Chapter Quid to Quixada of Q by Brewer's Phrase & Fable

Quid to Quixada

Quid a sovereign; Half a Quid, half a sovereign; Quids, cash or money generally. A suggested derivation may be mentioned. Quo = anything, and Quid pro quo means an equivalent generally. If now a person is offered anything on sale he might say, I have not a quid for your quo, an equivalent in cash.

“Then, looking at the gold piece, she added, `I guess you don't often get one of these quids.' ”- Liberty Review, June 9, 1894, p. 437.

Quid Libet Quid-libets and quod-libets. Nice and knotty points, very subtile, but of no value. Quips and quirks. (Latin.)

Quid of Tobacco A corruption of cud (a morsel). We still say “chew the cud.”

Quid pro Quo Tit for tat; a return given as good as that received; a Roland for an Oliver; an equivalent.

Quid Rides It is said that Lundy Foot, a Dublin tobacconist, set up his carriage, and asked Emmett to furnish him with a motto. The words of the motto chosen were Quid rides. The witticism is, however, attributed to H. Callender also, who, we are assured, supplied it to one Brandon, a London tobacconist.

“Rides,” in English, one syllable. In Latin (why do you laugh?) it is a word of two syllables.

Quiddity The essence of a thing, or that which differentiates it from other things. Schoolmen say Quid est (what is it?) and the reply is, the Quid is so and so, the What or the nature of the thing is as follows. The latter quid being formed into a barbarous Latin noun becomes Quidditas. Hence Quid est (what is it)? Answer: Talis est quidditas (its essence is as follows).

“He knew ...
Where entity and quiddity
(The ghosts of defunct bodies) fly.”
Butler: Hudibras, i.1

   Quiddity. A crotchet; a trifling distinction. (See above.)

Quidnunc A political Paul Pry, a pragmatical village politician; a political botcher or jobber. Quidnunc is the chief character in Murphy's farce of The Upholsterer, or What News? The words are Latin, and mean “What now?” “What has turned up?” The original of this political busybody was the father of Dr. Arne and his sister, Mrs. Cibber, who lived in King Street, Covent Garden. (See The Tatler, 155, etc.)

“Familiar to a few quidnuncs.”- The Times.

“The Florentine quidnuncs seem to lose sight of the fact that none of these gentlemen now hold office.”- The Times.

Quidnunkis Monkey politicians. Gay has a fable called The Quidnunkis, to show that the death not even of the duke regent will cause any real gap in nature. A monkey who had ventured higher than his neighbours fell from his estate into the river below. For a few seconds the whole tribe stood panic-struck, but as soon as the stream carried off Master Pug, the monkeys went on with their gambols as if nothing had occurred.

“Ah, sir! you never saw the Ganges;
There dwell the nation of Quidnunkis
(So Monomotapa calls monkeys).”
Gay: Tales.

Quietist (A). One who believes that the most perfect state of man is when the spirit ceases to exercise any of its functions, and is wholly passive. This sect has cropped up at sundry times; but the last who revived it was Michael Molinos, a Spanish priest, in the seventeenth century.

Quietus The writ of discharge formerly granted to those barons and knights who personally attended the king on a foreign expedition. At their discharge they were exempt from the claim of scutage or knight's fee. Subsequently the term was applied to the acquittance which a sheriff receives on settling his account at the Exchequer; and, later still, to any discharge of an account: thus Webster says-

“You had the trick in audit-time to be sick till I had signed your quietus.”- Duchess of Malfy (1623).

   Quietus. A severe blow; a settler; death, or discharge from life.

“Who would fardels bear ...
When he himself might his quietus make
With a bare bodkin?”
Shakespeare: Hamlet, iii. 1.

Quill-drivers Writing clerks.