CHAPTER VIII

LITERARY WORDS WITH DIALECT MEANINGS

[Sidenote: _Clever, Comical, Conceit, Discourse_ _False, Flippant, Idle_ _Jolly, Kind, Maxim, Odd_]

The linguistic study of the dialects becomes an entertaining pursuit when we turn our attention to the dialect usage of literary words in a sense other than that to which we are accustomed in standard English. This can only be illustrated by quotations, for only thus can the true inwardness of the dialect meaning be appreciated. _Adapted_ (Hmp.) means accustomed to: a man adapted to pigs is a man experienced in the rearing of swine; _agreeable_ (Yks.) means suitable, to one’s taste or liking, e.g. Noo, reach to, an’ mak’ yersels agreeable, an’ if ye dean’t lahk it lay back, is a friendly invitation to guests at the board to help themselves to what they fancy; an _auction_ (Yks. Lan. Chs. Stf.) is a dirty or untidy place or room, a meaning which no doubt has had its origin in the state of dirt and disorder occasioned by a public sale: Ah nivver seed sitch a auction i’ all my life as their hahse is, t’furnitur’s onnywheear but whear it sud be; _cake_ (Yks.) is bread, whilst _bread_ means oatcake, e.g. Etten cake’s sooin forgotten is a proverbial saying; to _call_ a person (gen. dial. use) means to abuse him to his face, to abuse any one behind his back is to _illify_. A Yorkshire minister preaching on Christian forbearance counselled his hearers thus: If they call ya, tak neea heed on’t, bud if they bunch [kick] ya, or cobble ya wi’ steeans, gan ti t’justice, an’ a’e deean wi’t at yance. _Casualty_ (n. m. and w. dials.) is used as an adjective meaning precarious, risky, uncertain, not to be relied upon, e.g. Cauves is cazzlety things to rear; a _Christian_ (gen. dials.) is a human being as distinguished from one of the lower animals, e.g. W’y ’e’d get on that wall, said a woman of a favourite dog, an’ bark like a krischun ’e ’ood, ’e knowed so well who wuz a-comin’. A shop-bill announcing the attendances of a veterinary at Mansfield Market more than a century ago, concluded with the words: ‘N.B. Likewise bleeds Christians.’ A _chintz_ cat is a tortoiseshell cat; _clever_ (Nhb. Dur. Yks. Ken. Dev. Cor.) means well, in good health, active, e.g. Hoo are ye the day, lad? Man, aa’s clivver; _comical_ (Wor. Hrf. Glo. Bdf.) means unwell, out of sorts, e.g. I’ve felt bad and comical a many days; used of roads (Shr.) it signifies bad, dangerous, e.g. It’s a comical road, specially if theer comes on a mug [fog]; a _conceit_ (Irel. n. and midl. counties) is an opinion, idea, fancy, e.g. If a wanst teks a consate, loike, you mee as good talk to a win’mill, and it can be used as a verb in a like sense, e.g. What do you understand by being confirmed? Why, I consate I’ll have to fight the devil by mysel’; _dead_ (Irel. Hrf. Glo. Cor.) means faint, unconscious, e.g. I was dead ever so long; a _deaf_ nut (n. midl. and sw. counties) is one without a kernel, e.g. He does not look as if he lived on deaf nuts is said of a man who looks well-fed and prosperous; to _disannul_ (n. midl. w. and e. counties) means to abolish, destroy, e.g. Mr. B. has disannulled the pigsty; or to disarrange, inconvenience, e.g. Yo’ can come in, yo’ oonna disannul the ladies; _discourse_ (Lin. Som. Dev.) is bad language, e.g. Of all the discoose ever I yurd in my life, that there beat everything; a _dormouse_ (Glo.) is a bat; _dubious_ (Chs. Shr.) or _jubious_ (Sc. Nhb. Yks. Lan. Stf. Der. War.) means suspicious, e.g. ’Er’s as jubous as ’er’s scrimmity [niggardly], weighs the flour out, an’ then the bread after it’s baked, be’appen ’er thinks as I should ate the duff; a _faggot_ (midl. and s. counties) is a dish, usually a small cake or rissole made of the fry, liver, or inferior portions of a pig or sheep, e.g. ‘Hot faggots to-night’ is a not uncommon notice to be seen, for example, in the windows of small eating-houses in Malvern, Cheltenham, or Oxford; a _fig_ (Brks. Hmp. Wil. Som. Dev. Cor.) is a raisin, hence _figgy-pudding_ stands for plum-pudding. A woman who made plum-puddings for sale, placed this notice in her shop-window: ‘Figgy pudden wan appeny a slice, more figgier wan penny a slice.’ It is a common saying that a Cornishman’s idea of happiness is: A fresh preacher and a figgy-pudding every Sunday. _False_ (n. and midl. counties), applied to children and animals, means sharp, shrewd, clever, precocious, e.g. as fause as a Christian, often said of a clever animal; _fierce_ (midl. and e.An.) means brisk, lively, in good health, and is usually applied to babies, it can also signify brave, valiant, mettlesome, as in the ironical simile: as fierce as a maggot; _fog_ (in gen. dial. use) is the aftermath, the second crop of hay, or the long grass left standing in the fields during winter. In a M.E. account of the fate of Nebuchadnezzar we read: ‘He fares forth on alle faure [fours], fogge watȝ his mete.’ A printed notice conspicuous in the market-square of Settle a few years ago advertised ‘120 acres of fog for Sale’. _Flippant_ (Dor. Som. Dev.) is used of rods or sticks in the sense of pliant, used of persons it means quick, nimble; _frightful_ (Hrf. e.An. Som.) means timid, easily frightened, e.g. Lauk! Miss, how frightful you are! said by a homely wench when Miss screams at a toad or a spider; a _gentleman_ (midl. and s. counties) is a man who need not work, or is disabled from work, e.g. He’s a gentleman now, but he just manages to doddle about his garden with a weedin’-spud. It can be applied to a sick woman, e.g. I’m sure I’ve done all I could for mother; if she isn’t a gentleman, I should like to know who is! _Good_ (Sc. n.Cy. Suf.), with names of relationship, denotes kinship by marriage, e.g. my good aunt, is my aunt by marriage; my good son, is my son-in-law; _good-natured_ (Dev.) can be used of inanimate objects, e.g. A good-natured stone is one easy to work; a _gull_ (midl. counties) is an unfledged gosling, called in parts of Hampshire a _maiden_; _head_ (Som. Dev.) can signify the cream on the surface of milk, so that if a farmer’s wife is asked for milk in the forenoon, she may reply: I ’ont break my head vor nobody; a _hypocrite_ (Suf. Sus.) is a person who is unwell, or a lame person, e.g. She’s quite a hypocrite, she can’t walk a step without her stilts; _idle_ (Suf. Sus. Hmp. I.W. Wil. Dor.) means mischievous, saucy, flippant. It is said that half the choir in a Dorsetshire village resigned when a lady told them they were _idle_. They believed that she had accused them of leading a vicious life. To _imitate_ (Chs. Shr. e.An. Nrf. Suf.) means to attempt, endeavour, e.g. Don’t yow imitate hittin’ me, or yow’ll find it won’t pay; an _income_ (Sc. n.Irel. n.Cy.) is an internal disease, or an abscess, boil; _inconsistent_ (Nhp. Hnt.) means reprehensible; to _intend_ (w.Yks.) can be used to express a desire or expectation beyond one’s own control, e.g. I had intended our Rector to be a Bishop; an _item_ (Yks. Chs. Der. Lin. War. Wor. Shr. Sus.) is a hint, signal, cue, e.g. I sid the Maister comin’ so I gid ’im the item. In Somerset and Devon it can mean a trick, antic, e.g. Her’s za vull ov items as a egg’s vull ov mayte. _Jolly_ (n.Cy. n.midl. e.An.) means fat, plump, e.g. the phrase _a jolly wench_ would be applied to a young woman weighing about twelve stone; _kind_ (midl. and s. counties) means in good condition, thriving, healthy, e.g. These’m nice kind pigs, He’s always been a kindly bullock. It can also signify pleasant, agreeable, as in the Lancashire saying: There’s never a gate ’at’s so kind to th’ fuut as th’ gate one likes to go. A _maxim_ (War. Wor. Suf. Som. Dev. Cor.) is a plan, contrivance, e.g. The curate’s a fustrate ’un amongst the lads, ’e’s got such a many maxims to amuse ’um; _mean_ (Yks.) signifies angry, e.g. I war ganging by t’field, and there war Willy Lowis’ bull. I couldna rin, and ’ea cam and leuked at me across t’stile. ‘Is ta gaen to be mean?’ says I; _megrims_ (Yks. Chs. Stf. Der. Lin. War. Shr.) are antics, tricks, gesticulations, grimaces, e.g. Them childern wun naughty i’ church, they wun makin’ maigrims an’ witherin’ one to another all the wilde, where _witherin_ implies muttering with an accompaniment of nods and winks; _miraculous_ (Sc. Yks.) means wild, eccentric, reckless, venturesome, e.g. He’s a bit mirak’lous wiv a gun; to _mortify_ (Yks. Der. Shr. Hrf. Glo. Oxf. Som.) is to tease, vex, annoy, e.g. Drat the cheel! her’s enough to mortify anybody out o’ their life; _novice_ (Yks.) is a very common term of reproach, used of a person who is awkward in manner or procedure; _odd_ (Cum. Yks. Lan. Der. Lin. Lei. War.) means solitary, single, lonely, e.g. He lives e’ a niced house, but it was so odd, there wasn’t a place of worship within three mile; a very common phrase is: an odd one, meaning a single one, e.g. Oor parson ewsed to keäp two curates, bud noo he’s a-gooin’ to mak shift wi’ a odd un. A Primitive Methodist preacher was advocating the missionary cause. Describing the heathen, he said: Them poor creätures weds as mony wives as iver thaay’ve a mind to, but th’Testament says as clear as daayleet, we’re nobbut to hev a odd un a-peäce. To _perch_ (Lan. Gmg. Pem. Dor. Som. Dev.) means to sit, sit down, take a seat, e.g. Prithee, perch!; similarly to _pitch_, e.g. Plaze to pitch, ma’am; and to _print_ (Cum. Wm. Yks.), e.g. Print thi body doon e’ that chair tell ah git a bit o’ this muck off mi hands an’ fiase; a _phrase_ (Cor.) is a habit, custom, e.g. She’s all the time groanin’, and it’s nothin’ in the world but a nasty old phrase she’ve took up; a _pig_ (Sc. Nhb.) or _piggy_, is a hot-water bottle. A traveller is said to have reported that in Northumberland the people slept with the pigs for warmth, because he had been asked if he would have a piggy in his bed. In parts of Scotland a _pig_ means a flower-pot. A rich Glasgow merchant once sent for a London artist to decorate the panels in the cabins of his yacht. The artist asked what kind of decoration was desired. The reply was: Ony thing simple, just a pig wi’ a flower. _Plain_ (Sc. Lin. Wor. Hrf. Dor.) signifies frank, unaffected, homely, e.g. Lady Jane is such a plain lady, she come into my ’ouse, an’ sits down, an’ takes the childern in ’er lap as comfortable as con be. She’s as plain as you be, Miss, every bit; a _posy_ (Lakel. Lan. Yks.) is used of any single flower, which explains the line: ‘He promised to buy me a garland of posies’; a _pot_ (Yks.) is an awful chasm, almost a bottomless pit, not uncommon in certain moorland districts, technically it is a fissure in limestone; _pot_ (Nhb. Cum. Yks. Lan. Not. Lei.) also means earthenware. Of a man with a squint it may be said: He skens wor nor a pot cat. To _prove_ (Nhp. Oxf.), applied to yeast or dough, means to rise, or to set to rise. When I complained recently that the bread was hard and dry, I received the following letter from the baker: ‘Dear Madam, I am sorry to receive your complaint concerning the bread; the tin bread had been overproved, I fear, but the foreman will make an extra care, so that it shall not occur again.’ _Purgatory_ (Der. Stf. Wor. Shr. Hrf. Glo. Oxf.) is a receptacle for ashes beneath or in front of the grate; a _radical_ (Cum. Yks. Lan. Oxf. Brks. and se. counties) means a troublesome boy, an impudent, idle fellow, e.g. That little chap be a proper young radical, a wunt do nothun’ his mother tells un; _rapid_ (Lin. Nhp. Glo. Ken. Sus. Wil. Som. Dev.) means violent, severe, applied specially to pain; a _retinue_ (w.Yks.) is a long, tedious tale; to _serve_ is a very common verb meaning to supply an animal with food, e.g. Ah’ll gan an’ sarve t’pigs; a _sessions_ (n.Cy. Yks. Ken. Sus.) is a disturbance, fuss, a great difficulty, e.g. Noo there’ll be a bonny sessions aboot it; to _settle_ (Yks. Lan. Lin.) is to reduce, to fall in price, e.g. Breead’s sattl’d a haup’ny; _severe_ (Som. Dev.) means sheepish, ashamed; to _shut_ (Shr.) means to yoke horses to the implements, to _unshut_ is to unyoke, or unharness them. This latter word occurs in an epitaph on a tombstone in Ludlow churchyard, over the grave of one John Abingdon, ‘who for forty years drove the Ludlow stage to London, a trusty servant, a careful driver, and an honest man’:

