HERE AND THERE.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 18581, 2 October 1928, Page 8

HERE AND THERE.

AN EYE FOR EVERYTHING. In the Days of Prise Fights. Long Reach Tavern, on the Thames below Woolwich, was the scene of more historic prize-fights than any other house in London. The table which used to serve as a stretcher for the victim may still be seen there, and near by is the tiny cove where a boat used to lie hidden ready to convey the principals across to the Essex shore when the alarm was given by watchers posted on the river wall of the approach of the police. Old residents tell of how Jem Mace went to Long Reach Tavern to fight his great battle with Jpe Goss, and how none recognised him until he put his huge black-pickled hands up to his face to hide a grin. Our First Dictionaries. s * It is not until the beginning of the seventeenth century that there appear any dictionaries' in English, and these are lists of hard words only. The contents of one, a “table alphabeticall” (1604), were, says the title page, “gathered for the benefit and help of ladies, gentlewomen, or any other unskilful persons, whereby they may the more easily and better understand many of hard English words which they shall hear or read in the scriptures, sermons, or elsewhere, and so be made to use the same aptly themselves.” John Ray’s dictionary of words peculiar to northern and southern counties, published in 1674, represents the begifli ning of dialect dictionaries. The first important attempt at a dictionary of slang is also here, under its title of “A new dictionary of the terms ancient and modern of the canting crew, in its several tribes of gypsies, beggars, thieves, cheats, etc.” (1720). Some of the early lexicographers had broad views as to the scope of a dictionary, as may be seen from a passage, under the name “Highgate,” in Francis Grose's “Classical dictionary of the vulgar tongue” (1787) : “Sworn at Highgate, a ridiculous custom formerly prevailed at the public house at Highgate, to administer a ludicrous oath to all travellers of the middle rank who stopped there. The party ivas sworn on a pair of horns fastened on a stick, and the substance of the oath was never to kiss the maid when he could kiss the mistress, never to drink small beer when he could get strong, with many other injunctions of the like kind, to all which was added the saving clause, ‘Unless you like it best.’ The person administering the oath was always to be called father by the juror, and he in return was to style him son, under the penalty of a bottle.”—“Daily Telegraph.”