1770.—"Now all European ships are obliged to anchor at Houang-poa, three leagues from the city" (Canton).—Raynal, tr. 1777, ii. 258.
WHISTLING TEAL, s. This in Jerdon is given as Dendrocygna Awsuree of Sykes. Latin names given to birds and beasts might at least fulfil one object of Latin names, in being intelligible and pronounceable by foreign nations. We have seldom met with a more barbarous combination of impossible words than this. A numerous flock of these whistlers is sometimes seen in Bengal sitting in a tree, a curious habit for ducks.
WHITE ANTS. See [ANTS, WHITE].
WHITE JACKET, s. The old custom in the hot weather, in the family or at bachelor parties, was to wear this at dinner; and one or more dozens of white jackets were a regular item in an Indian outfit. They are now, we believe, altogether, and for many years obsolete. [They certainly came again into common use some 20 years ago.] But though one reads under every generation of British India that they had gone out of use, they did actually survive to the middle of the last century, for I can remember a white-jacket dinner in Fort William in 1849. [The late Mr. Bridgman of Gorakhpur, whose recollection of India dated from the earlier part of the last century told me that in his younger days the rule at Calcutta was that the guest always arrived at his host's house in the full evening-dress of the time, on which his host meeting him at the door expressed his regret that he had not chosen a cooler dress; on which the guest's Bearer always, as if by accident, appeared from round the corner with a nankeen jacket, which was then and there put on. But it would have been opposed to etiquette for the guest to appear in such a dress without express invitation.]
1803.—"It was formerly the fashion for gentlemen to dress in white jackets on all occasions, which were well suited to the country, but being thought too much an undress for public occasions, they are now laid aside for English cloth."—Ld. Valentia, i. 240.
[c. 1848.—"... a white jacket being evening dress for a dinner-party...."—Berncastle, Voyage to China, including a Visit to the Bombay Pres. i. 93.]
WINTER, s. This term is constantly applied by the old writers to the rainy season, a usage now quite unknown to Anglo-Indians. It may have originated in the fact that winter is in many parts of the Mediterranean coast so frequently a season of rain, whilst rain is rare in summer. Compare the fact that shitā in Arabic is indifferently 'winter,' or 'rain'; the winter season being the rainy season. Shitā is the same word that appears in Canticles ii. 11: "The winter (sethāv) is past, the rain is over and gone."
1513.—"And so they set out, and they arrived at Surat (Çurrate) in May, when the winter had already begun, so they went into winter-quarters (polo que envernarão), and in September, when the winter was over, they went to Goa in two foists and other vessels, and in one of these was the [ganda] (rhinoceros), the sight of which made a great commotion when landed at Goa...."—Correa, ii. 373.
1563.—"R. ... In what time of the year does this disease (morxi, [Mort-de-chien]) mostly occur?
"O. ... It occurs mostly in June and July (which is the winter-time in this country)...."—Garcia, f. 76y.