adley Headstone had proposed marriage to
her, she would certainly have replied 'yes,' for she loved him;" but Mr.
Headstone did not love Miss Peecher--he loved Lizzie Hexam, and had no
love to spare for any other woman.--C. Dickens, _Our Mutual Friend_, ii.
1 (1864).

=Peel-the-Causeway= (_Old_), a smuggler. Sir W. Scott, _Redgauntlet_
(time, George III.).

=Peeler= (_Sir_), any crop which greatly impoverishes the ground. To
_peel_ is to impoverish soil, as "oats, rye, barley, and grey wheat,"
but not peas (xxxiii. 51).

Wheat doth not well,
Nor after Sir Peeler he loveth to dwell.

T. Tusser, _Five Hundred Points of Good Husbandry_, xviii. 12 (1557).

=Peelers=, the constabulary of Ireland, appointed under the Peace
Preservation Act of 1814, proposed by Sir Robert Peel. The name was
subsequently given to the new police of England, who are also called
"Bobbies" from Sir Robert Peel.

=Peep-o'-Day Boys=, Irish insurgents of 1784, who prowled about at
day-break, searching for arms.

=Peeping Tom of Coventry.= Lady Godiva earnestly besought her husband
(Leofric, earl of Mercia) to relieve the men of Coventry of their
grievous oppressions. Leofric, annoyed at her importunity, told her he
would do so when she had ridden on horseback, naked, through the town.
The countess took him at his word, rode naked through the town, and
Leofric was obliged to grant the men of Coventry a charter of
freedom.--Dugdale.

Rapin says that the countess commanded all persons to keep within doors
and away from windows during her ride. One man, named Tom of Coventry,
took a peep of the lady on horseback, but it cost him his life.

[Asterism] Tennyson, in his _Godiva_, has reproduced this story.

=Peerage of the Saints.= In the preamble of the statutes instituting the
Order of St. Michael, founded by Louis XI in 1469, the archangel is
styled "my lord," and created a knight. The apostles had been already
ennobled and knighted. We read of "the Earl Peter," "Count Paul," "the
Baron Stephen," and so on. Thus, in the introduction of a sermon upon
St. Stephen's Day, we have these lines:

Entendes toutes a chest sermon,
Et clair et lai tules environ;
Contes vous vueille la pation
De St. Estieul le baron.

=Peerce= (1 _syl._), a generic name for a farmer or ploughman. Piers the
plowman is the name assumed by Robert or William Langland, in a
historico-satirical poem so called.

And