" MESS OF POTTAGE."
[To THE EDITOR OF THE " SPECTATOR:1 SIR,—The Spectator so often opens its leaves for the solu- tion of difficulties that I now appeal to it. Whence is the term "mess of pottage" derived P I have asked dozens of people recently, including parsons. They all say it is ecrip- tural; yet I do not find any such word as " mess " in Cruden's Concordance. I look to you for light.—I am, Sir, LThe phrase "mess of pottage" does not occur in the Authorized Version of 1611, but is used proverbially of the means whereby Esau sold his birthright (Genesis xxv.). The actual phrase, however, was used in the heading to this chapter of Genesis in the Bibles of 1537 and 1539, and in the Geneva Bible of 1560. Coverdale in his Bible of 1535 used the phrase in other passages, viz., in 1 Chron. xvi. 3, and Prov. xv. 7, but not in Genesis xxv. See A New English Dictionary (Oxford University Press).—En. Spectator.]
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