In this strange book there are fifty other etymologies as remarkable as this.  The author plainly offers them in hard earnest.  This is something worth noting.

V.

By Hook or Crook.—­“As in the phrase ‘to get by hook or crook;’ in the sense of, to get by any expedient, to stick at nothing to obtain the end; not to be over nice in obtaining your ends—­By hucke o’er krooke; e.g. by bending the knees, and by bowing low, or as we now say, by bowing and scraping, by crouching and cringing.”—­Bellenden Ker’s Essay on the Archaeology our Popular Phrases and Nursery Rhymes, vol. i. p. 21. ed. 1837.

I wish your correspondent, “J.R.F.,” had given a reference to the book or charter from which he copied his note.

Has Mr. B. Ker’s work ever been reviewed?

MELANION.

     [Mr. Ker’s book was certainly reviewed in Fraser’s Magazine at
     the time of its appearance, and probably in other literary
     journals.]

By Hook or By Crook.—­I have met with it somewhere, but have lost my note, that Hooke and Crooke were two judges, who in their day decided most unconscientiously whenever the interests of the crown were affected, and it used to be said that the king could get anything by Hooke or by Crooke.  Query, is this the origin of the phrase?

If I cannot give my authority, perhaps “J.R.F.” may be able to give his, for deriving it from “Forest Customs?”

H.T.E.

El Buscapie.—­A very full and able disquisition on the subject of MR. SINGER’s query (No. 11., p. 171.), respecting El Buscapie, will be found in the appendix to a work which is just published, viz.  Ticknor’s History of Spanish Literature, vol. iii.  Appendix D. 371. et seq.  That writer, whose opinion is entitled to credit as that of a consummate student of Spanish letters, and who gives good reasons for his conclusions in this instance, pronounces against the authenticity of the poor little pamphlet recently put forth as belonging to Cervantes.

Those who take an interest in Spanish literature will find this book of Ticknor’s a most valuable contribution to their knowledge of its whole compass, and worth “making a note of.”

V.

Richard of Cirencester, &c.—­Bishop Barlow.—­Your correspondent “S.A.A.” (No. 6., p. 93), who is desirous of further information respecting Richard of Cirencester, will, I am sure, peruse with much interest and gratification a dissertation on that writer by K. Wex, which first appeared in the Rheinisches Museum fuer Philologie for 1846, and was shortly after translated and inserted in the Gentleman’s Magazine, with valuable notes by the translator.—­Respecting the writers of notes on the margin of books, few notes of the kind,