His labor done, no more to town His onward course he bends; His team’s unshut, his whip’s laid up, And here his journey ends. Death locked his wheels and gave him rest, And never more to move, Till Christ shall call him with the blest To heavenly realms above.

[Sidenote: _Literary Words with Dialect Meanings: Radical, Serve, Simple, Unshut_]

_Simple_ (Ken. Sur. Sus.) means unintelligible, hard to understand, e.g. Will you please lend mother another book? She says this one is so simple she can’t make it out at all; _small_ (Yks. Lan.) is thin, slender, so that a man over six feet high may be _small_; in the phrase: a small family (Sc. n.Cy.) it means young, e.g. A small family of nine children; a _soul_ (Yks. Glo.) is a night-flying white moth; a _stag_ (n. w. and sw. counties) is a young cock. A School Inspector who asked a child what it was that recalled St. Peter to repentance, was completely nonplussed when informed that it was a _stag_. To _stammer_ (Sc. n.Cy. Nhb. Cum. Yks.) is to stagger, stumble, totter, e.g. Grandfather’s very stammering, though ’e’s lisher [more nimble] of his feet than uncle; to be _suited_ (Cum. Yks. Lin.) is to be pleased, e.g. Oor Bill’s just suited noo he’s getten into th’quire wi’ a white surplice on; to _suppose_ (Yks. Not. Lin. Rut. Lei. War. Shr. Hrf. Sus.), in the phrase _I suppose_, is used to express certainty, e.g. I suppoäse he’s deäd for I was at th’ funeral; _tender_ (Hmp.), used of the wind, means sharp, biting; to _terrify_ (midl. and s. dialects) is to annoy, irritate, worry, e.g. ’E canna get a wink a slip uv a night, ’is cough is that terrifyin’; it can also mean to damage, destroy, e.g. Thay wapses do terrify our plums; _thin_ (Irel. Yks. Chs. Wor.), used of wind or weather, means cold, piercing, e.g. My word! but it’s a thin wind this morning, it’ll go through you before it’ll go round you; a pair of _twins_ (Shr.) is an agricultural implement for breaking the clods and uprooting the weeds of ploughed land, e.g. Tell Jack to shet [yoke] a couple o’ ’orses to that par o’ twins; to _upbraid_ (Nhb. Yks. Lan. Lin.) is used in speaking of digestion, e.g. Ah nivver eeats onions bud they upbraids mă; to _up-raise_, or _up-rise_ (Dev. Cor.) is to church a woman, e.g. Please, Sir, can Mrs. Smith be uprose this afternoon?; to _live upright_ (Yks. Lin. Nrf.) means to have independent means, e.g. He lives upright, and keeps a pig; to _worship_ (Som.) is to be fond of, e.g. Her [a cat] idn arter the pheasants, ’tis the rabbits her do worship; _young_ (Som. Cor.) means unmarried, e.g. Are you young or married? Of a very young bride it was said: She du look a pretty lot better than when she was young.

