Page:Studies in Lowland Scots - Colville - 1909.djvu/192

168 onneat. There is agreement, too, in the marked preference for the relative 'at instead of that, and the persistence of the plural present of the verb in s. Both are well-known Northern characteristics. Sometimes one sees these historic forms condemned as if they were vulgar English. Thus the phrase, "They were a man," &c., is called bad grammar. What is said is, "Th' wur a man," where we have such an old particle as we find preserved in German da used for inversion of the subject. Just as German has both da and dort, Scots has thae, thirr. "Wur" shows the regular wus changed in the final before a vowel. Other old forms, very common in the Scots of the seventeenth century, survive in Cumberland speech, such as the particles after comparatives, nor, as, be: "It's better ner gud like sugger te taties," "He's keynder as thee tull me," "summat by ordinar," and the genitive without the apostrophe s (t' cow horn). Northern speech never used than after comparatives. When one hears than in Scots it is for then. There are shades of difference here, too. The "as that" in the Cumberland, "He said as that he wasn't cumin," is "'at hoo" (that how) in Lowland Scots. In intensives Scots has the "gayly," "varra" and "fine" of Cumberland, but in addition "fell" (Ger. viel), and "'at weel" (Ger. ja wohl, yes, indeed). Of similar persistence over a wide Northern area are such popular wit as, "Wake as dish watter," "Rowtin like a quey in a fremd lonnin," "Maiden's bairns are aye weel bred," "He's no fed on deef (worm-eaten) nits," "He hardly made sote to's kail," "Better fleitch a feull ner feight 'm," "Aback o' beyont whoar the meer fwoaled the fiddler," "He dissna ken a b fra a bull's feutt," and "He hiss neah maar wit ner's pitten in wi' a speun." The custom of the country substitutes a gander for a hen in the saying, "Dancin like a steg on a het gurdle," while, in both North and South, the following would now have little meaning: "Sweerin like a tinkler," "Teugh as a soople" (thong joining the two parts of the flail).

Extremely suggestive is the subject of Cumberland idiom, especially since it exhibits all the characteristics of Northern English as it has been so well preserved in Lowland Scots. A few significant phrases only can be given, such as "t' words 'at we use in oald Cumberlan'," "ah maks mesel easy," "a gey fine