Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 5.djvu/402

 394

NOTES AND QUERIES.

s. v. MAY 19, im

It is not necessary here to touch upon th

questionable alternative placed before u

that a gift and bribe are synonymous. Wha

I venture to think requires further elucida

tion is the word itself. So far as I find it i

not clearly defined as to root or origina

meaning. Handsel is said to have its paren

in A.-S. handselen=lna,nd, and selen=to give

Again, hansel is said to be from the Britis

honsel, he that buys first from a tradesman

in the morning; German, I believe, is t

imitate with ridiculous ceremony and t

receive, or " make a fool of." Three hundrec

years ago the first bridal banquet after th

wedding-day was, I think, called " the gooc

hanzel feast." It would thus appear tha

there is more than a mere "hair-splitting"

difference between the various meanings

and that it will require some erudition to

bring into line " a ridiculous ceremony " wit]

" a bridal banquet " or bribe, &c. We know

hansel is a familiar term in England anc

Scotland, and variously denotes a gift ; a gif

when an article of dress, &c., is first worn

and a New Year's gift the first Monday o:

a new year, &c. But all this only accentuates

the necessity of, if possible, a clear exposi

tion of the true etymological account of the

word. Sir Walter Scott uses the word to

represent a present ; in the ' Evergreen ' il

is used to denote the first money a merchanl

gets. ALFRED CHAS. JONAS.

^ [The word is fully dealt with, under ' Handsel,' in

" LAZY LAURENCE." The following passage from Desrousseaux's * Mceurs Populaires de la Flandre FranQaise,' 1889, vol. i. p. 35, shows that Lazy Laurence has his analogue abroad :

" The words lozard, lozarde, mean slothful, and it is said of individuals who merit this designation that St. Loza is their patron, the same as St. Longin is given as patron to people who are slow. At Douai till about 1830 this imaginary saint had his fete kept every year on Trinity Monday,"

the following refrain being sung among others :

Non, Saint Loza n'est pas mort, Non, Saint Loza n'est pas mort, Car il vit encor, Car il vit encor.

M. P.

JOB BETTS, WATCHMAKER. Respecting this maker, Britten, in his recently issued book, merely quotes an advertisement in the London Gazette of 11-15 Aug., 1692, offering a reward for the recovery of a gold watch made by him, which, with other things, had been stolen from Mr. Cheyne Rowe, of Walthamstow, in Essex. It will therefore be of interest to
 * Old Clocks and Watches and their Makers,'

note the following extract from the parish register of St. Andrew Undershaft, London (of which parish he was probably an in- habitant), recording his burial there, viz., "1680/1, Feb. 24. M r Job Betts, Watch- maker." W. I. R. V.

"MAWKIN." (See ante, p. 293.) I think this word as denoting a scarecrow is in pretty general use. It is usually spelt as above, but is also found as "morkin," "maukin," and 44 malkin." Miss Baker gives it in her ' Dic- tionary of Northamptonshire Words and Phrases ' as " malkin or mawkin," and also states that "galliment is a corresponding term in Devonshire." She likewise instances

malkin " as meaning (1) an oven mop (giving a quotation from Palsgrave), and (2) a slattern, a tawdry woman (giving a quotation from Shakespeare's * Coriolanus '). In this locality the word " mawks " is commonly used to signify a dirty, slatternly woman or girl, e.g., " Yeh gret mawks." " Mawkins " are very much in vogue just now on the newly sown ground, and I lately came across a fine speci- men. ' The figure was dressed as a man, and stood very upright and sen try -like beneath an open umbrella. How the said umbrella las fared during the recent gales I shall be nterested to ascertain anon.

JOHN T. PAGE.

West Haddon, Northamptonshire.

ORIGIN OF THE ROYAL ACADEMY. It may not >e generally known that the Royal Academy, vhich annually opens its doors in the month of May, owes its origin to the Foundling lospital, Guilford Street. The hospital was ounded in 1739 by Thomas Coram, a retired ea captain. The present building was erected n 1754, when it was desired to decorate its vails, but the charity being too poor to pay -he artists, Hogarth, Sir Joshua Reynolds, jfainsborough, Richard Wilson, arid many of he chief painters of their day offered their ervices. The exhibition of their works of rts proved successful. The painters took d vantage !of the interest excited by their ollected pictures, formed a society in 1 760, nd opened their first exhibition in the large oom of the Society of Arts, then located in be Strand. In 1771 King George III. granted ooms in old Somerset House, where, and ubsequently in the present building, the xhibition was held annually till 1838. It r as then removed to the National Gallery, nd in 1868 to Burlington House, Piccadilly.

EVERARD HOME COLEMAN.

" CHACMA," ZOOLOGICAL TERM. I have .ready treated in these columns of most of