Page:Notes and Queries - Series 12 - Volume 3.djvu/371

 i28.iii.jcLv.i9i7.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

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"wallets" (an Americanism?). Upon the resumption of silver coinage in 1876, '' purses " came again into general use for the silver coins, but for a number of years the French word " porte-monnaie " (now dropped) was used to some extent. The words "purse" and "pocket-book" (for coins and bank-notes respectively) are both now in common everyday use. Gold coins, as MR. LANE states, have never become general, excepting in certain sections, notably in California and on the Pacific coast. It is always possible to obtain them, but people seem to prefer " bills," the common name for bank-notes or bank-bills.

With regard to the use of the word " jack " for " knave," what MR. LANE says is in the main correct, but " knave " is also used to a limited extent. When I was a boy (1860-70) "jack" was considered inelegant, the word " knave " being used in polite society, but this is no longer the case.

The word " cricket " is now, and always has been, used to denote a low footstool with four legs. Those with three legs are called " stools " or " milking-stools."

I would like to comment more at length on the article by MR. PENRY LEWIS (ante, p. 115). What he says about the omission of auxiliary verbs is to a certain extent true, but it is only colloquial, and not universal. I very much doubt if these verbs would be omitted by a careful writer, or, in conversa- tion, by a careful speaker. A number of the phrases he gives are in no sense " Ameri- canisms," being merely ungrammatical. Such are "Don't you want I should wipe ?" " I don't feel to." " You don't hurt you," " He groaned like he was dying." These are not examples of the usual speech of Americans, any more than the speech of the English Cockney is an example of the usual speech of Englishmen. MR. LEWIS is in error when he says Americans do not use the word " gasometer," nor speak of a policeman's " beat." Those are the very words that are used throughout the New England States. The substitutes he gives are doubtless used in some parts of the United States, or he would not have cited them ; I can only say that I have never heard them. " Front -yard " is used very generally in the country and the country towns, where the houses are detached and set back from the street. I believe that the term is also used in the Middle West to denote the small plot of ground in front of a city residence. '' Trolley," to denote a car propelled by electricity" through the over- head wire system, is, t think, universal, as

far as sections of country go, but in the New England States the word " electrics " is used perhaps as often. In cities where the cable system was inaugurated the cars were called " cable-cars." Many cities have both the cable system and the electric sys- tem. Others cities have both the under- ground and overhead electric system. I think that the word " trolley " "first came into use in these cities to designate the lines using the overhead system.

WILLIAM FRANCIS CRAFTS. Brookline, Boston, U.S.

JACOB, THE WONDER-WORKING FRENCH ZOUAVE (12 S. iii. 226). Another con- temporary account of " Le Zouave Jacob," as he was generally known, who was one of the " wonders " of Paris in that wonderful year for the French capital, 1867, is to be found in the letters of Anthony B. North Peat, an Attache du Cabinet du Ministre de I'lnterieur, who at that time was Paris correspondent of The Morning Star and occasional contributor to The Yorkshire Post, a very good selection of his articles having been arranged for publication by Mr. A. Pv. Waller in 1903, under the title ' Gossip from Paris during the Second Empire.' Writing on Aug. 21, 1867, Peat made his first mention of " the great novelty of the day," and described in some detail the alleged cures, adding: "Medical men are themselves taken by surprise, but the facts are not contradicted " (pp. 256-7). On the 22nd he continued the narrative, ex- claiming : " The Zouave guerisseur is de- cidedly the lion of the day," and he was obviously trying fairly to balance the evi- dence for and against imposture (pp. 257-8), But by the 30th he had made up his mind, recording : " The farce of the Zouave gue- risseur has been played out. . . .Whether the man believes in himself, I cannot take on myself to say ; but Paris has ceased to believe in him" (pp. 259-60). The rapidity of the rise and fall was not the least surprising feature of a very singular phenomenon. ALFRED F. BOBBINS.

THE MACBAINS OF SCOTLAND (12 S. iii. 299). " Full details " of this family would occupy several pages of ' N. & Q.' Briefly, they'form one of the many septs or branches of the Clan Chattan, of which The Mackintosh is generally recognized as chief. The Macbeans so called either from an ancestor's fair complexion (ban), or their dwelling among the mountains (beinn) came out of Lochaber in Inverness-shire, and their territory lay in that county.