Page:Studies in Lowland Scots - Colville - 1909.djvu/180

156 pawnd (Lat. pendo, to hang, through French). Of house utensils there were the bowie, a round barrel for the milk, and the scimmer "for reamin" or removing the cream on top. A smaller and shallower milk vessel was the bain, probably from the Gaelic bainne, milk. In South-western Scotland it is always a washing-tub. In Sackville's "Induction to the Mirror for Magistrates" (1555) there is an example of the word,—

Old-fashioned varieties of food lingered in sowens, and soor-dook. Soup maigre was barefit broth, of water, pot barley, and milk. Dainties were little known, such as in "the liths" of an orange, a word which he had never heard.

I did not test my friend much on the wide held of natural objects. He knew the Buchan for the lapwing, the wallop, evidently in both cases a visualising of the bird's characteristic flight. The rhyme,—

is a variant of the familiar

He knew the yellow-hammer as the yellow yorlin. From the frog's spawn he got an indication of the weather. " If the season was to be dry, it was in the centre of the pool; if wet, near the edge." He never saw this prognostic fail, but could give no guarantee for a period beyond three months, when the young came to maturity. In the plant world I note only his Thissilaga (colt's foot) and Peenie (peony) rose for the Fife Dishielogie and Speengie rose respectively.

The scene of these reminiscences was the farm-toon of Willie Gallon. The "gudewife" was Leezie Harl—known, as married women of old were, by their maiden name—and their man or grieve, Rob Manson. "I was wi' them twenty years," said