Confused etymology. The editors should have known better than to claim that the “F. pique-nique is derived from Eng. picnic, and not vice versa.”
PICNIC, n. pik’nlk [Eng. pick, to eat by morsels; nick, the former familiar name of the tankard for liquor]: originally, an entertainment toward which each guest contributed; now, a pleasure-party on an excursion into the country, especially when they carry their own provisions, etc., with them; a kind of small sweet biscuit. Note.—The Picnic is pre-eminently an English institution: the F. pique-nique is derived from Eng. Picnic, and not vice versa: pick or pic simply indicates the informal way of eating the viands; and nick or nic the OE. familiar name for the tankards from which the liquors were drunk; or perhaps OE. nick, a coal-basket or hamper; perhaps, too, nick, the proper time, the time chosen: comp. also knick-knacks, trifles, indicating for Picnic the sense, an eating of trifles in a free-and-easy way.
See Columbian Cyclopedia. Buffalo, NY: Garretson, Cox & Company, 1897