upa,
Puella, Virgincula."--_Etymol._ sub voce.

Webster merely gives (with strange neglect, having Skinner before him):
{412}

"Mauther, a foolish young girl(not used)."--_Ben Jonson._

Skinner is, I believe, wrong in assigning the _r_ termination to the Danish
word. Such a termination of the word _maid_ is not to be found in any of
the Teutonic dialects. The diphthong sound and the _th_ appear frequently;
as,

1. Moeso-Gothic: _Magath_ or _Magaths_; _Mawi_,
dim. _Mawilo_.
2. Anglo-Saxon: _Maeth_, _Maegth_, dim. _Meowla_.
3. Old-German: _Maget_.
4. Swedish: _Moe_.
5. Norse: _Moei_.

I therefore suppose the _r_ termination in _mauther_ to be a mere
corruption, like that pointed out by Skinner in the Lincoln Folk-speech: or
is it possible that it may have arisen from a contusion of the words _maid_
and _mother_ in Roman Catholic times? In Holland the Virgin Mary was called
_Moeder Maagd_,--a phrase which may possibly have crossed over to the East
Anglian coast, and occasioned the subsequent confusion.

B.H.K.

P.S. Do the words _modde_, _moddeken,_ quoted by Skinner, exist? and, if
so, are they Dutch or Flemish? I have no means of verifying them at hand.

[On referring to Kilian's _Dictionarium Teutonico-Latin-Gallicum_ (ed.
1642), we find, "MODDE, MODDEKEN, Pupa, Poupee."]

_Cheshire Cat_ (Vol. ii., p. 377.).--A correspondent, T.E.L.P.B.T., asks
the explanations of the phrase, "grinning like a Cheshire cat." Some years
since Cheshire cheeses were sold in this town moulded into the shape of a
cat, bristles being inserted to represent the whiskers. This may possibly
have originated the saying.

T.D.

Bath.

"_Thompson of Esholt_" (Vol. ii., p. 268.).--In an old pedigree of the
Calverley family, I find it stated that _Henry Thompson of Esholt_ (whose
only daughter _Frances_ William Calverley of Calverley married, and by her
acquired that property) was great-grandson to Henry Thompson,

"One of the king's gentlemen-at-arms at the siege of Boulogne (temp. H.
7.), where he notably signalised himself, and for his service was
rewarded with the _Maison Dieu at Dover_, by gift of the king;
afterwards, in the reign of Edward VI., exchanged it for the manor and
rectory of _Bromfield_ in Cumberland, and the site of the late
dissolved nunnery of Esholt."

Further particulars regarding the above grant of _Bromefield_, and a
_pedigree_ of the Thompsons, are pub