rarebit redux

[Laurence Horn]

At 2:31 PM +0100 5/8/00, Lynne Murphy wrote:
>Barry wrote from Prague:
>
>> TOAST HAWAI--ham, cheese, pineapple.
>
>The pub near campus here serves this open-faced and calls it "Hawaiian
>rarebit."
>
>Lynne
>
I guess that counterexemplifies the observation (e.g. at the OED entry for
Welsh rarebit) that the only sort of "rarebit" in the world is a Welsh one.
But this is presumably a blend (Hawaiian + [Welsh] rarebit).

As it happens, I've just been tracking down some views on, and early cites
of, Welsh rarebits as an illustration of language attitudes and folk
etymology. Here's a sampler:

M. Schele De Vere, "Fated Words", in Harper's 32 (1866): 205, courtesy of
the Making of America archive, which cites as an instance of 'the
ill-treatment of English nouns' the process by which 'a Welsh rarebit
became a Welsh rabbit' alongside such legitimate folk etymologies as
'shamefaced' and the interesting 'court-card', which De Vere derives from
'coat-card' (I can't find 'court card' in the OED).

George Wakeman, "Wrecks of Words", The Galaxy 8 (1869): 850, with the same
errant line

Brander Matthews, "As to 'American Spelling'", Harper's 85 (1892): 279, who
cites the line (attributed to 'a well-known writer on spelling reform' not
otherwise identified') "The men who get their etymology by inspiration are
like the poor in that we have them always with us", and notes that "few of
them are as ignorant as the unknown unfortunate who first tortured the
obviously jocular _Welsh rabbit_ into a pedantic and impossible _Welsh
rarebit_"

more charitable toward the rarebitters is Robert Hendrickson in his Facts
on File Word and Phrase Origins, p. 713: "rather than being an affected,
mannered corruption of the correct Welsh rabbit, it is a well-meaning, if
misdirected, attempt to remove a slur on Welshmen from the language", an
instance of "country humor" that "conveys the idea that only people as poor
and stupid as the Welsh would eat cheese and call it 'rabbit'".  This take
is prefigured by Alfred Holt, in his 1936 _Phrase Origins_, who after
finding a 1725 cite of _Welsh rabbit_ 'cheese on toast' and noting the
analogous Albany beef 'sturgeon', remarks that "_Rarebit_ was later, a
well-meaning attempt to spoil one of those little jokes that help to take
the sting out of life."  On Holt's view, and Hendrickson's, _Welsh rarebit_
is essentially what we now call a p.c. euphemism.  I'm not sure the
consciousness they attribute ("well-meaning") to the rabbit-->rarebit
substitution is really there, though, especially given the robust survival
of the verb "to welsh" (on a bet) and the fact that the Welsh are not a
salient oppressed minority in the U.S. where the substitution also appeared
as early as Poe's 1845 short story "Some Words with a Mummy" appearing in
the American Whig Review 1: 363 (thanks again to Making of America!):
===================
A light supper, of course.  I am exceedingly fond of Welsh rarebit.  More
than a pound at once, however, may not be at all times advisable.  Still,
there can be no material objection to two.  And really between two and
three, there is merely a single unit of difference.  I ventured, perhaps,
upon four.  My wife will have it five; --but, clearly, she has confounded
two very distinct affairs.  The abstract number, five, I am willing to
admit; but, concretely, it has reference to bottles of Brown Stout, without
which, in the way of condiment, Welsh rarebit is to be eschewed.
===================
--I wonder if Lynne's Brighton pub serves Brown Stout with Hawaiian
rarebit.  Wouldn't be a bit surprised.

larry