Humble  pie,  To  eat,  to  apologize  or  humiliate  one's  self  abjectly,  an  old
English  expression  that  harks  back  to  the  days  when  English  forests  were
stocked  with  deer  and  venison  pasty  was  commonly  seen  uii  the  tables  of
the  wealthy.  The  inferior  and  refuse  portions  of  the  deer,  termed  the  umbles^
or  numbles^  were  generally  appropriated  to  the  poor,  who  made  them  into  a
pie :  hence  **  umble-pie"  became  suggestive  of  poverty,  and  afterwards  was
applied  to  degradations  of  other  sorts,  the  word  '*  umble'*  being  misinterpreted
into  "  humble."

Humbug  was  introduced  as  a  slang  word  among  the  ton  about  the  middle
of  the  eighteenth  century,  with  exactly  its  modern  meaning  or  want  of  mean-
ing.   In  the  interim  its  meaning  had  varied  :

There  b  a  word  very  much  in  vogue  with  the  people  of  taste  and  fashion,  which,  though
it  has  not  even  the  "  penumbra"  of  a  meaning,  yet  makes  up  the  sum  total  of  the  wit,  sense,
and  judgment  of  the  aforesaid  people  of  taste  and  fashion  ! — "  This  peace  will  prove  a  con-
founded numbug  upon  the  nation.  These  theatrical  managers  humbug  the  to«-n  damnably  !"
— Humbug  is  neither  an  English  word  nor  a  derivative  from  any  other  language.  It  is,
indeed,  a  blackguard  sound,  made  use  of  by  most  people  of  distinction.  It  is  a  tine  make-
weight in  conversation,  and  some  ^eat  men  deceive  themselves  so  egregiously  as  to  think
they  mean  something  by  it. —  The  Student  (1751),  vol.  ii.  p.  41.
