must own, I see no ground for concluding that any sarcastic stricture was levelled at the Roman pontiff. There is, however, a manifest pun, i. e. a distortion of the word from its primary and universal acceptation; and, that Milton did not forbear complying with this taste of the age, there is a glaring proof in the punning speech delivered by Satan upon the opening of his new-invented battery against the good angelic host. But Addison's remarks on the allegory of Sin and Death, as I am inclined to believe, will lead to a plausible surmise of what might occasion Milton's thus adapting the words pontificial and pontifice. "A reader (observes this ingenious critic) who knows the strength of the English tongue, will be amazed to think how the poet could find such apt words and phrases to describe the actions of these two imaginary persons, and particularly in that part where Death is exhibited as forming a bridge over the chaos; a work suitable to the genius of Milton." Milton, however, from a want of apt words, in their ordinary signification, was, it appears, at length constrained to give a novel meaning to one word, and to coin another, before the ideal bridge could be completed with chimerical materials by visionary architects. And it was in consequence of the same defect that, in a preceding verse (310), he slipt into a deviation from a part of speech, by forming a particle out of a noun substantive in the simile of Xerxes:

Over Hellespont

Bridging his way, Europe with Asia join'd;

for, was not the verb to bridge till then unknown in the English language?

1723, Nov.

Yours, &c.

W. and D.

CVIII. A List of Local Expressions, with Illustrations.

MR. URBAN,

As a knowledge of local expressions may frequently be of service in critical inquiries, and is at least a matter of curiosity, the following list is at your service. You may depend on its authenticity; a circumstance which ought always to be examined in information of this kind; since, either for want of frequent inquiries about the same word, or through the

dishonourable fiction of little wits, there is reason to suppose that many errors have been admitted into vocabularies of this kind.

AUNT. It is common in Cornwall to call all elderly persons Aunt or Uncle, prefixed to their names. The same custom is said to prevail in the island of Nantucket, in North America. In some parts of England Gammer and Gaffer are said to be used in the same manner.

ANUNT, Opposite to. Gloucestershire.-Gr. ravtı.

A CUSTIS. A schoolmaster's ferula. North of Cornwall. CLOME. Earthen-ware; and a clome shop; and a clomen oven, and the like. General through Devonshire.

CAWCH. A nasty place. Nastiness. Devonshire. In other places called a mess.

A DONKY, or A DICKY. An ass. Essex and Suffolk.— The colliers of Kingswood call the same animal a Neddy-ass, but more usually a Neddy.

CALLED HOME. Asked in church by banns; and this, either the first, second, or third time. King's Sedgemoor. To DON, and To DOFF. To put on, and put off, the clothes:

DULL. Hard of hearing. Somerset.

An ERRISH. A stubble-field. Devon.

A FESCUE, pronounced also Vester. A pin, or point, with which to teach children to read. Cornwall. Probably a corruption of Verse-cue; Verse being vulgarly pronounced all through the West, Ves.

A GOUT. An under ground drain of a house or street. Camden mentions this word as peculiar to Bristol in his (Queen Elizabeth's) time. Gowtes and gutters occur in two deeds (dated 1472 and 1478) in the collection of deeds belonging to the library of Bristol. It is still the only word used in that city.

To GORGEY. To shake. Lookee how our chimney do gorgey with the wind. King's Sedgemoor. The original is, probably, to gorge; it being common in Somerset to add a y to numberless words, such as to droppy, &c.

A GOOD-DAY. A holiday. Staffordshire.

A Pair of JEMMIES. Hinges. Minehead.
LARY. Empty. Devon.

A LYNCHER. A border of grass, left to divide property in a ploughed common-field. Sedgemoor.

The LEACH-ROAD. The path by which a funeral is carried to church. Somerset and Devon. It often deviates from the high road, and even from any path now in use; in which

case the country people will break down the hedges, rather than pass by an unhallowed way.

To LUMPER. To stumble, as a horse. Sedgemoor.

To MOOCH. To play truant, to stay from school. Bristol. MAZED. Deranged in mind. Cornwall. Mazed Bet Parkin, a woman well known in Padstow some 30 years since.Perhaps some of your correspondents may have made the same observation as myself, that there were a surprising number of persons of that description along the North coast of Devon and Cornwall.

MOILED. Troubled, fatigued. Sedgemoor.

NAN? A vulgar expression in the West of England, particularly in Gloucestershire, which means what do you say? Ha, or Hai, is commonly used for the same. In the -neighbourhood of Sedgemoor, say ma'am—say sir, is very

common.

NESH. Soft, tender. It is applied to the health, and means delicate. