306
NOTES AND QUERIES. [9* S.VIL APRIL 20,1901.
builders and contractors, were a Liverpool
firm in the early part of last century," which,
as he notes, has already been refuted in these
columns by MR. J. F. MANSERGH. I may
add that, after seeing the original letter to
this effect printed in Truth in January,
1884, I wrote to its author asking for the
evidence on which the statement was made.
In his reply, now lying before me, dated
18 December, 1885, the writer admitted that
no evidence was producible ; he added that
he was under the impression of having heard
this explanation of jerry-builder from the
English master at the school which he
attended, but he had subsequently searched
for authority without finding any ; and Sir
James Picton, our great Liverpool authority,
who had been consulted, had never heard of
it. He therefore could not maintain the
reliability of the story, and frankly withdrew
it. In preparing the articles on the Jerry
words in the 'New English Dictionary'
(section published 1 January last) we
made further investigation, with the help
of correspondents in Liverpool, and ascer-
tained that no trace of any such name as
Jerry in connexion with the building trade
could be found. While, therefore, it is quite
possible that the cloth-finisher's jerry, the
compositor's jerry on an apprentice complet-
ing his time, a jerry- hat, a jerry-shop (or
Tom-and-Jerry shop), and a jerry-building
may all contain the masculine name Jerry
(short for Jeremy or Jeremiah), we are
reduced to the conclusion that "Jerry
Brothers " have merely been invented to
concoct what, in view of its unsubstantial,
pretentious, and deceptive character, we may
distinguish as a " jerrymology " (the m being
a deceptive insertion in the " jerry-ology " to
make it more like the real thing). We all
know how such become current. Some one
wonders what can be the origin of a word or
phrase. Another of ready wit (such have
been in all ages) offers a conjecture, which
strikes the inquirer as "very likely" or
"just how it must have happened."" He
repeats it as a brilliant suggestion. His
auditor repeats it with a prefixed "It is
said." The next man drops the "It is said"
as rather spoiling the story, and retails it as
a fact. His auditor greedily takes it down,
and sends it to ' N. & Q.' as a valuable con-
tribution to etymology ; but it is only a
jerrymology, after all.
A glance at the 'Dictionary' will show that the earliest connexion of jerry with the building trade is its adverbial use in jerry- built, a dialectal expression explained in the ' Lonsdale Glossary,' 1869, as " slightly or un-
substantially built." This was also used by
Mr. Ruskin in 1875 in 'Fors Clavigera.' As
an adjective, qualifying "builder," "building,"
jem/ appears in 1881-2, when the 'Lancashire
Glossary ' explained it as " bad, defective,
and deceptive." In those days it was still
written as a separate word ; but jerry builder
and jerry building naturally suggested jerry-
build, which is exemplified in 1890. Earlier
dates than some of these may, of course, be
found ; but on the whole Ruskin's execration
of "jerry-built cottages" in 1875 seems to
point to the literary " coming out " of the
word.
I need hardly point out that " jerry-built " is not strictly a verb " formed out of a proper name"; the verb is build, to which jerry func- tions merely as an adverb, as in "badly built," "unsubstantially built." We have not found any verb "to jerry," although "jerryism" appeared in 1885.
J. A. H. MURRAY.
" CAPACITY " : " CAPACIOUS." Mr. Burns, M.P., lately used in the Commons "capa- cious " of a man possessed of " capacity," and was laughed at for it by a few " bloods." Napier, however, our consummate stylist of the nineteenth century, writes, " Sir Arthur
Wellesley was endowed by nature with a
lofty genius, and capacious for war." D.
[An instance of "capacious" in this sense is quoted from Gale, under date 1677, in ' H.E.D.' Mrs. Browning employs the word in the same sense.]
"THEODOLITE." Better late than never, and I should like to thank PROF. SKEAT for correcting (8 th S. viii. 130) my inadvertently erroneous spelling (p. 64) of the name of Prof. Hunaus of Hannover. Perhaps I may be allowed to call PROF. SKEAT'S attention to the fact that he has not corrected in the third edition of his ' Etymological Dictionary ' the error in the date of the discovery of oxygen which I pointed out in 8 th S. viii. 204.
Now with regard to the origin of that puzzling word theodolite. (Orrery and similar words would be equally puzzling, were it not that in that and other cases we do know how they arose.) That it came from a proper name is a more likely suggestion than any that has yet been made, and we may hope some day to run Theodulus down. But surely it is not necessary to suppose that he was the actual divider of a circular rim (which was the earliest form of a theodolite), any more than that Lord Orrery was the first constructor of an orrery, which we know that he was not. PROF. SKEAT says there was a saint of the name Theodulus. The ' Dictionary of Christian Biography,' edited
