Meanwhile, I submit to his consideration, that beside the analogy of the
Gothic _sprauto_, we have in Icelandic _spretta_, imperf. _spratt_,
"subito movere, repente salire, emicare;" and _sprettr_, "cursus
citatus," and I do think these analogies warrant my conclusion.

I embrace this opportunity of submitting another _conjecture_ respecting
a word in MR. THORPE'S edition of the _Anglo-Saxon Paraphrase of the
Psalms_. It occurs in Ps. cvi. ver. 10., "Quid exacerbaverunt eloquium
Domini," &c., which is rendered: "Forthon hidydan Drihtnes spræce ægwaes
_ægype_." In a note MR. THORPE says: "_ægype_, non intelligo," and gives
a reason for deeming the passage corrupt. To me it seems to express the
generally accepted sense of _exacerbaverunt_: and here a cognate
language will show us the way. Icelandic _geip_, futilis exaggeratio;
_atgeipa_, exaggerare, effutire: _ægype_, then, means to _mock_, to
_deride_, and is allied to _gabban_, to gibe, to jape. In the Psalter
published by Spelman it is rendered: hi _gremedon_ spræce godes. In
Notker it is _widersprachen_, and in the two old Teutonic interlinear
version of the Psalms, published by Graff, _verbitterten_ and
_gebittert_. Let us hear our own interesting old satirist, Piers
Plouhman [Whitaker's ed. p. 365.]:

And God wol nat be gyled, quoth Gobelyn, ne be _japed_.

But I cease, lest your readers should exclaim, Res non verba. When I
have more leisure for _word-catching_, should you have space, I may
furnish a few more.

S.W. SINGER.

Feb. 11. 1850.