In the

marked (1) and (3) indiscriminately. All the quotations in the letters A-C are from the latter. rest of the volume the quotations are all from (1).

It has fallen to my lot to finish this work alone. A portion of it was published some years ago in a periodical for Sunday Schools called 'The Monthly Paper,' under the title of Notes on Scriptural and Liturgical Words, by the Rev. J. Eastwood, M.A.,' but this did not extend beyond the letter H.

Mr Eastwood is known as the author of 'The History of the Parish of Ecclesfield, Yorkshire,' and was. deservedly esteemed by the late Mr Herbert Coleridge as one of the most indefatigable contributors to the English Dictionary projected by the Philological Society.

He had completed the work on the same plan, and his manuscript was then put into my hands for revision. With his consent I modified the treatment of the words, in which he aimed more especially at the instruction of Sunday School children, and endeavoured, in most instances by recasting each article, to render the work a contribution to English lexicography. Besides this, I added a large quantity of examples from my own reading, arranging them in chronological order, and more than trebled the number of words in Mr Eastwood's original list. For

such etymological notes as occur in the course of the volume I am alone responsible. I would willingly have avoided speaking so much as I have been compelled to do in the first person. Had my colleague lived to see the completion of the book in which he took so much interest, it would have had the advantage of his careful revision, which now has been given only to the first few sheets. Wanting his friendly counsel, it has been my endeavour to carry out his wishes to the full, and with this end in view I have bestowed much time and labour, in the midst of many interruptions, upon the completion of what would have been the better for his superintendence.

To other labourers in the same field I have to express my obligations for the assistance I have derived from their works. I would especially mention the following:

A Short Explanation of Obsolete Words in our Version of the Bible, &c. By the Rev. H. Cotton, D.C.L. Oxf. 1832.

Scripture and the Authorized Version of Scripture, &c. By Samuel Hinds, D.D. Lond. 1845.

A Glossary to the Obsolete and Unusual Words and Phrases of the Holy Scriptures, in the Authorized English Version. By J. Jameson. Lond. 1850.

A Scripture and Prayer-Book Glossary; being an

explanation of Obsolete Words and Phrases in the English Bible, Apocrypha, and Book of Common Prayer. By the Rev. John Booker, A.M. 4th ed. Dublin, 1859.

On the Authorized Version of the New Testament, &c. By R. C. Trench, D.D. 2nd ed. Lond. 1859.

Motes upon Crystal: or Obsolete Words of the Authorized Version of the Holy Bible, &c., Part 1. By the Rev. Kirby Trimmer, A.B. London, 1864.

It is my intention at some future time to extend the plan of the present work to the other English Versions of the Bible, so as to form a complete Dictionary of the archaisms which they contain, and to illustrate a well-marked period in the history of the English language. For this, however, I must wait for more leisure than I can at present command.

WILLIAM ALDIS WRIGHT.

TRINITY COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE,

23 Jan. 1866.

THE BIBLE WORD-BOOK.

A.

I. AT the time of the printing of our Authorized Version (1611) the usage of a or an before words beginning with h was by no means uniform. Thus we find a half' (Ex. xxv. 10), 'a hurt' (Ex. xxi. c.), 'a hairy man' (Gen. xxvii. 11), 'a hammer' (Jer. xxiii. 29), a hole' (Ex. xxxix. 23*), 'a hard thing' (2 Kings ii. 10), 'a harp' (1 Chr. xxv. 3), a high wall' (Is. xxx. 13), 'a horseman' (2 Macc. xii. 35), 'a hot burning' (Lev. xiii. 24), and so on; while, on the other hand, we more frequently meet with 'an half' (Ex. xxxvii. 6*), 'an hammer' (Judg. iv. 21), an hole' (Ex. xxviii. 32), 'an hairy man' (2 Kings i. 8), an hard man' (Matt. xxv. 24), ʻan harp' (1 Sam. xvi. 16), ‘an high hand' (Ex. xiv. 8), 'an horse' (Ps. xxxiii. 17), 'an hundred' (Gen. xi. 10), 'an hot burning oven' (2 Esd. iv. 48). The former usage appears on the whole to be exceptional, and we may infer that at the beginning of the 17th century the sound of h had much less of the aspirate in it than it has at the present day.

2. A or An is used with participles in a manner which is now obsolete. Thus 'a dying' (Luke viii. 42), 'a fishing' (John xxi. 3), ‘an hungred' (Matt. iv. 2), as in the following examples.

When the prophet came unto him, and said...... 'Set thy house in order, for thou shalt surely die, and not live' (2 Kings xx.), it struck him so to the heart that he fell a weeping. Latimer, Serm. p. 221.

* Altered in modern editions.