With the Romans there existed a law that in certain cases the verdict of the jury might be given CLAM VEL PALAM, viz., _privily_ or _openly_, or in other words, by _tablet_ or _ballot_, or by _voices_. Now as the essence of a Parliament or council of the people was its representative character, and as secrecy would be inconsistent with such a character, it was doubtless a _sine quâ non_ that its proceedings should be conducted "_palam_," in an open manner. The absence of the letter "_r_" may possibly be objected to, but a moment's reflection will cast it into the shade, the classical pronunciation of the word _palam_ being the same as if spelt _PARlam_; and the illiterate state of this country when the word Parliament was first introduced would easily account for a _phonetic_ style of orthography. The words enumerated by Blackstone's annotator are purely of English composition, and have no _correspondent_ in the dead languages; whilst _testament_, _sacrament_, _parliament_, and many others, are Latin words Anglicised by dropping the termination "_um_"--a great distinction as regards the relative value of words, which the learned annotator seems to have overlooked. "_Mentum_" is doubtless the offspring of "_mens_", signifying the mind, thought, deliberation, opinion; and as we find "_palam populo_" to mean "_in the sight of the people_," so, without any great stretch of imagination, may we interpret "_palam mente_" into "_freedom of thought or of deliberation_" or "_an open expression of opinion_:" the essential qualities of a representative system, and which our ancestors have been careful to hand down to posterity in a word, viz., _Parliament_. FRANCISCUS. * * * * * "INCIDIS IN SCYLLAM, CUPIENS VITARE CHARYBDIM." I should be sorry to see this fine old _proverb in metaphor_ passed over with no better notice than that which seems to have been assigned to it in Boswell's _Johnson_. Erasmophilos, a correspondent of the _Gentleman's Magazine_ in 1774, quotes a passage from Dr. Jortin's _Life of Erasmus_, vol. ii. p. 151., which supplies the following particulars, viz.:-- 1. That the line was first discovered by Galeottus Martius of Narni, A.D. 1476. 2. That it is in lib. v. 301. of the "Alexandreis," a poem in _ten_ books, by Philippe Gualtier (commonly called "de Chatillon," though in reality a native of Lille, in Flanders). 3. That the context of the passage in which it occurs is as follows:-- "-- Quo tendis inertem Rex periture, fugam? Nescis, heu perdite, nescis Quem fugias: hostes incurris dum fugis hostem. Incidis in Scyllam, cupiens vitare Charybdim." where the poet apostrophises Darius, who, while {86} flying from Alexander, fell into the lands of Bessus. (See _Selections from Gent. Mag_. vol. ii. p. 199. London, 1814.) C. FORBES.