ghee (ge)

[E. spelling of Hind. ghi, Beng. ghi, etc., and universally used as a substitute for oil in cooking, especially in the preparation of food for the Brahmans and religious mendicants, and in offerings to the gods, Ghee is largely used medicinally as an emollient and stomachic, and as a dre ing for wounds and ulcers. For these purposes it is esteemed in proportion to its age. When carefully prepared from pure materials it will keep sweet for a great length of time, and it is not extraordinary to hear of ghee a hundred years old. They will drink milk, and boil'd Butter, which they call Ghe. Fryer, A New Account of East India and Persia, p. 33, The great luxury of the Hindu is butter, prepared in a manner peculiar to himself, and called by him ghee . Mill , British India, I. 410. gherkin (ger'kin), n. [Formerly also gerkin , gir kin , gurkin , guerkin (the h or u being intended "to keep the g hard"), agurkje (prob. once * agurkken , with dim. suffix- ken = E.- kin , equiv. to dim. -je ) = Dan. agurk = Sw. gurka = G. gurke , a cucumber, gherkin, okurka = Serv . ugorka = Pol. ogorek , ogurek = Upper Sorbian korka = Lower Sorbian gurka = Ru . oguretsŭ = Hung. ugorka = Lith. agurkas Lett. gurkjis (ef. ML. angurius, MGr. άγγουρον, ἀγγούριον, NGr. ἀγγούρι, ἀγκούρι , a cucumber, gherkin, of Ar. or Pers. origin): ef. Ar. ' ajur , a cucumber (Pers. angūr , a grape). The source can hardly be, as a erted, in the Ar. Pers. Turk. khiyar, Hind. khira , a cucumber.] A small-fruited variety of the cucumber, or simply a young green cucumber of an ordinary variety, used for pickling. = We this day opened the gla of girkins which Captain Cocke did give my wife the other day, which are rare things. Pepys, Diary, Dec. 1, 1661.