Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 1.djvu/104

 96

NOTES AND QUERIES.

[9 th S. I. JAN. 29,

or boards of dwelling-rooms of former days as on those of stables of to-day. Though the Holy Table was long since ordered to be covered with a carpet, we are not yet in the habit of covering the floor of the nave with one. " Madam," said the maid in ' She Wou'd if She Cou'd,' " let him creep under the table, the carpet is long enough to hide him."

But "Lexica contexat" may still be a wish for our worst enemies, for, though all idea of drudgery on such a work as the 'H. E. D.' may be well forgotten in the splendour of its execution, there must be sad disappoint- ment in the neglect sometimes reckless, some- times intentional of those whom the work should benefit. " I have not looked," a corre- spondent sometimes confesses. One has only to look for Carpet to find "On the carpet (i. e., of the council table), under consideration or discussion," illustrated by instances in the past and present centuries. The last instance being only referred to and not quoted, I may be allowed to give it here. It is from an author as modern and as free from affectation of "aged accents and untimely words" as Motley. " It was supposed," he writes, " that an alliance between France and England, and perhaps between Alen9on and Elizabeth, was on the carpet."

Sympathizing with the writer of the note in dislike of the literal Englishing of French idioms, I cannot help thinking that he would have reserved his attack for another occasion if he had consulted the * H. E. D.'

KlLLIGREW.

This expression, like "by dint of," is not " absurd and misleading " to one who is acquainted with its history. Except phraseo- logically, dint, in the sense of " force," has gone out of use; and so, to mean "table-cloth," has carpet, which, however, was not yet obsolete in 1728, or perhaps later. " On the carpet (i. e., of the council table! under con- sideration or discussion." So the 'H. E. D.,' which shows also that the phrase in question came up while carpet still answered to the French tapis. F. H.

Marlesford.

The first example of this rendering I remember was given by the Bishop of Gloucester, in a letter to the late Archdeacon Denison, in 1866. His lordship wrote declining to bring " holy mysteries upon the carpet of public, and perhaps newspaper, controversy." GEORGE ANGUS.

St. Andrews, N.B.

"HiDE" (9 th S. i. 28). Archdeacon Hale's 4 Domesday of St. Paul's ' (Camden Society,

1858) is one of many proofs that any local record competently edited is of infinitely more than local value. The inquisition into the manors of St. Paul's in 1222, with its attendant illustrative pieces and learned annotations, is full of light for the study of ancient agricultural economics in Europe at large, and of course specially so for England. The quotation given by Q. V. is literally identical with the text on p. 64, except that Jurati is in the quotation what Isti in the text denotes, and that sexties in the former is in the latter spelt in the not uncommon mediaeval fashion with a c for the t. The MS. note is therefore quite exact in the information it professes to furnish, which was, as it bears, the jurors' return.

GEO. NEILSON.

The survey in question was edited by Archdeacon Hale for the Camden Society in 1858, under the title of 'The Domesday of St. Paul's.' The passage referred to will be found 'on p. 64 of that work. S. O. ADDY.

Here 120 acres is the normal size of the hide in a three-field manor. Only the tilled fields were gelded, the field in fallow being exempt. If, as was afterwards the case, all three fields are counted, then the hide would be 180 acres, 60 in each field.

ISAAC TAYLOR.

Settrington.

THE MAUTHE DOOG (8 th S. ix. 125). I would propose, as the origin of mauthe, the Manx word corresponding to the Irish madadh, a dog, if there be such a word in Manx (which perhaps one of your readers from the Oilean may be able to tell us); and if that word approaches as near in sound to the Anglicized mauthe as does the Irish word, I think we have a much simpler clue to the derivation of the word than that which Scott proposes in his note to * Peveril of the Peak. As to the second word in the popular appellation of this "spectre hound," I see that, while Brewer, in his 'Dictionary of Phrase and Fable,' simply calls the animal " the mauthe dog," Scott spells the second word "doog." Now, may it not be that (contrary to what both Scott and Brewer seem to presume) this may be not simply a mispronunciation of "dog," but another Manx word, probably an adjec- tive qualifying the noun, here corrupted to mauthe ? On this point, too, I would put it to one of your Manx readers to enlighten us. ARTHUR J. BROCK.

CONSTRUCTION WITH A PARTITIVE (8 th S. xii. 206, 312, 411, 477, 517 ; 9 th S. i. 38). My censor at the last reference admits that ety-