Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 6.djvu/328

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NOTES AND QUERIES. [n s.vi. OCT. 5, 1912.

If George Bunyan were really a descendant of the family of John Bunyan, possibly some one conversant with the family tree may be able to place him. I imagine it improbable that George's death in America is on definite record. A. STAPLETON.

39, Burford Road, Nottingham.

"Mos" = A WANTON. R. Head's 'Eng- lish Rogue,' of the date 1665, is quoted in ' N.E.D.' for " mob " as a cant name for a wanton ; but the word in that sense is used in the first number of Mercurius Democritus, or, a Perfect Nocturnal, " Pub- lished for the right understanding of all the Mad-Merry People of Great Bedlam," 3-10 May, 1659. ALFRED F. ROBBINS.

KISSING THE LADIES AN ENGLISH MODE OF SALUTATION. (See 7 S. vi. 445, 498 ; 8 S. iv. 301 ; v. 18.) It appears from the first reference that in the time of Charles II. it was the custom for visitors to kiss the senior lady first, and leave the girls and children to the last. Kissing as a mode of greeting was used in France about the same time ; and it may have been borrowed from England, for Erasmus notices it. See 6 S. vii. 69. 93, 116 ; viii. 58 ; xi. 92.

A passage from"'," The Chevalier D'Ar- vieux's Travels in Arabia the Desart, Done into English by an Eminent Hand," 1718, is worth quoting :

" The Emir and his whole Court heard with some Pleasure the little Detail I gave 'era ; but when I told 'em of the handsome Liberty the Men have with the Women, I observed that the Prince blush'd, and that all his Court were out of Countenance : Our Custom especially of saluting the Ladies, seem'd insupportable to 'em ; nothing shock'd 'em- so much as that ; they could not comprehend how a Man of Honour could suffer his Wife or his Daughter to be Kiss'd before his Face by way of Civility ; 'tis, with them, to injure the Honour of the whole Family." Pp. 11-12.

This book appears to have been written by order of Louis XIV. Laurence D'Ar- vieux was born at Marseilles in 1635. and died there in 1702. The above conversation took place in 1664.

RICHARD H. THORNTON.

" O.K." The phrase " it is all O.K." was introduced into this country about five-and twenty years ago. At first its use was practically confined to what " Mr. John Thomas" described as the " Hupper Suedes," but now the phrase is pretty generally established.

If you ask what it means, you will be told that it stands for " Orl Kerrect." Now I confess I was totally unable to

account for the origin of the phrase until, going over an old chateau, we came to a room which was " perfectly charming," when a French gentleman exclaimed " Bien coquet," and we all said " Yes, it is quite O.K." EDWIN DURNING LAWRENCE.

[MR. ALBERT MATTHEWS, in a long article on "O.K." at 11 S. iii. 390, showed that the explana- tion of the letters as standing for oil korrect was familiar in the United States as long ago as 1840. He cited, moreover, an instance of the use of the abbreviation in 1790.]

WE must request correspondents desiring in- formation on family matters of only private interest to affix their names and addresses to their queries^ in order that answers may be sent to them direct.

"Ton, DICK, AND HARRY." The earliest instance of the English use of this compre- hensive phrase sent in for the ' New English Dictionary ' is accidentally of 1865. But we have examples from the United States of 1815 and 1818. Will readers try to furnish English examples earlier than these, or in the interval between 1815 and 1865 ? I seem to remember it in colloquial or newspaper use before 1860. J. A. H. MURRAY.

Oxford.

" ARMIGER " AND " HUSBANDMAN." In the Plea Rolls of Hen. IV. and Hen. V. these terms frequently occur. Thus in one suit we find a plaintiff styled " armiger " and the defendants "yomen." In another single suit we have the terms " squyer " and "gentilman"; in another single suit the terms " yoman," " husbondman," and "laborer" (3 Hen. V.). I think some opinions on the evolution of these various designations, and their exact signification at that time, from the military and the economic standpoint respectively, would be very in- teresting. It is evident that many of the " yomen " and " husbondmen " in these cases are men of good family.

CHARLES SWYNNERTON.

[For armiger see 7 S. x. 383, 445 ; xi. 97, 173 ; and for husbandman, (> S. xii. 363.]

PRICE OF TOBACCO IN THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY. In 1656, and again in 1662, the Rev. Giles Moore, Rector of Horstead Keynes, Sussex, paid Is. for two ounces of tobacco- that is, at the rate of 8s. per Ib. (Sussex Archaeological Society's Collections, vol. i. pp. 70 and 87). In 1685 Mr. Richard Stapley, gentleman, of Twineham in the same county, paid Is. 8d. for "a pound of