"'Don't be frightened, mistress,' said Quilp, after a pause. 'Your son knows me: I don't eat babies; I don't like 'em. It will be as well to stop that young screamer though, in case I should be tempted to do him a mischief. Holloa, Sir! will you be quiet?' Little Jacob stemmed the course of two tears which he was squeezing out of his eyes, and instantly subsided into a silent horror.... The moment their [Quilp and Swiveller] backs were turned, little Jacob thawed, and resumed his crying from the point where Quilp had frozen him."—Vol. i. pp. 207-9.
J. B. Colman.
To Pose.—In Vol. ii., p. 522., your correspondent F. R. A. points out some passages in which the word "posing" appears to be used in a sense equivalent to "parsing." Neither the etymology nor the exact meaning of the word "to pose," are easy to determine. It seems to be abbreviated from the old verb "to appose;" which meant, to set a task, to subject to an examination or interrogatory; and hence to perplex, to embarrass, to puzzle. The latter is the common meaning of the word to pose; thus in Crabbe's Parish Register:—
"Then by what name th' unwelcome guest to call,
Was long a question, and it posed them all."
Hence, too, the common expression, that a question which it is difficult to answer, or an argument which seems to decide the controversy, is a poser. The word "posing" in the passages cited by F. R. A. may refer to the examination of the pupil by the teacher of grammar. Thus, Fuller, in his Worthies, art. Norfolk, says that—
"The University appointed Dr. Cranmer, afterwards Archbishop of Canterbury, to be the poser-general of all candidates in divinity."
Roquefort, Gloss. de la Langue Romaine, has "apponer, appliquer, poser, plaier." See Richardson in appose and pose.
L.
Culprits torn by Horses (Vol. ii., p. 480.).—In reply to Mr. Jackson's question respecting culprits torn by horses, I beg to inform him that Robert François Damiens was the last criminal thus executed in France. He suffered on the 28th March, 1757, for an attempt on the life of Louis XV. The awful penalty of the law was carried out in complete conformity with the savage precedents of former centuries. Not one of the preparatory barbarities of question, ordinary and extraordinary, or of the accompanying atrocities of red-hot pincers, melted lead, and boiling oil, was omitted. The agony of the wretched man lasted for an hour and a half, and was witnessed, as Mercier informs us, by all the best company in Paris.