oat-stealer

Updated: May 15, 2025

But even those who recognize the most fully this merit, must allow that he was ill equipped by any preliminary studies for tracing the past history of words; that in this he errs often and signally; sometimes where the smallest possible amount of knowledge would have preserved him from error; as for instance when he derives the name of the peacock from the peak, or tuft of pointed feathers, on its head! while other derivations proposed or allowed by him and others are so far more absurd than this, that when Swift, in ridicule of the whole band of philologers, suggests that 'ostler' is only a contraction of oat-stealer, and 'breeches' of bear-riches, these etymologies are scarcely more ridiculous than many which have in sober earnest, and by men of no inconsiderable reputation, been proposed.

Richard Chenevix Trench - On the Study of Words