Page:The New Forest - its history and its scenery.djvu/304

 , To. To dint, or imprint. Formed, as Mr. Wedgewood remarks, of the kindred words, dint, dent, dunt, by an onomatopoëtic process. We find the word in an old song still sung in the New Forest, "A Time to remember the Poor:"— "Here's the poor harmless hare from the woods that is tracked, And her footsteps deep dounted in snow."

, A. A prison; "the cage" of the Midland districts. Curiously enough the old poet William Browne, as also Wither, speaks of a squirrel's nest as a "dray"—still used, by-the-by, in some counties—which in the New Forest is always called a "cage." In this last sense Mr. Lower adds it to the glossary of Sussex provincialisms (Sussex Archæological Collections, vol. xiii., p. 215). I may further note that at Christmas in the Forest, as in other wooded parts of England, squirrel-feasts are held. Two parties of boys and young men go into the woods armed with "scales" and "snogs" (see chap. xvi. p. 182). to see who will kill the most squirrels. Sometimes as many as a hundred or more are brought home, when they are baked in a pie. Their fur, too, is sought after for its glossiness.

, An. The stem of an ivy tree or bush, which grows round the bole of another tree.

, To. To draw up, press, squeeze. We find the substantive "drunge," with which it is evidently connected, given in Wright as a Wiltshire pronunciation for pressure, or crowd. Mr. Barnes also, in his Glossary of the Dorsetshire Dialect, p. 235. gives the forms "dringe" or "drunge," to squeeze or push.

, An. An handful of thatch. Common both in the New Forest and Wiltshire. In the former three elams make a bundle, and twenty bundles one score, and four scores a ton. In the latter the measurement is somewhat different, five elams forming a bundle.

. (From the Old-English fus, ready, prompt, quick). Proud, upstart. In the glossaries of Wright and Halliwell we find "fess" given as the commoner form.

, To. Used with reference to churning butter. "To fetch the butter," means, to raise the cream into a certain consistency.

. A pimple, or eruption on the face. See "bunch."

. Small, minute. Used especially of misty rain.

, or quite as often. (From the Old-English flit, or geflit). Not only as explained in the glossary of Wiltshire, impertinent, busy, but, by some boustrophêdon process, good-humoured. "You are very flitch to-day," that is, good-natured.

. Worms, which on certain land get into the livers of sheep, when the animal is said to be "cothed." Called also "flukes," and "flounders." See the word "cothe."

, A. A crotchet, or, as the vulgar expression is, a maggot. Used always in a deprecatory sense. When a person has done anything foolish he says, "this is a gait I have got."

. Sprung, or slightly cracked. Used throughout the West of England.

, To. To stand awry or crooked. Said especially of small things, which do not stand upright.

, To. (From the French en-gloutir). Not simply, to swallow or gulp, as explained in the glossaries, but more especially to keep down or stifle a sob.

, The. The bog-moss (Sphagnum squarrosum), which is used in the New Forest to make fine brooms and brushes.

, The. The bog-myrtle, or English mock-myrtle (Myrica 282