Chapter Waldenses to Walnut of W by Brewer's Phrase & Fable

Waldenses to Walnut

Waldenses So called from Peter Waldo, a citizen of Lyons, who founded a preaching society in 1176.

Waldo a copse between Lavant and Goodwood (Sussex). Same as weald. wold, wald, walt, “a wood.” (Anglo-Saxon.) The final o is about equivalent to “the,” as haelo, the whole, i.e. health; maenego, the many- i.e. multitude, etc.

Wales The older form in Wealhas (plural of Wealth), an Anglo-Saxon word denoting foreigners, and applied by them to the ancient Britons; hence, also, Corn-wall, the horn occupied by the same “refugees.” Wälschland is a German name for Italy; Valais are the non-German districts of Switzerland; the parts about Liège constitute the Walloon country. The Welsh proper are Cimbri, and those driven thither by the Teutonic invaders were refugees or strangers. (See Walnut. )

Walk (in Hudibras) is Colonel Hewson, so called from Gayton's tract.
   To walk. This is a remarkable word. It comes from the Anglo-Saxon wealcan (to roll); whence wealcere, a fuller of cloth. In Percy's Reliques we read-

“She cursed the weaver and the walker,
The cloth that they had wrought.”

   To walk, therefore, is to roll along, as the machine in felting hats or fulling cloth.

Walk Chalks An ordeal used on board ship as a test of drunkenness. Two parallel lines being chalked on the deck, the supposed delinquent must walk between them without stepping on either.

Walk Spanish To make a man walk Spanish is to give him the sack; to give him his discharge. In 1885 one of the retired captains in the Trinity House Establishment said, “If I had to deal with the fellow, I would soon make him walk Spanish, I warrant you.”

Walk not in the Public Ways The fifth symbol of the Protreptics of Iambichus, meaning follow not the multitude in their evil ways; or, wide is the path of sin and narrow the path of virtue, few being those who find it. The “public way” is the way of the public or multitude, but the way of virtue is personal and separate. The areana of Pythagoras were not for the common people, but only for his chosen or elect disciples.

“Broad is the way that leadeth to destruction, but narrow is the path of truth and holiness.”

Walk the Plank (To). (See Plank. )

Walk through One's Part (To). A theatrical phrase, meaning to repeat one's part at rehearsal verbally, but without dressing for it or acting it. To do anything appointed you in a listless indifferent manner.

“A fit of dulness, such as will at times creep over all the professors of the fine arts, arising either from $$$ or contempt of the present audience, or that caprice which tempts painters, musicians, and great actors ... to walk through their parts, instead of exerting themselves with the energy which acquired their fame.”- Sir W. Scott: Redgauntlet, chap. xix.

Walker a proper name, is generally supposed to be $$$, a fuller, but the derivation of ancient names from trades is to be received with great caution. It is far more probable that Walker is derived from the old High German walah, Anglo-Saxon wealh, a foreigner or borderer; whence Wallack, Walk, Walkey, Walliker, and many others. (See Brewer. )
   Helen Walker. The prototype of Jeanie Deans. Sir Walter Scott caused a tombstone to be erected over her grave in the churchyard of Irongray, stewartry of Kirkcudbright. In 1869 Messrs. A. and C. Black caused a headstone of red freestone to be erected in Carlaverock churchyard to the memory of Robert Paterson, the Old Mortality of the same novelist, buried there in 1801.
   Hookey Walker. John Walker was an outdoor clerk at Longman, Clementi, and Co.'s, Cheapside, and was noted for his eagle nose, which gained him the nickname of Old Hookey. Walker's office was to keep the workmen to their work, or report them to the principals. Of course it was the interest of the employés to throw discredit on Walker's reports, and the poor old man was so badgered and ridiculed that the firm found it politic to abolish the office, but Hookey Walker still means a tale not to be trusted. (John Bee.