Page:Notes and Queries - Series 12 - Volume 10.djvu/554

 456 NOTES AND QUERIES. [12 s. x. JUNE 10, 1022. YORKSHIRE USE OF " THOU " (12 S. x. 408). " To them " a person by way of insult or vituperation was in former times, as is well known, not confined to Yorkshire, witness the trial of Sir Walter Raleigh in 1603 for treason. Sir Edward Coke, Attor- ney-General, in his examination of Raleigh appears soon to have substituted " thou " and " thee " for " you," and " thy " for " your." In another part of the trial, Coke was, if possible, even more coarse and violent. Raleigh. I do not hear, yet, that you have spoken one word against me ; here is no treason of mine done ; if my Lord Cobham be a traitor, what is that to me ? Alt. All that he did was at thy instigation, thou viper, for I thou thee, thou traitor. I quote from ' Westminster Hall ; or, Professional Relics and Anecdotes of the Bar, Bench, and Woolsack ' (compiled according to Lowndes by Henry and Thomas Roscoe), 1825, vol. i., p. 130. The reference appears to be to Howell's ' State Trials,' 85. The compilers of ' Westminster Hall ' say : It has been thought that Shakspeare alludes to Coke's expression, for I thou thee, &c., in 4 Twelfth Night,' where he makes Sir Toby, in giving directions to Sir Andrew for his challenge to Viola [Act III., sc. ii.] say " If thou thousts him some thrice, it may not be amiss." But the phrase was probably a common one at that day. Howard Staunton, in his edition of Shake- speare, in a note on the passage, says that the conjecture is put out of court since acted nearly two years before Sir Walter Raleigh's trial. Touching the Quaker use of " thou " and " thee " the following is taken from Thomas Clarkson's * Portraiture of Quakerism,' 3rd ed., 1807, vol. i., p. 301 : It was a common question put to a Quaker in those days [the days of George Fox], who ad- dressed a great man in this new and simple manner, " Why, you ill-bred clown, do you Thou me ? " The rich and mighty of these times thought themselves degraded by this mode of address, as reducing them from a plural magnitude to a singular, or individual, or simple, station in life. " The use of Thou/' says George Fox, " was a sore cut to proud flesh, and those who sought self -honour." On p. 304, Clarkson writes : But the great argument, to omit all others, which Penn and Barclay insisted upon for the change of You, was that the pronoun Thou, in addressing an individual, had been antiently in use, but that it had been deserted for You, for no other purpose than that of flattery to men ; and that this dereliction of it was growing greater and greater, upon the same principle, in their own times. Hence, as Christians, who were not to puff up the fleshly creature, it became them to return to the antient and grammatical use of the pronoun Thou, and to reject this growing fashion of the world. It is strange that after this insistence on the grammatical " thou," Quakers, or many of them, say sixty years ago, used to sub- stitute the accusative " thee " for the nominative " thou," e.g., " Does thee know," &c. Although it has little connexion with the matter in hand, I may perhaps offer an amusing story. A certain Quaker of good position in the north had a dinner party. One of his guests on being offered more of whatever it was refused the offer. How- ever, a little later he said that he had changed his mind, upon which his host said, " Friend, thou shalt not make a liar of thyself at my table." ROBERT PIERPOINT. The English dislike of being tutoye dates back many years. Erasmus (i. 796) tells a story of a German physician who treated a London citizen successfully for fever, but was refused his fee. The Londoner alleged that .his wife had already paid it, and the doctor, denying it (they were both speaking in Latin), used the second person singular. Whereupon the Londoner, ex- claiming, " Vah, homo Germanus tuissas Anglum ! " made off without payment. JOHN B. WAINE WRIGHT. ABBOT PASLEW: HIS PLACE OF EXECU- TION (12 S. x. 407). Your correspondent may rely on the trustworthiness of the local tradition. The monster of the sixteenth century loved the bizarre even in his wanton cruelties. But, apart from that, there is the parallel case of poor old Richard Whiting, the last Abbot of Glastonbury. After a brutal trial at Wells, he was dragged with the utmost ignominy back to Glastonbury, and there hanged a blessed martyr on the Tor, in full view of his glorious Abbey, the most sacred and the most venerable spot in England. CHARLES SWYNNERTON. MULES ON MOUNTAINS (12 S. ix. 354, 395, 431, 475). When this query appeared I at once wrote to my son-in-law, who is surveying on the mountains of Chile. In reply he says : This place (Arica) is situated at a height of about 16,000ft. We use both horses and mules, but for riding I always use a horse. We are more or less 60 miles from the station, and we change horses once. The two stages are
 * Twelfth Night ' is discovered to have been