner-time, was mealtide; and the Dutch term is noenmael [middagmael]; q.e. noonmeal [midday-meal]. JOHNSON tells you, to dine, is as the French diner. When we refer to etymologists for diner, they tell us it is, as the Italian desinare [to dine], and that, that is, as the Latin desinere, to cease, to end; but that would be a better source for death [ceasing to live] than for to dine, which is, to better, or add to, continuance. The fact is, this is one of those scholastic whims which have degraded etymology with us, and given language the appearance of being the result of stupid chance, instead of divine design, as, when duly traced, it is found to be. The Italian desinare, is simply a latinized form of the old French disner,

now diner. Dyen sounds as we pronounce dine, and dijen, asthe French pronounce dine. Dijen is also spelt dijden and dijghen, and is the source of a large stock of words, to be explained in the subsequent pages.

"I love bettir the acqueintance

Ten timis of the King of France
Than of a pore man of milde mode,
Though that his soul be all gode,
For when I se beggirs quaking,
Naked on mixins all stinking,
For hunger crie, and eke for care,
I entremet not of ther fare,
Thei ben so pore, and ful of pine,
Thei might not one's yeue me A DINE †,
For thei have nothing but their life;

What should he yeve that licketh his knife."

False Semblant in CHAUCER's Romaunt
of the Rose; from the French.
"The morowe came, and nighin gan the time
Of MEALTIDE, whan that the faire quene Helen
Shope hir to ben an hour aftir the prime

With Deiphobus, to whom she n'olde ‡ faine
But as his sustir homely, sothe to saine,

She came to DINIR, in her plaine § entent,
But God and Pandare wist || at what she meant."
CHAUCER.

The French dinée, dinner, is a dining, and has no relation either to time or sort of food, but is as dijing, dije, the participle present of dijen, and thus a filling of the stomach, and so a bettering of the body, and our dinner is the same word spelt after the English pronunciation of the French term.

CHEEK BY JOLE.

As in the expression, "there they are setting cheek by jole,” in reference to people sitting so

* Dung-heaps.

ti. e. A dinner; a belly-full of victuals; a dining.

To whom she was wholly inclined, but with a sisterly love.
Ostensible, apparent, outward.

Judged, guessed, divined; wijsen, to judge, to form an opinion.

close as to make a ridiculous appearance, or to suggest the idea of impropriety to him who uses the expression. Schick by jool; q. e. a posture [arrangement] contrived by a fool; in the sense of, no one but a fool would have taken so ridiculous a position; and as the expression, by its form, relates to each or either, and thus to one as much as the other, and so to both or all together, it is as fools placed one by the side of the other. I believe we use the phrase generally as confined to two only; and that arises merely from the travesty being cheek by jole, two terms for the same thing; but that is not the original sense. Schick, order, arrangement. Jool, fool, ridiculous personage. Weezende in der daat een JOOL (being in fact a fool). P. C. Hooft.

TO LEAD APES IN HELL,

In the meaning of to remain unmarried, to continue a spinster or a bachelor, and in no real relation to one sex more than the other. T'u lied: ee-haps in el; q. e. for you the bridal song; while marriages proceed in another direction; you can hear the nuptial carol, while you see chances of matrimony taking place in other directions; and implying, in spite of the espousals you see take place with others, your heart is still obdurate enough to keep from following the example set you by your neighbours. The saying in the original has none of the little minded malice infused into it, by the travesty; but refers to a voluntary complacency in celibacy, or at least in not committing yourself to another for better for worse without necessity. Lied is as, bruid-loft-lied; epithalamium, hymeneal chaunt. Tu, te u (to you, for your share). Ee, marriage. Hap, chance, portion, lot; and ee-hap, marriage-chance, is used here in the plural number; or, the original word may have been ee-'happes, and thus marriage