Item 18 - Letter from W. W. Skeat to W. Aldis Wright

1 single sheet

(Place of writing not indicated.)—Discusses the sense of the word ‘and’ in the phrase ‘and a little tiny boy’ (in Twelfth Night).

(It is unclear whether this letter is complete. There is no initial greeting, date, or address.)

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Transcript

Appendix to Etym Dicty.

Song at end {1}. I suppose this is rather a miserable affair, & not necessarily grammatical. And a little tiny boy seems = even a little &c. If it is a mere expletive, we may still ask—how did it arise? And perhaps and = even is as good a guess as another. Or else we may consider it as short for and it were = an it were.

Yours sincerely
W. W. Skeat.

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{1} See Twelfth Night, V. i. 398.

This description was created by A. C. Green in 2022.