Cherry-pit (Tw. N. iii. 4), a game played by children. It consisted in throwing cherry-stones into a small hole.
Christendom (K. John, iv. 1), baptism, (All's Well, i. 1) name given in baptism. It answers to halidom, and to the Spanish santiguada.
Christom-child (H. V. ii. 3). The proper word is chrisom; for it was, says Blount, "the white cloth which is set by the minister of baptism upon the head of a child newly anointed with chrism after his baptism." When the use of the chrism was abolished, it came to signify "the white cloth put about or upon a child newly christened, wherewith the women used to shroud the child if dying within the month," and such was called a chrisom-child.
Cinque pace. See [Galliard].
Circumvention (Cor. i. 2). The only meaning this word can have in this place is, apparently, secret information obtained by stratagem, the enemy being, as it were, circumvented. A curious instance of the liberties the poet took with language!
Cling (Macb. v. 5), from clingan A.S., to shrink, pine, wither. "Or clyngest for-drye" (Vis. of P. P. 9011). In this place of Macbeth it is used in a causative sense, as in "Clings not his guts with niggish fare, to heap his chest withal" (Surrey, Eccles. ch. v.).
Clock. "A German clock" (L. L. L. iv. 1). Clocks, it appears, were then, as now, imported from Germany, and were of a very inferior order.
Cloud in his face (Ant. and Cl. iii. 2). This, we are told, was said of a horse when he had a dark spot between his eyes.
Clown. This term for a licensed jester, and as such nearly synonymous with Fool, is peculiar to Shakespeare. The Fool in Lear hardly differs from the Clowns of the other plays. It probably comes from colonus.
Clubs (H. VIII. v. 3, As Y. L. v. 2), the cry to the London apprentices to come forth with the clubs or bludgeons which they always kept by them to keep, or as often to break the peace.