Names Taken From Trades

The Baxters belong tothe satneclass as the Masons, the Carpenters, the Taylors, the Smiths, the Gardiners,and the Fullers. In f act, the surnames derived f rom trades or occupations are more numerous than those of any ether class, except patronymica and place-names. Some of them belong to existing tradea like those quoted above, while others represent obsolete trades, or at least obsolete trade terminology, like the Fletchers, or arrow-makers.the Arblasters, who mannfaetured cross-bows or arblasts (arcubalistse) aud the Tuckers, who worked ia the tucking-mills where cloth was prepared for market. Those who wish for f urther information upon these subjects cannot do better than turn to Mr. Bardsley's excellent and systematic work on English aurnames. A man who bakes is called a Baker; but in earlier timea a woman who bakes was called a Bakester, or Baxter. So a man who brews is a Brewer.while a woman who brews is a Brewater. I In mediseval English the terminahon "ster" was a feminine one, and it stül survivea with its primitive significatiou in spinister. A huckster was originally a mirketwoman, but the word I has now come to mean anybody, male I on1 "fnmala wrVírt liaurba oVnnf". rtrrAa ?■ I JU. H,U1H1V, nuu ULf Tf UU UUVUV gVUUO 111 he public streets. The same changa ías come over malster, throwster, and nany other analogous words. But mndry sumamos will show us the two 'orms side by side, as in Webber and Webster. Henee we may conclude that the ancestor of all the Baxters was ei woman who kept a bake house. Why her descendants should take their name f rom her, rather than f rom their father, is easy enough to understand on a number of natural hypotheses Joan Baxter may in one place have been a ■widow woman, whose children would, of course, be called af ter her; in another place she might be a persön of some character, while her husband was a field laborer or a ne'er-do-well, and ia another again, there might be two Piers Gardeners or two Wat Carters in the i same village, so that it might be more convenient to describe the youngsteru by their mother's calling than by theii