was _centunculus_.]

{97} [An error. Prof. Skeat shows that 'tram' was an old word in
Scottish and Northern English (_Etym. Dict._, 655 and 831).]

{98} Several of these we have in common with the French. Of their own
they have 'sardanapalisme', any piece of profuse luxury, from
Sardanapalus; while for 'lambiner', to dally or loiter over a task,
they are indebted to Denis Lambin, a worthy Greek scholar of the
sixteenth century, whom his adversaries accused of sluggish
movement and wearisome diffuseness in style. Every reader of
Pascal's _Provincial Letters_ will remember Escobar, the great
casuist among the Jesuits, whose convenient subterfuges for the
relaxation of the moral law have there been made famous. To the
notoriety which he thus acquired he owes his introduction into the
French language; where 'escobarder' is used in the sense of to
equivocate, and 'escobarderie' of subterfuge or equivocation. The
name of an unpopular minister of finance, M. de Silhouette,
unpopular because he sought to cut down unnecessary expenses in the
state, was applied to whatever was cheap, and, as was implied,
unduly economical; it has survived in the black outline portrait
which is now called a 'silhouette'. (Sismondi, _Histoire des
Francais_, tom. xix, pp. 94, 95.) In the 'mansarde' roof we have
the name of Mansart, the architect who introduced it. I need hardly
add 'guillotine'.

{99} See Col. Mure, _Language and Literature of Ancient Greece_, vol. i,
p. 350.

{100} See Genin, _Des Variations du Langage Francais_, p. 12.

{101} [Dr. Murray in the N.E.D. calls these by the convenient term
'nonce-words'.]

{102} _Persa_, iv. 6, 20-23. At the same time these words may be earnest
enough; such was the {Greek: elachistoteros} of St. Paul (Ephes.
iii, 8); just as in the Middle Ages some did not account it
sufficient to call themselves "fratres minores, minimi, postremi",
but coined 'postremissimi' to express the depth of their
"voluntary humility".

{103} It is curious that a correspondent of Skinner (_Etymologicon_,
1671), although quite ignorant of this story, and indeed wholly
astray in his application, had suggested that 'chouse' might be
thus connected with the Turkish 'chiaus'. I believe Gifford, in
his edition of Ben Jonson, was the first to clear up the matter.