Magpie

A contraction of magotpie, or magʹata-pie. “Mag” is generally thought to be a contraction of Margaret; thus we have Robin red-breast, Tom-tit, Philip—i.e. a sparrow, etc.

“Angurs and understood relations have

(By magotpies, and choughs, and rooks) brought forth

The secretʹst man of blood.”

Shakespeare: Macbeth, iii. 4.

Magpie. Here is an old Scotch rhyme:

“One’s sorrow, two’s mirth,

Three’s a wedding, four’s a birth,

Five’s a christening, six a dearth,

Seven’s heaven, eight is hell,

And nine’s the, devil his ane selʹ.”

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Entry taken from Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, edited by the Rev. E. Cobham Brewer, LL.D. and revised in 1895.

Magpie

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