[Sidenote: _Literary Words in the Dialects with Peculiar Idiomatic Uses_]

Sometimes the simplest of English words have a peculiar idiomatic use in the dialects, which may sound curious to our ears; for instance, with _belong_ (Wm. Lin. Stf. Nhp. Som.) property and its possessor are reversed, e.g. Who do belong to these here bullicks? A town boy, seeing some geese pasturing on the wide expanse of Newby Moor, wanted to carry off one of them, and being remonstrated with, he replied: Why! nobody belongs to ’em! To _break_ (Nhp. Glo. Hmp. Wil. Som. Dev.) is used of things which tear, and conversely, _tear_ is used of things which break, e.g. Please, governess, her’s a-broke my jacket. Who’ve a-bin an’ a-tord the winder? He wadn a-tord ’smornin’. _Few_ in many dialects is used in speaking of liquid food, more especially of broth, e.g. Will ye hev a few mair broth? _Just_ (Nhb. Der. Gmg. Pem.) implies nearly, almost, e.g. She’ve a just cut her hand off, means she has narrowly missed doing so; _partly_ (Yks. Chs. Der. Oxf. Brks. Hnt.) is similarly used, e.g. He’s partly ten years old. It is also often used as a termination to a sentence, much in the same way as _like_, or _in a manner of speaking_ and other phrases intended to round off the angles of a too explicit statement, e.g. Well, ah thenk a’d a-coom if his woife ’ud a-let him, paartly. To _want_ (Sc. Irel. and n. dialects) signifies to do or be without, to be free from, e.g. She never knew what it was to want a headache; to _half_ do a thing (Oxf.), used with a negative, implies an excessive amount of energy in the performance of the action, e.g. She didn’t half cry, means that she made a tremendous noise; _while_ (Sc. n.midl. and e.An.) means until. A north-countryman taking a Sunday-school class ‘down south’ surprised his hearers by saying: Now, boys, I can’t do nothing while you are quiet. An epitaph in a Lancashire church runs:

Here must he stay till Judgment day, While Trumpets shirl [shrill] do Sound, Then must he Rise in Glorious wise, And Gloriously be Crown’d.

Another, commemorating a married pair in Lincolnshire, is as follows:

Married we were in mutual love, And so we did remain, Till parted by the God of love While we do meet again.

This use of _while_ was once literary, and occurs in Shakespeare’s Plays. The conjunctions _if_, _and_, used as present participles, form an expression denoting hesitation, e.g. I axed that ŏŏman about the weshin’, an’ after a good bit o’ iftin’-an’-andin’ ’er said ’er’d come--but ’er didna seem to car’ about it (Shr.). _Neighbour_, used as a verb, is very common in the sense of associate with, visit, go about gossiping, e.g. I give them the time o’ day, but I don’t neighbour with any of them.

[Sidenote: _Familiar Forms in Standard English with different Meanings in the Dialects_]

