Well has the name of Pontifex been given Unto the Church’s head, as the chief builder And architect of the invisible bridge That leads from earth to heaven. ROUGH. Mr. Motley, in his _History of the United Netherlands_, IV. 138, thus ascribes the use of this word to Queen Elizabeth, of England, in her last illness:— The great queen, moody, despairing, dying, wrapt in profoundest thought, with eyes fixed upon the ground or already gazing into infinity was besought by the counsellors around her to name the man to whom she chose that the crown should devolve. “Not to a Rough,” said Elizabeth, sententiously and grimly. These particulars are apparently given on the authority of the Italian Secretary, Scaramelli, whose language is quoted in a foot-note, and who says that the word _Rough_ “in lingua inglese significa persona bassa e vile.” Charles Dickens said, “I entertain so strong an objection to the euphonious softening of _ruffian_ into _rough_, which has lately become popular, that I restore the right word to the heading of this paper.” (_The Ruffian, by the Uncommercial Traveler, All the Year Round._) “Lately popular” does not mean popular for two hundred and eighty years past. A word that has escaped the notice of the Glossarists cannot have been in use early in the seventeenth century. That it should have been used in its modern sense by Queen Elizabeth, passes all bounds of belief. With all her faults she did not make silly unmeaning remarks; and it would have been extremely silly in her to say she did not wish a low ruffian to succeed her on the throne. If she uttered a word having the same sound, it might possibly have been _ruff_. The “ruff,” though worn by men of the upper class, was in Queen Elizabeth’s time an especially female article of dress, and the queen might have said, “I will have no ruff to succeed me,” just as now-a-days one might say, “I will have no petticoat government.” We want better authority than that of Scaramelli before we can believe that Elizabeth used either the word _rough_ or _ruff_, when consulted as to her wishes respecting her successor. NOT AMERICANISMS. In Bartlett’s Dictionary the term “_stocking-feet_” is given as an Americanism. But the following quotation from Thackeray’s _Newcomes_ (vol. i. ch. viii.) shows that this is an error:— “Binnie found the Colonel in his sitting-room arrayed in what are called in Scotland his stocking-feet.” Professor Tyndall, at the farewell banquet given in his honor by the citizens of New York, prior to his departure, in referring to his successful lecture-course in the United States, said he had had—to quote his words—“what you Americans call ‘_a good time_.’” But this expression is not an Americanism. It is used by Dean Swift in his letter to Stella, (Feb. 24, 1710–11); “I hope Mrs. Wells had a good time.”