nt
of gamblers, should have been ransacked on this occasion."

[323] "Ornithology of Shakespeare," p. 121.

[324] "Illustrations of Shakespeare," 1839, p. 36; the term
"bully-rook" occurs several times in Shadwell's "Sullen
Lovers;" see Dyce's "Glossary," p. 58.

_Snipe._ This bird was in Shakespeare's time proverbial for a foolish
man.[325] In "Othello" (i. 3), Iago, speaking of Roderigo, says:

"For I mine own gain'd knowledge should profane,
If I would time expend with such a snipe,
But for my sport and profit."

[325] In Northamptonshire the word denotes an icicle, from its
resemblance to the long bill of the bird so-called.--Baker's
"Northamptonshire Glossary," 1854, vol. ii. p. 260.

_Sparrow._ A popular name for the common sparrow was, and still is,
Philip, perhaps from its note, "Phip, phip." Hence the allusion to a
person named Philip, in "King John" (i. 1):

_Gurney._ Good leave, good Philip.

_Bastard._ Philip?--sparrow!

Staunton says perhaps Catullus alludes to this expression in the
following lines:

"Sed circumsiliens, modo huc, modo illuc,
Ad solam dominam usque pipilabat."

Skelton, in an elegy upon a sparrow, calls it "Phyllyp Sparowe;" and
Gascoigne also writes "The praise of Philip Sparrow."

In "Measure for Measure" (iii. 2), Lucio, speaking of Angelo, the
deputy-duke of Vienna, says: "Sparrows must not build in his
house-eaves, because they are lecherous."[326]

[326] See Nares's "Glossary," vol. ii. p. 653; Dyce's
"Glossary," p. 320.

_Sparrow-hawk._ A name formerly given to a young sparrow-hawk was
eyas-musket,[327] a term we find in "Merry Wives of Windsor" (iii. 3):
"How now, my eyas-musket! what news with you?" It was thus
metaphorically used as a jocular phrase for a small child. As the
invention, too, of fire-arms took place[328] at a time when hawking was
in high fashion, some of the new weapons were named after those birds,
probably from the idea of their fetching their prey from on high.
_Musket_ has thus become the established name for one sort of gun. Some,
however, assert that the musket was invented in the fifteenth century,
and owes its name to its inventors.

[327] Derived from the French _mouschet_, of the same meaning.

[328] Nares's "Glossary," vol. ii. p. 593: Douce's
"Illustrations of Shakespeare," 1839, p. 46. Turbervile tells
us "the first name and te