Public ledger. [volume] (Memphis, Tenn.) 1865-1893, 1882-03-01
TERMS AND THEIR MEAN.
lNGS.
Peculiar Origins Of FavOrits
Popular Expressions.
Some interesting Examples.
How the Most Trivial InOldSuts Have
Given Birth to Much. Used Terms.
A vocabulary Worth Reading.

mon personifcation ofthe yellow fever.
Although used as a proper name, lit is
probable that the original meaning of
the expression was nothing more than
yellow flag, a flag being termed a jack
by season, and yellow being the color
Of that customarily displayed from
lazarettos, or naval hospitals, and from
vessels in quarantine.
Yankee term in America for New
Englanders, and applied by foreign.
ers to all natives Of the United States.
The most feasible origin is that the
Indians, when speaking of the En-
glish settlers, called them "YeDg-
hees," corrupted afterward to "Yant
kee."
The Gray Mare is the Better Horse
This expression first occurred in
Heywood's Proverbs, 1862, and was
subsequently quoted in Hazlitt's En-
glish Proverbs, with Haywood as
authority. The story Of the origin of
this familiar saying is as follows: A
young English gentleman had married
a very handsome lady vita a large
fortune, but she proved to be SO de-
termined to be the head of the family
that he was anxious to part from her.
He accordingly laid the matter before
her father, Offering, if he would take
her back, to refund all the fortune he
had received with her. The old gem
tleman assured his o in Flaw that
his case was by no means an unusual
one, but that, in fact, all women did
not only wish to govern their hus-
bands, but that they actually did so,
some by one means and some by an
other. Now, said the old gentleman,
in order that you may be convinced
that you are quite as well off as other
men, and so have nothing to complain
Of, | will make you this proposition:
/ have two horses in my stable.
You shall harness them to a
cart, in which | will place q basket
containing a hundred eggs, and you
shall ride through the county, making
diligent inquiry, and whenever you
find a house in which the husband is
master, you shall leave a horse, and at
every house where the wife governs,
you shall leave an egg. If you find
that if you get rid of the eggs before
yoH do the horses, you shall 90 home
and be content with my daughter; but
if the horses are gone first, | will take
my daughter home, and youshall keep
her fortune" The young man set out
on his expedition. At every house
where he made inquiries he found
enough to convince him that the wife
was the master, until his basket of
eggs was nearly empty before he had
got rid of either Of the horses. At
length, early one morning, he came to
a fine mansion, and asked to see the
master Of the house. The servant
said the master was not yet up, but
the lady was in the parlor, into which
he was ushered. The lady received
him c%ourteously, and said that unless
his business was very urgent she
would prefer not to awaken her hus.
band. Really, madame" he said,
you will think my business a very
singular one. | hope you will not
consider me impairment, but | wish
to ask a question which you can an
swer as well as your husband, and a
considerable wager depends upon the
answer which | shall receive. The
question is just this, DO you govern
your husband, or he govern your" ut
is an odd question, certainly replied
the lady, but no one, surely, ought to
be ashamed Of doing what is right. 1t
is the wife's duty to obey he husband,
and | am proud 10 say that | always
obey mine. But perhaps you would
like to have his testimony also. Here
he comes, and you can ask him." The
husband being appealed t., promptly
confirmed the truth Of what his wife
had said, whereupon the stranger ex
planned the object of bis inquiry, and
said that it gave him the utmost pleas
ure to ask his new friends to select
whichever OF the horses they liked
best. The husband preferred the fine
black stallion, while the wife fixed her
heart on the pretty gray mare, and
the argument arose as TO which it
should be. An end was put to this by
the wife saying in a determined tone :
you say you will not take her, but |
say you shall, for | am sure the gray
mare is the better horse" "M eli,
we'll" replied the husband IF il must
be so, have your own way, as you al
ways do. Well take the mare
he continued, addressing the visitor.
mo you DON'T" was the reply, you'll
have to put up with an egg, as every
one else to whom | have put the ques-
ton has done. AS for me, | shall take
my horses home, and shall try to live
happily with my wife, for she does
allow me to have my own way now and
then"
Brag-OfC Celtic origin. 1t appears
in the third edition Of Pugh's Die
%tionary and in Spurrell's; it is also
given by the Rev. D. Sullivan Evans
in his English Welsh Dictionary as
a rendering Of Drag In the same
work is found bragwie, as an equiva-
lent for "braggadocio" and "bragcart. "
The South " elsh form of the verb is
BRAGG, with the vowel very short.
meaning ito boast"
Better Late Than Never-This ex-
preston originated in 1857 lin the
reign Of Phillip and Nary with Du-
mas Tussen, who put it into his Five
Hundred Points Of Good Husbandry,'
but it came among the household say
iings when put by John Bunyan, the
half inspired tinker, in his immortal
Pilgrims Progress
Castles in the Air-First used by
Robert Burton, in his Anatomy OF
Melancholy" over two hundred and
fifty years ago, and since appropriated
by Dean Swift, Henry Fielding, Philip
Sidney, Oolley Cibber, Charles Church.
i'll, William Shenstone and innumera.
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