NOTES AND QUERIES. [9 th s. XL JAN. 10, 1903.
known trick Pan is induced to believe tha
he has witnessed lead changed into gold. H
falls into the trap thus laid for him, and take
the alchemist to his house, where a range o
buildings are devoted to the furnaces and t
the residence of the alchemist and his wife
Pan finds the precious material for the opera
tions, which are to last forty-one days, an
the adept lays stress upon the necessity o
purity of life and thought in those who ar
in the enterprise. Before the time is up i
messenger arrives to tell the adept that hi
mother is dead and that he must at once
depart for his home. Pan is in despair, bu
after consultation it is arranged that the
furnaces shall be supervised by the wife o
the adept, who is to remain behind with hei
two servants and the man whose duty it is
to see that the furnaces are always kept a
the proper degree of heat. This arrangement
suits Pan all the better that he has been
carrying on a flirtation with the lady. After
the departure of the adept, Pan, having causec
the labourer to be made drunk, seduces the
alchemist's wife. Whilst this guilty love-
making is proceeding the alchemist returns,
and professes to know, from the failure of
the gold -making operation and the dis-
appearance of the precious powder of trans-
mutation, that something improper has
happened. He threatens his wife, who there-
upon makes a clean breast of it, and Pan is
glad to escape from prosecution by the pay-
ment of an enormous bribe to the alchemist.
Still the passion for alchemical research
continues, and in another adventure Pan,
when far away from home, is despoiled of
all the money and possessions he had with
him, and is obliged to beg his way back to
his estates. One day in a houseboat he sees
the fair face of the alchemist's wife. The lady
also recognizes Pan and sends for him. She
then explains to him the deception which had
been practised upon him, and in which she
had borne an unwilling part. The Chinese
courtesans, of whom she was one, are sold to
that trade as children, and are so veritably
slaves that it is difficult to attach moral
blame to them. She was hired to entice Pan
into love-making which might furnish a pre-
text for the non-fulfilment of the alchemist's
promise. No longer being under contract
with the rogues, she was at liberty to explain
to Pan the methods by which he had been
robbed. More than this, she gave him suffi-
cient money to carry him home a wiser man.*
- Since this note was written I observe that
rot. K. K. Douglas has included a version of this Vonox m o 1 .? enter taining ' Chinese Stories ' (London, o21.
The story is not a pleasant one ; but Pan
is no worse than Sir Epicure Mammon, and
the alchemist's " wife " stands on a higher
level than Doll Common.
WILLIAM E. A. AXON.
Manchester.
"JEER." In a paper read by Prof. Skeat
at the anniversary meeting of the Philo-
logical Society last May we find a note on
the etymology of " jeer." In the new ' Con-
cise Dictionary,' 1901, a Dutch derivation
was suggested doubtfully namely, from
scheeren, to shear. But now another account
of the word is proposed in this paper, which
makes "jeer" identical with "cheer." Dr.
Murray in ' H.E.D.' had noticed this identi-
fication as " plausible and phonetically feasi-
ble," but dismissed it with the remark that
it " lies beyond existing evidence." In the
article before us Prof. Skeat undertakes to
supply the evidence. Let us examine this
evidence. The professor brings forward two
passages cited in Godefroy's ' O.F. Diet.,' in
which O.F. chiere (countenance, visage, mien)
appears in the form giere. They run as fol-
qws : (1) "S'aucuns hons te fait d'amer[e]
?iere," i.e., If any man makes thee to be of
3itter cheer, or of a sorrowful countenance ;
(2) " Mas faites bale [for " bele "1 giere, ioie,
solas, et ris," i.e., But make good cheer, joy,
solace, and laughter. These two passages show
'}hat O.F. chiere (Eng. cheer) was pronounced
n a certain French dialect giere ; but do they
afford any evidence in support of the conten-
tion that our English' word "jeer" (a scoff,
-?ibe, taunt) is identical with the French giere
chiere)] Prof. Skeat maintains that "to
eer at a man " or " to jeer a man " meant
iriginally " to make him ill cheer, to put him
nit of countenance, to make him look as if
- ast down." This may or may not be the
ormal effect of jeering I do not think that t is a necessary one ; but, however this may M3, "to jeer at a man" is quite distinct in meaning from "putting him out of coun- enance," quite as distinct as "boxing a boy's ars" is from "making him cry." I still hink, with Dr. Murray, that the identifica- ion of "jeer" with "cheer" lies beyond xisting evidence.
COMESTOR OXONIENSIS.
PENNSYLVANIAN DUTCH. Dr. Henry Leff- marin, of Philadelphia, has been good enough o send me a "cutting" relative to a dialect poken in Pennsylvania, which is an olla odrida of English and German (German redominating), and resembles in a marked egree the Jewish jargon, as much in regard o its structural formation as to its linguistic
