In the _Taming of the Shrew_, p. 143., the substitution of "_Warwickshire_ ale" for "sheer ale" strikes me as very far-fetched, and wholly unnecessary. There is no defect of sense in the term "_sheer_ ale." Sly means to say, he was "fourteen pence on the score for ale alone:" just as one speaks of "sheer nonsense," _i. e._ nothing but nonsense, "sheer buffoonery," "sheer malice," &c. Why should Sly talk of being in debt for _Warwickshire_ ale at Wincot? If he kind been drinking ale from Staffordshire, or Derbyshire, or Kent, he might possibly have named the county it came from; but to talk of _Warwickshire_ ale within a few miles of Stratford-on-Avon seems absurd. It is as if a man came from Barclay and Perkins's, and talked of having been drinking "_London_ porter." In p. 144., I submit, with great deference, that turning "Aristotle's checks" into "Aristotle's ethics" is the very reverse of an improvement. What can be more intelligible than the line-- "And so devote to Aristotle's _checks_;" that is, to the checks which Aristotle's rules impose upon profligacy? The idea is more poetical, {452} and the line runs more smoothly; while the altered line is prosaic in comparison, and the metre is not correct. My dwindling space warns me that I must very soon pause; but these examples can be extended _ad infinitum_, should another opportunity be afforded me. The instances of alterations simply _unnecessary_ are too numerous to be recorded here. I have already a list of forty odd, selected from only eight plays. CECIL HARBOTTLE. * * * * * Minor Notes. _Local Rhymes, Norfolk._-- "Halvergate hares, Reedham rats, Southwood swine, and Cantley cats; Acle asses, Moulton mules, Beighton bears, and Freethorpe fools." Z. E. R. "_Hobson's Choice._"--I, the other day, in a paper of 1737, came upon the inclosed, if of interest sufficient for insertion in "N. & Q.:" "Upon the mention of Mr. Freeman being appointed one of the four horse carriers to the university of Cambridge, we had the following paragraph:--'This was the office that _old Hobson_ enjoyed, in which he acquired so large a fortune as enabled him to leave the town that ever-memorable legacy the conduit, that stands on the Market Hill, with an estate to keep it perpetually in repair. The same person gave rise to the well-known adage, 'Hobson's choice--this or none;' founded upon his management in business. He used to keep, it seems, hackney horses, that he let out to young gentlemen of the university, with whose characters being well acquainted, he suited his beast to its rider, who upon a dislike was sure to receive that answer from him, 'This or none.'" J. W. G. G. _Khond Fable._--The following is a free version of a fable current among the Khonds of Oriosa, of whom a very interesting account is given by Captain Macpherson in the _Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society_ for 1852: