372
NOTES AND QUERIES. p* s. xn. NOV. 7, IOOB.
impossible for any one to appreciate the
peculiarities of A.-S. spelling till he has
learnt the alphabet, the pronunciation, and
the habits of spelling. The point is, of course,
that the A.-S. for to steal is stelan (always
with e, never with ea), whilst the A.-S. for
stall is steall or steal, though the Anglian
form was stall. The sound denoted by the
A.-S. ea was the Latin short e followed by
the Latin short a, technically known as a
" broken " vowel ; and this ea is found in
A.-S. before any I, r, or h followed by another
consonant. The curious point is that modern
English retains the unbroken Anglian a in
words of this kind. Examples are : eall,
all : ceallian, to call ; feallan, to fall ; cjealla,
gall; heall, a hall, &c. Consequently, our
modern English stall was spelt steall in A.-S.,
though the later I was sometimes dropped in
the nom. and ace. cases, not in the gen.
stealles or in the dat. stealle. Similarly, the
Anglian and Old Mercian staW (gen. stalles
and dat. stalle) was sometimes spelt stal in
the nom. and ace. See the numerous examples
in Bosworth and Toller, s.v. ' Steall,' and see
- H.E.D.' To complete the series, let me add
that the spellings stell, stel, also appear, but these are post-Conquest spellings, and prac- tically Anglo-French.
But none of these words has any connexion with stealing, as appears when once the meaning of the modern Eng. ea is known. The spelling ea (as still in use) arose in the sixteenth century (six to nine centuries later than the normal ea of Anglo-Saxon) in order to denote the sound of the open e in break (A.-S. brecan), which had arisen from the lengthening of e in the M.E. breken (early M.E. breken, late M.E. breken). The very same thing -happened in the verb to steal This was A.-S. stelan, early M.E. stolen, late M.E. stelen, steelen with open e, Tudor English steal (pronounced stale], mod. E. steal (pro- nounced steel).
Accurate definite spelling was introduced into the English language in the seventh century, but was not always adhered to in the later periods. In the time of the Edwards the English system was superseded by an Anglo-French spelling, which was at first accurate, but has now practically fallen to pieces through lack of frequent change.
WALTER W. SKEAT.
"ENGLISH TAKE THEIR PLEASURES SADLY" (7 th S. viii. 466; 9 th S. xii. 32). At the latter reference MR. LATHAM refers to a difference between the French and the Eng- lish in the use of the knife and fork. Accord- ing to my observation at dinner in hotels and restaurants, in very many visits to France
during the last twenty years, the Frenchman
uses his knife and fork to cut up his meat,
then puts his knife down, and takes his tork
in the right hand to convey the meat to his
mouth, as asserted. EGBERT PIERPOINT.
Sir Edwin Arnold, in one of his weekly articles in the Daily Telegraph (29 August, 'Seaside Manners,' p. 3, col. 1), writes as follows: "If the old chronicler could re-
nciiu. a. presume _., ..--
cler" Sir E.Arnold refers to Froissart ; but
can he give chapter and verse ; or does he,
like so many others, take it for granted that
Froissart is the author of the phrase ?
EDWARD LATHAM.
[We cannot afford to correct all the misconcep- tions of current journalism, as our space is limited.]
THE NATIONAL FLAG (9 th S. xii. 327).-The references appended to UNION'S note have certainly been overlooked by me during my absence abroad, and I must plead guilty to being ignorant that His Majesty has been pleased " to give authority that the Union flag is the flag to be flown by all British subjects," and I have not here my volumes ot ' N. & Q.' to help me. My letter to the Times was suggested by a paragraph in that journal relating to the orders conveyed by a British Consul abroad to a British resident to haul down the Union flag displayed at a private house. I am unable to find the papers ; but if I remember aright, the resident demurred, and the correspondence was re- ferred to the Foreign Office. The Times in a leading article noticed the uncertainty which surrounded the question, and rather blamed the Foreign Office for not pronouncing an authoritative decision. It was suggested by me that if, as appeared to be the case, the non-official Briton is debarred from the use of the Union flag because of its being the distinguishing ensign of certain officials, the difficulty might be surmounted by "charg- ing " or " differencing " all official Union flags with the Imperial device in the centre, as in the case of the flags of the Viceroy of India, H.M.'s Ambassadors and Ministers, and some other officials. In a long article which appeared in the Times some days later this same solution of the difficulty was advocated , by another writer. All this indicated that j the matter had not been authoritatively
- decided. And it certainly seemed desirable
| that the question should not remain doubtful. If I have been misled it may be pleaded in extenuation that besides the above consular incident, as a disturber, a case was reported
