_Pettifogger_ (Vol. vii., p. 354.).--One who "would cast a mist before,"
and around, his clients. He makes it his constant practice to raise a
"petty-fog."
"And thus much for this cloud, I cannot say rather than _petty-fog_ of
witnesses, with which Episcopal men would cast a mist before us, to
deduce their exalted {288} Episcopacy from Apostolick Times."--Milton,
of _Prelatical Episcopacy_, Ed. Col. Amst., 1698, vol. i. p. 245.
Is not this a more probable origin of the word than the _pettivogueur_ of
our etymologists? And MR. KEIGHTLEY will, I am sure, permit me to suggest
that it is a derivation at least as obvious and expressive as
_pettyfolker_.