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Brewer's: Cutter's Law

Not to see a fellow want while we have cash in our purse. Cutter's law means the law of purse-cutters, robbers, brigands, and highwaymen. “I must put you in cash with some of your old…

Brewer's: Lydford Law

is, punish first and try afterwards. Lydford, in the county of Devon, was a fortified town, in which was an ancient castle, where were held the courts of the Duchy of Cornwall. Offenders…

Brewer's: Lynch Law

Mob-law, law administered by private persons. According to Webster, the word lynch refers to a Mr. James Lynch, a farmer, of Piedmont, in Virginia. The tale is that, as Piedmont, on the…

Brewer's: Mariotte's Law

At a given temperature, the volume of a gas is inversely as the pressure. So called from Ed. Mariotte, a Frenchman, who died 1684. Source: Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, E. Cobham…

Brewer's: Salic Law

The law so called is one chapter of the Salian code regarding succession to salic lands, which was limited to heirs male to the exclusion of females, chiefly because certain military…

Brewer's: Red Laws

(The). The civil code of ancient Rome. Juvenal says, “Per lege rubras majoram leges” (Satires, xiv. 193). The civil laws, being written in vermillion, were called rubrica, and rubrica…

Brewer's: Poyning's Law

or Statute of Drog-heda (pron. Drohe-dah). An Act of Parliament made in Ireland in 1495 (10 Henry VII., chap. 22), declaring all general statutes hitherto made in England to be in force in…

Brewer's: Rhodian Law

The earliest system of marine law known to history; compiled by the Rhodians about 900 B.C. Source: Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, E. Cobham Brewer, 1894RhoneRhodian Bully A B C D E…

Brewer's: Stafford Law

Club law. A beating. The pun is on the word staff, a stick. (Italian, Braccésca licenza.) (Florio, p. 66.) (See above.) Source: Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, E. Cobham Brewer,…

Brewer's: Storks' Law

or Lex Ciconaria. A Roman law which obliged children to maintain their necessitous parents in old age, “in imitation of the stork.” Also called “Antipelargia.” Source: Dictionary of…