November, 2006
Challenges
** Cat's Cradle **
This phrase denotes - as who does not know? - a figure of a cradle, made with a string upon the fingers of both hands, and capable of a variety of transformations.
But how many of those who have played the game know that the figure does not represent a cat's cradle, after all, but the manager in which Mary laid the infant Saviour, when "there was no room for them in the inn"?
Such is the fact. Cat's is corruption of cratch, an old word having the same origin as crib, and meaning a manager, or rack for hay in a stable. Spenser, referring to the birth of our Lord, says, -
"Begin from first where he cradled was,
In simple cratch, wrapt in a wad of hay."
The word long since dropped out of common use, and the original significance of the phrase of which it formed a part having been forgotten, the misnomer of cat's cradle was invented, as furnishing a plausible and self-explanatory substitute.
Cross-word Enigma
My first is in James, but not in Bill;
My second is in factory, but not in mill;
My third is clownish, but not in low;
My fourth is in knock, but not in blow;
My fifth is in single, but not in one;
My sixth is in sol, but not in sun;
My seventh is in song, but not in lay;
My whole made the British run away.
(Check the answer next month)
The answer of in October
The poet name is Alfred Lord Tennyson
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