the original song in General Vallancey's paper, some of the words are, I think, beyond controversy misinterpreted, but I have neither room nor inclination to go critically through it. All I desire should be inferred from these remarks is, that, although this Anglo-Saxon curiosity is well worthy the attention of those who take an interest in our early literature, we must be careful not to assume that it is a pure specimen of the language of the period to which, and of the people to whom, it is said to relate. Postscript.-The demonstrative pronouns, and their use in the Somerset dialect, are. deserv ing some attention. Theäze, this; theäzam, theäzamy, these; thic, that [West of the Parret, thecky]; them, themmy, those. But such is the disposition for pleonasm in the use of all these pronouns, that they are, very often indeed, used with the adverb there. As theäze here, thic there [West of the Parret thecky there], theäzam here, theäzamy here; them there; themmy there. OBSERVATIONS, &c. THE district which the following Glossary is designed to include, embraces the whole of the county of Somerset east of the river Parret, as well indeed as parts of Wiltshire and Gloucestershire; many of the words being common to all these counties. In the district west of the river Parret, the pronunciation and many of the words are very different indeed, so as to designate strongly the people who use them. The chief peculiarity, however, of the district west of the Parret, consists in their terminating, in the present tense of the indicative mood, all the third persons singular of the verbs in th or eth ; thus, instead of he loves, he reads, he sees, it rains, &c. they uniformly say, he lov'th, he readth, he zee'th, it rain'th, &c. There is also some variation in some of the pronouns; thus they have Ise for I, and Er for he. The peculiarities and contractions of this dialect are, to a stranger, not a little puzzling. Thus, her is very frequently indeed used for she. Har'th a doo'd it, is, she has done it. This dialect pervades, not only the more western parts of Somersetshire, but also the whole of Devonshire. Howit is not my intention to enter further into this subject here. I shall occasionally note in the glossary such words as are distinguishingly characteristic of it. ever, Two of the most remarkable peculiarities in the language of the West of England, and particularly of a large portion of Somersetshire, are the sounds given to the letters A and E. A has, almost universally, the sound given to it as in the word father: in the words bâll, tâll, câll, &c. it is thus pronounced. The E has most commonly the same sound as the French give to this letter, which is, in fact, the slender sound of the A as heard in pane, cane, fane, &c. It is a curious fact, and well deserves observation, that the sound given in our polished dialect to the letters th, expressed by the Anglo-Saxons, is frequently converted in the western dialects into the sound universally given in England to the letter d. Thus for thread, we have dread or dird; for through, droo; for thrash and its compounds, drash; for throng, drong, or rather drang; for thrush, dirsh, &c. |