QUESTIONS UNDER CHAPTER IV.

1. Will you mention the several periods of the English language?

2. To what is the term Semi-Saxon applied?

3. What is the grammatical distinction between the Anglo-Saxon, the Old English, and the Modern English?

4. What was the last characteristic distinction of Middle English which passed away?

5. In whose reign was Modern English introduced?

6. In what three several ways has the language been somewhat injured— in Queen Elizabeth's reign? in Queen Anne's reign? in our times?

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CHAPTER V.

DIALECTS AND PROVINCIALISMS.

$84. A DIALECT is one branch of a language peculiar to a province, state, or kingdom. Thus, in the Greek language, there were the Attic, the Doric, the Eolic, and the Ionic dialects. A dialect has certain prominent idioms in its vocabulary, pronunciation, or orthography.

An examination of the dialects of the English language is indispensable in order to understand its present condition, and also to learn historically how it came to its present condition. It is among the provincial dialects, too, that we discover many beautiful archaisms, which explain the obscurities of our ancient writers, which have so often bewildered the most acute commentators of works like SHAKSPEARE'S. These provincial modes of speech, however much they may be despised by fastidious critics, have actually preserved for us the origin of English phraseology, and enlightened the philologist in his efforts to walk in paths hitherto unexplored.

EXISTING

DIVERSITIES OF LANGUAGE IN

ENGLAND.

§ 8. Besides the Lowland Scotch, and the Gaelic, and the Welsh languages, there are certain peculiarities which mark the language in different quarters of the island. Thus the language in the Western counties differs from that spoken in the Eastern. The language in the Northern counties differs from that spoken. in the Southern, while that of the Midland counties differs from all. These differences have long existed. VERSTIGAN, more than two hundred years ago, gave three different modes of pronouncing the same sentence. One at London would say, "I would eat more cheese if I had it." The Northern man saith, "Ay sud eat mare cheese gin ay had it." And the Western. man saith, "Chud eat more cheese an chad it."

SOURCES

OF

EXISTING DIVERSITIES.

§ 36. These are to be sought in the diverse origin of the people, or in some of those causes which produce diversities in language generally, as heretofore described in § 16. Calling to mind the Celts, the Romans, the Saxons, the Jutes, the Angles, the Danes, the Normans, who were ancestors of those who now dwell in England, we can not fail to expect diversities in language, as now written and spoken, originating in the languages of those nations and tribes. These existing diversities are evidently diminishing, as they naturally must, in the increased intercourse which is taking place by rail-road communication in different parts of the island, in the increasing intelligence of the people, and in the more extensive use of common standards of writing and speaking.

§ 87. The Lowland Scotch is substantially the same as the English, with certain specific differences in its written vocabulary and pronunciation. "Our common language," says ELLIS, "was separately formed in the two countries, and owed its identity to its being constructed of similar materials, by similar gradations, and by nations in the same state of society." It has been supposed that the Scotch was extensively derived from the Danish, as the English was from the Anglo-Saxon. In the popular works of BURNS and of Sir WALTER SCOTT, we have such abundant specimens of Scotch peculiarities of dialect that it seems to be hardly necessary to give any in this work.

DIALECT OF THE NORTHERN COUNTIES.

§ 88. With many diversities, this is the dialect of Northumberland, which resembles the Lowland Scotch of Cumberland, Durham, and Westmoreland. To these counties might be added York and Lancaster, Derbyshire and Cheshire. They are, in general, remarkable for a broad pronunciation. In some places o is sounded for a; as hond for hand; eow for ou and ow, as keow, theou, for cow, thou. In some places cauf is sounded for calf; caw for call; con for can; foo for full; howd for hold; hawpenny for halfpenny; twoine for twine.

SPECIMEN OF THE CUMBERLAND

DIALECT.

What ails this heart o' mine?

What means this wat'ry e'e?

What gars me aye turn pale as death

When I tak' leave of thee?

When thou art far awa'

Thou'll dearer be to me;

But change of place and change o' folk
May gar thy fancy jee.

When I sit down at e'en,
Or walk in morning air,

Ilk rustling bough will seem to say,
I used to meet thee there;
Then I'll sit down and wail
And greet aneath a tree,
And gin a leaf fa' i' my lap,
I's ca't a word from thee.

I'll hie me to the bow'r
Where yews wi' roses tied,

And where, wi' monie a blushing bud,

I strove my face to hide;

I'll doat on ilka spot,

Where I have been wi' thee,

And ca' to mind some kindly look

'Neath ilka hollow tree.

Wi' sic thoughts i' my mind,
Time thro' the warl may gae,
And find me still, in twenty years,
The same as I'm to-day:
'Tis friendship bears the sway,
And keeps friends i' the e'e;
And gin I think I see thee still,

Wha can part thee and me?

Here we have e'e for eye; gar for make; jee for crooked; greet for weep; aneath for beneath; gin for if; for in; monie for many; ilka for each; sic for such; tak' for take.

SPECIMEN OF THE YORKSHIRE DIALECT.

DICKY DICKESON's Address to't knawn world; from the first number of the Yorkshire Comet, published in 1844.

Dear vverybody,-Ah sudn't wonder bud, when some foak hear o' me startin' on a paper, they'll say, what in't world hez maade Dicky Dickeson bethink hizzen o' cummin' sich a caaper as that? Wah, if ye'll nobbut but hev hauf o't paatience o' Jobb, Ah'll try ta tell ya. Ye mun kuaw, aboot six year sin', Ah wur i' a public hoose, wheare ther wur a fellur as wur braggin' on his larnin', an' so Ah axed what he knawed aboot ony knawledgement, an' he said he thowt he'd a rare lump moare information i' his heead ner Ah had i' mine. Noo, ye knaw, Ah sudn't ha' been a quarter as ill mad if ther hedn't been a lot o chaps in't plaace 'at reckoned ta hev noa small share o' gumption. Soa, as sooin as Ah gat hoame that neet, Ah sware ta oor Bet, 'at as suare as shoo wur a match-hawker, Ah wud lecarn all't polishments at Schooilmaister Gill could teich ma.

Here we have Ah for I; sudn't for should not; bud for but; foak for folk; o' for of; startin for starting; hizzen for himself; nobbut for only; hev for have; hauf for half; ya for you; ta for to; knaw for know; 'at for that; aboot for about; sin' for since; wur for were; wheare for where; fellur for fellow; heead for head; ner for than; hedn't for had not; sooin for

soon.

DIALECT OF EAST ANGLIA, OR THE EASTERN COUN

TIES.

§ 9. Under the term East Anglia are included the counties of Norfolk, Suffolk, Cambridgeshire, and portions of other counties bounded upon them. The dialect of East Anglia, then, is the peculiar language of what are called "The Eastern Counties." FORBY remarks that "the most general and pervading characteristic of the pronunciation is a narrowness and tenuity, precisely the reverse of the round, sonorous, 'mouth-filling' tones of Northern English. This narrowness of utterance is, in some parts of this district, rendered still more offensive to ears not accustomed to it by being delivered in a sort of shrill, whining recitative. This has sometimes been called 'the Suffolk whine.'”