Whisker

Following up the quarrel noticed at reference 1, we came across references to scallops and scallop whisks, possibly mixed up with a significant servant girl, formerly in the Pepys employ.

The breakfast thought was that these were a sort of food whisk, formed in the shape of a scallop, the sort of thing you might use to whisk eggs. Scallops as in Compostela as in reference 2. But after breakfast, before getting dfown to serious business, I found that whisk and whisker between them occupied around three columns of OED, around a page equivalent. One use was the fly whisk, another was the food whisk and another (obsolete) was the game of whist. But the one we wanted was the collar of a dress, presumably a white lace affair, fashionable in the 17th century, presumably so called because of its shape. With a scallop whisk being scalloped around the bottom.

All of which was brought to mind by these carefully pruned trees outside the camelia house in Chiswick Park.

Reference 1: http://psmv3.blogspot.co.uk/2016/04/thoughts-of-and-prompted-by-mcewan.html.

Reference 2: http://caminoteca.com/en/.

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