_Retire_
for _go to bed_ is in Fielding's
'Amelia.
'Amelia.
James Russell Lowell
_Heap_ is in 'Piers
Ploughman' ('and other names _an heep_'), and in Hakluyt ('seeing such a
_heap_ of their enemies ready to devour them'). _To liquor_ is in the
'Puritan' ('call 'em in, and liquor 'em a little'). _To loaf_: this, I
think, is unquestionably German. _Laufen_ is pronounced _lofen_ in some
parts of Germany, and I once heard one German student say to another,
_Ich lauf_ (lofe) _hier bis du wiederkehrest_, and he began accordingly
to saunter up and down, in short, to _loaf_. _To mull_, Mr. Bartlett
says, means 'to soften, to dispirit,' and quotes from
'Margaret,'--'There has been a pretty considerable _mullin_ going on
among the doctors,'--where it surely cannot mean what he says it does.
We have always heard _mulling_ used for _stirring, bustling_, sometimes
in an underhand way. It is a metaphor derived probably from _mulling_
wine, and the word itself must be a corruption of _mell_, from O. F.
_mesler_. _Pair_ of stairs is in Hakluyt. _To pull up stakes_ is in
Curwen's Journal, and therefore pre-Revolutionary. I think I have met
with it earlier. _Raise_: under this word Mr. Bartlett omits 'to raise a
house,' that is, the frame of a wooden one, and also the substantive
formed from it, a _raisin'_.
_Retire_ for _go to bed_ is in Fielding's
'Amelia. ' _Setting-poles_ cannot be new, for I find 'some _set_ [the
boats] with long _poles_' in Hakluyt. _Shoulder-hitters_: I find that
_shoulder-striker_ is old, though I have lost the reference to my
authority. _Snag_ is no new word, though perhaps the Western application
of it is so; but I find in Gill the proverb, 'A bird in the bag is worth
two on the snag. ' Dryden has _swop_ and _to rights_. _Trail_: Hakluyt
has 'many wayes _traled_ by the wilde beastes. '
I subjoin a few phrases not in Mr. Bartlett's book which I have heard.
_Bald-headed_: 'to go it bald-beaded;' in great haste, as where one
rushes out without his hat. _Bogue_: 'I don't git much done 'thout I
_bogue_ right in along 'th my men. ' _Carry_: a _portage_. _Cat-nap_: a
short doze. _Cat-stick_: a small stick. _Chowder-head_: a muddle-brain.
_Cling-john_: a soft cake of rye. _Cocoanut_; the head.
Ploughman' ('and other names _an heep_'), and in Hakluyt ('seeing such a
_heap_ of their enemies ready to devour them'). _To liquor_ is in the
'Puritan' ('call 'em in, and liquor 'em a little'). _To loaf_: this, I
think, is unquestionably German. _Laufen_ is pronounced _lofen_ in some
parts of Germany, and I once heard one German student say to another,
_Ich lauf_ (lofe) _hier bis du wiederkehrest_, and he began accordingly
to saunter up and down, in short, to _loaf_. _To mull_, Mr. Bartlett
says, means 'to soften, to dispirit,' and quotes from
'Margaret,'--'There has been a pretty considerable _mullin_ going on
among the doctors,'--where it surely cannot mean what he says it does.
We have always heard _mulling_ used for _stirring, bustling_, sometimes
in an underhand way. It is a metaphor derived probably from _mulling_
wine, and the word itself must be a corruption of _mell_, from O. F.
_mesler_. _Pair_ of stairs is in Hakluyt. _To pull up stakes_ is in
Curwen's Journal, and therefore pre-Revolutionary. I think I have met
with it earlier. _Raise_: under this word Mr. Bartlett omits 'to raise a
house,' that is, the frame of a wooden one, and also the substantive
formed from it, a _raisin'_.
_Retire_ for _go to bed_ is in Fielding's
'Amelia. ' _Setting-poles_ cannot be new, for I find 'some _set_ [the
boats] with long _poles_' in Hakluyt. _Shoulder-hitters_: I find that
_shoulder-striker_ is old, though I have lost the reference to my
authority. _Snag_ is no new word, though perhaps the Western application
of it is so; but I find in Gill the proverb, 'A bird in the bag is worth
two on the snag. ' Dryden has _swop_ and _to rights_. _Trail_: Hakluyt
has 'many wayes _traled_ by the wilde beastes. '
I subjoin a few phrases not in Mr. Bartlett's book which I have heard.
_Bald-headed_: 'to go it bald-beaded;' in great haste, as where one
rushes out without his hat. _Bogue_: 'I don't git much done 'thout I
_bogue_ right in along 'th my men. ' _Carry_: a _portage_. _Cat-nap_: a
short doze. _Cat-stick_: a small stick. _Chowder-head_: a muddle-brain.
_Cling-john_: a soft cake of rye. _Cocoanut_; the head.
