Nam simul exta Deo data sunt, licet omnia fari;
Verbaque Honoratus libera Praetor habet."
The dies festus was not only not dies fastus, but dies nefastus.
Without going beyond feast and fast, I see nothing in C.B.'s suggestion better than the old derivations of the words feast from festus -um, and fast from the Anglo-Saxon; nor indeed anything half so good. Feast and fast are opposed in meaning: our word fast has a meaning which neither fas, fari, nor fastus, nor all three together, will explain.
CH.
Replies to Minor Queries.
[The Badger's Legs] (Vol. i., p. 381.).—In answer to one of your correspondents, who inquires whether there is any allusion to the inequalities of the badger's legs previous to that made by Sir T. Browne:—
"And as that beast hath legs (which shepherds fear,
'Yclept a badger, which our lambs doth tear),
One long, the other short, that when he runs
Upon the plain, he halts, but when he runs
On craggy rocks, or steepy hills, we see
None runs more swift or easier than he."
Browne's Britannia's Pastorals, B.I.