_Harlequins_ (Vol. iii., p. 287.).--The origin of the word _hellequin_, unknown to M. Paul Paris, is to be sought in Scandinavia, especially Norway, whence so many swarms of fierce Pagan settlers rushed into Normandy and other parts of France. The _helle-quinna_ or _hell-quean_ was the famous _hela_ or _hel_, the _death-goddess_ (whence our word _hell_, the _death-realm_, as still used in the Creed, &c.), so well known also to our own West Scandinavian (commonly called Anglo-Saxon) forefathers. The Wild Hunt of the Helle-quinna (the Death-quean and her Meynie) was therefore soon easily synonymous with that of _La Mort_, and, as M. Paris has well observed, naturally led to the grotesque mummeries of _notre famille d'Arlequin_. GEORGE STEPHENS. Stockholm. _Christ's-cross Row_ (Vol. iii., p. 330.).--Quarles, in his _Emblems_, b. 2. 12, p. 124., edition 1812, has the following passage: "Christ's cross is the christ-cross of all our happiness," _i. e._ the alphabet, the beginning, perhaps the alpha and omega. Grose, in his _Olio_, p. 195., 1796, relates the following story: "An Irishman explaining the reason why the Alphabet is called the Criss-cross-Rowe, said it was because Christ's cross was _prefixed_ at the beginning and end of it." W. B. H. Manchester. _Meaning of "Waste-book"_ (Vol. iii., pp. 118. 195. 251. 307.).--The gentlemen who have hitherto attempted to explain this term are very evidently unacquainted with the subject on which they write; with the exception, however, of MR. CROSSLEY, whose quotation from the _Merchant's Mirrour_ confirms what I am about to say. To the clerk in a merchant's counting-house, like him "Who pens a stanza when he should engross,"