Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 8.djvu/63

 viii. JULY is, loci.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

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much information equally curious and valuable is supplied. Special attention is rewarded by what is said concerning the manner in which after the Norman Conquest k, till then a supplemental symbol, occasionally used instead of c for the guttural sound, was substituted for c before e, i, and y, and later before n words, such as knight, knave, &c. It is curious to note that while the unstressed suffix ick in words such as traffick, musick, is now changed to ic, when a swffix in e or i follows, as in trafficker, the deleted k reappears. It is obviously impossible to condense into a space capable of being given in our columns information that has already been compressed as closely as was reconcilable with the preservation of lucidity. It is with the.?' words, however, that the part is principally concerned. Very many of these belong, as is pointed out, to the colloquial rather than to the literary stratum of the language. Such words are jig, job, jog, jolt, jiffy, jigger, jumble, and the like, many of which are onomatopoeic. Jewel, in its various senses, is the first word treated wholly in the part. Many quotations from Shake- speare are given. We should like to have seen the lines of Helena in ' A Midsummer Night's Dream ' (IV. i.),

And I haue found Demetrius, like a iewell,

Mine owne, and not mine owne,

since some dispute has been raised as to its exact meaning. The matter has, however, more concern for commentators than for philologists. Whence Jew's harps, first called Jew's trumps, got their name is doubtful. Reference is, however, made to the article in * N. & Q.' by the REV. C. B. MOUNT, 8 th S. xii. 322. Jib as a verb when applied to a horse is said to be of recent date and uncertain derivation. Jig, a dance, is much earlier, but not less uncertain in origin. Jig supplies us with some of the senses of jigger, others of which are obscure. It is, of course, natural that in words of this stamp, known principally in popular speech, no certain derivation should be obtainable. Jim- iam, among the slang meanings of which in the plural is delirium tremens, is described as "a reduplicated term of which the elements are unexplained; perhaps only whimsical." Jimp= slender reached our literature from Scotland in the last century. Of jingle it is said that there does not seem to be any original association with jangle. The connexion seems nearer with tinkle. Jobation=3i lecture is earlier than we should have supposed, an instance of use in 1689 being furnished. A very interesting account appears of jockey. It is naturally a diminutive, kindred to Jacky. Jucund, from jucundus, is the etymological form of jocund, which is said now to be exclusively a literary word. A Celtic origin for jog=to shake up has been put forward, but is said to be not tenable, the origin remaining unascertained. The modern use of Johnny is mentioned as "chiefly denoting a fashionable young man of idle habits." This description seems due to the Daily News, which among the morning papers enjoys a practical supremacy or mono- poly of quotation, to some extent shared by the Westminster Gazette among evening papers. We should not personally assume idleness, as being indispensably involved in a term which we have heard applied to an assemblage including one o: the editors of one of the periodicals in questior as well as other hardworking men. No instance o: ioke is given earlier than 1670. Under jolly we find

Coverdale in 1549 using what seems a quite modern brm of expression, "I thought my selfe a iolye brtunate man." Jolly-boat is of uncertain origin. Extracts illustrative of journalese are given from.the AthencKum and the Pall Mall Gazette. Journalist n the form jurnalist is found in 1693 ; journalism does not appear before 1833. Carlyle is responsible 'or journalistic. The origin of juggins==a, simpleton cannot be settled. It is first traced in Disraeli in L845. Of junket the history is said to be " somewhat obscure in respect both of form and sense." Under this word we do not trace Milton's

How faery Mab the junkets eat. Another word the origin of which is said to be unknown is jury-mast. Just, in its many senses and with its numerous derivatives, occupies many 'nteresting columns. Kaffir is the word of most nterest under K we have so far reached.

S. Gilbert of Sempringham and the Gilbertines. A History of the only English Monastic Order. By Rose Graham. (Stock.)

ST. GILBERT of Sempringham was born about twenty- three years after the Norman Conquest, and is said to have lived t9 attain his hundredth year. Sempringham is a Lincolnshire village near Bourne. It is now a fertile place, but it must have been a lonely and depressing spot when he knew it, as it was on the edge of that great stretch of fenland which extended to the Wash. St. Gilbert came of the race of the invaders, and the time had not arrived when the conquerors and the conquered blended into one people. His father Jocelin was a Norman knight, holding his lands under Gilbert de Gant, of Falkingham, a mighty potentate in Lincolnshire, whose father Baldwin of Flanders was brother of Matilda, wife of King William. It is possible, though we know no evi- dence whatever for our surmise, that this Gilbert may have been the godfather of the future saint, and that the latter was, according to a custom prevalent in those days, named after him. Gilbert's father married a lady of Saxon lineage, and this may have been a reason why their son, apart from his own virtues, became popular with the servile classes, with whom in after days he was in such intimate relation. He grew up a pious and innocent lad, but won the contempt of the retainers from a physical defect from which he suffered. He could not engage in knightly exercises on account of his infirmity; his father therefore determined to give him a clerkly education ; but this also seemed out of the poor boy's reach, for he was considered to be dull of intellect. For this offence, as it was regarded it was, we may assume, a sign of slow develop- ment rather than of idleness he fell into dis- grace with his parents. This the tender-hearted lad felt so hard to bear that he fled to France. Perhaps he may there have met with kinder treat- ment than at nome, or it may be that change of environment awoke his slumbering faculties, for he seems to have at once turned his attention to scholarship. When he returned home he was found to be a well-educated and refined young man, according to the standards of that rough time. His mind had widened, and he had become bent upon doing good to those around him, though at first it does not appear that he had any fixed idea as to the direction which his energies should take. He began by what we may in a loose manner call keeping a school ; that is, instructing the young of both sexes. We have reason to believe he did this