Then there are an almost unlimited number of dialect terms which sound like familiar forms in standard English speech, but which are in reality words of totally different origin and meaning. _Agate_ is a very common adverb in all the north-country dialects, meaning on the way, afoot, astir, &c., concerning which a story is told of a farmer’s wife giving her instructions to a new, south-country servant thus: Thoo mun git a-gait i’ good tahm i’ t’mornin’ an’ leet t’fires. The poor girl was seen wandering about the fields in the early morning, and when the mistress appeared and reproached her for the unlighted fires, she explained that she had been searching in vain for an old gate to break up and use for kindling. A villager meeting the new curate accosted him with: ‘Ah see you’re a-gait.’ ‘No,’ replied the parson in an indignant tone, ‘I’m the curate.’ A _badger_ (n. and midl. counties) is a corn dealer, or a huckster, a very old term, found in early English Dictionaries; a _banker_ (Yks. Stf. Lin.) is a navvy, a drain-and ditch-digger. The judge and bar were puzzled by being told that a disreputable fellow whom the police had found asleep under a stack was a banker. ‘A banker!’ exclaimed the judge. ‘Yes, sur, and he is a banker, that I’ll take my Bible oath on, for I seed him mellin’ doon kids at the stathe end not ower three weeks sin’,’ replied the witness, and an interpreter had to be found in court to explain to the men of law that the witness had described a navvy occupied in hammering down faggots supporting the foreshore of a river. A _banker-mason_ (Rut.) is one who works fine stone: We call them as chops stones for walls, choppers-and-wallers. If you called a banker-mason a chopper-and-waller, he’d look awkward [annoyed]. To _boast_ (w.Yks.) is to dress stone with a chisel, which chisel is termed a _boaster_; a _bounder_ (Cor.) is the holder of a tin-bound or parcel of land in the tin-mines; a _damsel_ (Sc. Irel. Nhb. Yks. Lan. Chs.) is a damson plum, e.g. Fine fresh damsels at sixpence a peck; a _dodger_ (Ken.) is a night-cap; a _fresher_ (e.An.) is a young frog; a _humbug_ (Yks. Lan. Chs. Der. Lin. War. Wor. Hrf. Glo. Wil. Dev.) is a particular kind of sweetmeat, varying in different localities. A well-known vendor of _humbugs_, familiarly called Dan, until a few years ago regularly plied his trade on the platform of Shipley station, and was wont to relate with pride that he had once sent a parcel of his wares to Her Majesty Queen Victoria, by the hand of Princess Beatrice. _Love_ (Ess.) means lather, soap-suds; an _old maid_ (Wor. Glo.) is a horse-fly; to _peck_ (Wor. Oxf. Brks. Sus. Wil.) is to use a pickaxe. In a case of manslaughter the witness giving evidence remarked: You see he pecked he with a peck, and he pecked he with a peck, and if he’d pecked he with his peck as hard as he pecked he with his peck, he would have killed he, and not he he. _Raps_ (Chs. War. Shr.) are sports, games, fun of any kind, e.g. It wuz rar’ raps to ’ear the ’unters shoutin’ to the scar-crow to know which way the fox went; _shale_ (w.Yks.) denotes a fire-lighter, made by cutting down a piece of soft deal wood into something resembling a tree-fern. A showman proclaimed that within his show we were to be told something worth a pound for a penny. Inside was a man cutting shales, and all he said was: Always cut from you and you’ll never cut yourself. To _simper_ (Irel. w.Yks. e.An.) is to simmer, cp. ‘I symper, as lycour dothe on the fyre before it begynneth to boyle,’ Palsgrave, 1530; a _slip_ (Irel. Pem. I.W. Dor. Som. Dev. Cor.) is a young pig; to _steal_ (Yks.) is to put handles on pots. The following conundrum was once very common: As Ah went ower Rummles Moor, Ah pept dahn a nick an’ Ah seed a man steylin’ pots, an’ they wor all his awn. Hah could that be? A _wig_ (in gen. dial. use) is a kind of cake or bun, a _plain wig_ is a bun without currants, a _spice wig_ is one with currants. The Lincolnshire version of the common nursery rhyme runs as follows:

Tom, Tom, the baker’s son, Stole a wig, and away he run; The wig was eat, and Tom was beat, And Tom went roaring down the street.

[Sidenote: _‘Pig’ or ‘Wig’_]

The ordinary version substitutes ‘pig’ for ‘wig’, and makes Tom’s father a ‘piper’. It is a question for textual critics to settle, but natural sequence of idea and detail is on the side of the ‘wig’-version being the original one; and it is easy to see how in a literary nursery, authority would say that the most omnivorous of small boys could not eat a periwig, and therefore the word must be pig. This change once made, Tom’s father becomes a piper for the sake of alliteration, rather than because there is any historical connexion between a piper and a pig.