Query the authority for this? the reason seems easy to define.
NATHAN.
Sir William Coventry.—Pepys mentions in his Diary, that Sir William Conventry kept a journal of public events. Is anything known of this journal? It is not known of at Longleat, where are several papers of Sir William Conventry's.
A MS. letter from Lord Weymouth to Sir Robert Southwell, giving an account of Sir W. Conventry's death, was sold at the sale of Lord de Clifford's papers in 1834. Can any of your readers inform me where this letter now is?
C.
Shrew.—Is shrew, as applied to the shrew-mouse, and as applied to a scolding woman, the same word? If so, what is its derivation?
The following derivations of the word are cited by Mr. Bell. Saxon, "Schreadan," to cut; "Schrif," to censure; "Scheorfian," to bite; "Schyrvan," to beguile. German, "Schreiven," to clamour; none of which, it is obvious, come very near to "Schreava," the undoubted Saxon origin of the word shrew.
Now it was a custom amongst our forefathers to endeavour to provide a remedy against the baneful influence of the shrew-mouse by plugging the wretched animal alive in a hole made in the body of an ash tree, any branch of which was thenceforth held to be possessed of a power to cure the disease caused by the mouse. It thereupon occurred to me that just as brock, a still existing name for the badger, is clearly from the Saxon broc, persecution, in allusion to the custom of baiting the animal; so schreava might be from schræf, a hollow, in allusion to the hole in the ash tree; and on that supposition I considered "shrew," as applied to a woman, to be a different word, perhaps from the German schreyen, to clamour. I have, however, found mentioned in Bailey's Dictionary a Teutonic word, which may reconcile both senses of "shrew,"—I mean beschreyen, to bewitch. I shall be obliged to any of your subscribers who will enlighten me upon the subject.
W.R.F.
A Chip in Porridge.—What is the origin and exact force of this phrase? Sir Charles Napier, in his recent general order, informs the Bengal army that