Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 2.djvu/263

 11 8. VIII. SEPT. 27, 1913.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

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these pipes were always placed on the table .after dinner, together with screws of shag tobacco, and a smoking parliament, moist- ened with hot or cold punch according to the season, was generally held during the following hour. Of course, in those days .no one ever thought of smoking a pipe in the presence of ladies.

W. F. PRIDEAUX.

The old pipe -rack, with its long row of churchwardens and Broseleys at one time an indispensable fitting in most bar -parlours has vanished. These pipes survived long .after the sixties of the last century and the advent of meerschaums and briars. Pro- fessional men and tradesmen met nightly to smoke their long pipes and to discuss scandal and affairs of state. By an un- written law working-man and their habili- ments were excluded, except under the wing of a protector. He was a bold man who would enter with a short clay pipe in his mouth. This curious notion concerning the appearance of the short clay still exists, although the enormous quantity of them sold shows it is a general favourite with smokers. B. D. MOSELEY.

When I was a cadet at Sandhurst in 1855-8 Milo's cutty pipes were quite the ^hing, and the selection by cadets of a good one out of a fresh consignment packed in sawdust was eagerly watched by the " Johns." Of course we were imitating our parents.

Is MR. APPKRSOX right in his reference to ' Ask Mamma,' for I fail to find it in my copy of 1858 ?

HAROLD MALET, Colonel.

There cannot be the slightest doubt that long-stemmed " churchwardens " are meant as distinct from the short clays of the farm hands and other labourers visiting the " public." L. L. K.

SMUGGLING QUERIES (11 S. viii. 209). (2) " Skellum." Philologists who have tackled " skellum " tentatively state its family history thus : " Dan. skielm = a, rogue, a knave ; Dut. and Germ, schelm" They proffer as definition, " a worthless fellow, a scoundrel," adding that the word is Scotch and is used in ' Tarn o' Shanter.' Such of Burns' s editors as risk an attempt at inter- pretation offer " worthless fellow," "wretch, " scapegrace," or something similar, as adequate equivalent. One of the ablest among the exponents, Mr. Scott Douglas, gives the gloss " wiseacre " for the ' Tarn

o' Shanter ' term, and also for the " self-

jonceited critic skellum " in the poet's

Burlesque Lament for the Absence of Wil-

iam Creech, Publisher.' The same expositor

gives " wretches " as his definition of the

' worthless skellums " condemned in the

Epistle to the Rev. John McMath.' Pro-

bably the editorial conclusions have mainly

been reached through consideration of the

context and without reference to the origin

of the word. THOMAS BAYNE.

(2) Skellum, a rascal, a villain ; Dutch and German schelm. " N.E.D.' quotes, 1611, Ben Jonson's ' Introd. Verses to Coryat's Cru- dities,' " Dutch skelum " ; 1663, Pepys's Diary, 3 April, " He ripped up Hugh Peters (calling him the execrable skellum) " ; 1603, Urquhart's 'Rabelais,' III. xlviii. 386,

Pander, knave, rogue, skelm, robber, or thief " ; 1673, Dryden, ' Amboyna,' L i., " These skellum English " ; 1814, Scott, ' Waver ley,' Ixxi.," That schellum Malcolm," &c.

In South Africa the word is still applied to animals : 1887, Rider Haggard, ' Jess,' i. 6, " But I am glad you have killed the skellum (vicious beast)."

I have also found this word used in the literature of the great Civil War (1642-60), but cannot, at the present moment, lay my hand upon an example.

A. R. BAYLEY. [A. J. V. R. also thanked for reply.]

HEBREW OR ARABIC PROVERB (11 S. viii. 30, 115, 136). With regard to above, I have just located its real source. The Rabbis of the Talmud (Sanhedrin 106a) apply the proverb to Balaam, who was appointed to be a prophet in Israel, and then fell from grace on account of his arrogance.

" Mar Zubra, the son of Tubia, said (in his masters name), ' It is just as folks say ; the camel set out to get him horns and was shorn of his ears.' "

M. L. R. BRESLAR.

Erasmus, ' Adagia,' Chil. iii., cent. v. No. 8, under the heading " Camelus desider- ans cornua etiam aures perdidit," cites

Kttt TO,

cora Trpoo-aTTwAtcrcv as " sump turn ex apologo do camelis, qui per oratorem cornua a love postularunt, ille offensus stulta postu- latione aures quoque resecuit," and adds " et hoc Apostolii uidetur." The Greek proverb quoted by Erasmus is found in Apostolius, ix. 59 b and viii. 43. Leutsch and Schneidewin, at the latter place in their edition of the * Faroe miographi Gr0eci,' give