98
NOTES AND QUERIES. en s. m. FEB. 4, IQIL
BLACKSTONE'S ' COMMENTARIES,' FIRST
EDITION (10 S. xii. 385). I think that MR.
W. R. B. PRIDEATJX will find some altera-
tion in the treatment of the ^ copyright
question, as to which Blackstone's opinion
was confirmed by the Courts. Q. V.
WHYTEHEER OR WHYTEBEER (US. ii. 228, 318, 378, 511). The ' N.E.D.' has not yet reached W, but under " taw," ix. 117, col. 3, it quotes " Whittawer " of the date 1474.
W. C. B.
on
The Oxford English Dictionary. Sauce-alone
Scouring (Vol. VIII.). Edited by Henry
Bradley. TTealf. (Vol. IX.) Edited by
Sir James A. H. Murray. (Oxford, Clarendon
Press.)
THE ' NEW ENGLISH DICTIONARY ' has made such steady and continuous advance as to put a heavy tax on the time of the conscientious re- viewer who studies every page of it with care. There should, however, be no fear of ' N. & Q.' being indifferent to the progress of a splendid work to which it is continually devoting the research of its contributors. Last July ' Sauce- alone Scouring ' (Vol VIII.) appeared, edited by Mr. Henry Bradley ; and last October ' T Tealt ' (Vol. IX.), under Sir James Murray's care. These two parts show the admirable skill and patient research which make the ' Dictionary ' a delight to all serious students of English. The elaborate analysis of the various senses of a word will not strike the ordinary reader, perhaps, so much as other features of the scheme ; but all experts in language must recognize the great success attained in this, possibly the most difficult part of lexicography. Johnson's definitions are occasionally utilized as a beginning, but a minute and careful separation of senses follows which must have been the outcome of much time and thought.
Foreign and dialectic words are freely included in the scheme, which also extends to words now current only outside England.
Nothing is more difficult than to guess at the length of time during which any word has been used, and the ' Dictionary ' by its wealth of dated examples has in this respect sa long outstripped all competitors that it is not necessary to quote the statistics provided at the beginning of each section.
The mere fact that a whole section is needed for "sauce-alone" to "scouring" shows the ex- tended scale on which the ' Dictionary ' is planned. Dr. Bradley has no common words to deal with which need treating at great length, " say " occupying the most room. The literature of learning is, however, well exhibited in " science," and " school " with its many cognates. The colloquial " saucebox," of persons, goes back as far as 1588. It is pointed out that " sauciness " and " saucy " have grown milder in their mean- ing of late years. That specially German condi- ment, " Sauerkraut, "^hasVon its way into English,
and is followed by " saufey," " saught," and
" saulee " terms obscure to the ordinary reader
and now obsolete. "Saunter" is described as
of obscure origin, and the derivation suggesting
" to venture oneself," is regarded as " phono-
logically inadmissible." The number of spellings
given for " sausage " is remarkable, and still more
its actual varieties, which are said to exceed 150.
We are glad to find Dickens quoted more than
once for the word and its derivatives. The same
page gives us words so different as " savant " and
" savate." " Save " is a capital instance of
idioms well differentiated. "Saw" includes
several special combinations from the United
States. Under " sawyer " is a third section
marked " U.S." ; but the last quotation given
therein explains " snags " and " sawyers," which
occur in combination in Dickens.
" Say-so "=mere word or dictum, is an effect- ive piece of English which is current now only in America, and might be revived, as " ipse dixit " has taken its place here. We believe that in the law " scaffolding " implies the presence of a rope. There are two important words with the same spelling " scale." " Scamper " is of uncertain origin, but " not improbably the word was origin- ally military slang " of foreign origin, we hasten to add. Pope's " presume not God to scan " suggests to us the addition of a further verse quotation, Burns's
Then gently scan your brother man ;
Still gentler, sister woman,
in the ' Address to the Unco Guid.' " Scapegoat'* was " apparently, invented by Tindal (1530) " for use in Leviticus xvi. ; but we learn that it has been turned out of the Revised Version, which . has " Azazel " instead. A " Scarborough warn- ing " =very short notice, or none at all, occurs as early as 1546. " Scavenger " is altered from " scavager " with intrusive n, as in '* passenger " and " messenger " ; the instrument of torture called the "Scavenger's daughter " presents, however, a perverted form of the inventor's name, Skeffing- ton. Of " scenery " of the open-air kind there is, as might be expected, no quotation before the seventeenth century was well advanced. In Johnson's days people preferred, we think, to talk of a " prospect." " Sceptred " offers a good display of that poetical quotation which the ' Dictionary ' seems sometimes unduly to despise, for examples are provided from Shakspeare, Milton, Gray, Landor, and Byron. The heading " sch " has some Important hints as to pronuncia- tion. "Schiedam" and "schnapps" are both allied forms of drink. The slight specialization of meaning which "scholar" and "scholar- ship " have acquired is well treated* It would, however, be easy to add to the quotations from books, which we prefer to journalism or Acts of Parliament. Special attention is directed to the word " scientific," of which the true history is now traced for the first time to a rendering of the word tirivT-fifni in Aristotle.
We end our notice of this part with two words of University usage. " Scio " was the formal testimony once given at Oxford to the fitness of a candidate for a degree. "Sconce" is a Uni- versity fine which is illustrated from our own columns in 1885. In its humorous form it has r we believe, been inflicted on dons as well as under- graduates, though the latter only are mentioned! 1 in sense b.
