A Student's Pastime: Being a Select Series of Articles Reprinted from "Notes and Queries,"Clarendon Press, 1896 - 410 pages |
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Common terms and phrases
Ælfric's Anglo-Saxon Beowulf called Cambridge century Chaucer common connexion Cotgrave Crown 8vo curious derived dialect Dict Dutch Early English editor English etymology English word error examples explained Extra fcap fact French German given gives Glossary Greek Grimm's Law guess Halliwell Hence Icel Icelandic instance janissary language Latin letter leue London M.A. Extra fcap means meant merely Middle English modern English occurs Old English once original Ovid Parker Soc passage Philological phonetic phrase Piers Plowman Piers the Plowman plural poem printed pronunciation quotation quoted readers reference remarkable rime Robert of Brunne Robert of Gloucester Saxon sense Shakespeare Shropshire Skeat sound Specimens spelling spelt Spenser suffix suggestion suppose syllable Teutonic translation verb viii vowel W. W. SKEAT whence whilst write
Popular passages
Page 194 - High birth, vigour of bone, desert in service, Love, friendship, charity, are subjects all To envious and calumniating time. One touch of nature makes the whole world kin...
Page 247 - ... instead of dirt and poison, we have rather chosen to fill our hives with honey and wax ; thus furnishing mankind with the two noblest of things, which are sweetness and light.
Page 68 - Anatomy of Melancholy,' he said, was the only book that ever took him out of bed two hours sooner than he wished to rise.
Page 81 - So spake the grisly terror ; and in shape, So speaking, and so threatening, grew ten-fold More dreadful and deform : on the other side, Incensed with indignation, Satan stood Unterrified, and like a comet burned, That fires the length of Ophiuchus huge In the Arctic sky, and from his horrid hair Shakes pestilence and war.
Page 51 - Come one, come all ! this rock shall fly From its firm base as soon as I.
Page 45 - I have put off my coat; how shall I put it on? I have washed my feet; how shall I defile them?
Page 14 - Cotgrave. The alphabet was called the Chritt-eross-roie, some say because a cross was prefixed to the alphabet in the old primers ; but as probably from a superstitious custom of writing the alphabet in the form of a cross, by way of charm.
Page 11 - In skullers' bark does lie at Hull Which he for pennies two does rig, All day on Thames to bob for grig : Whilst fencer poor does by him stand, In old dung-lighter, hook in hand ; Between knees rod, with canvas crib, To girdle tied, close under rib ; Where worms are put, which must small fish Betray at night to earthen dish.
Page 310 - There is still a good deal to be done in the way of tabulating phonetic changes in English, and I hope that the faithful drudges who attempt to register examples contribute somewhat to the clearer understanding of the subject. It occurs to me that the loss of v in English words seems to take place most commonly before r, n, and 2.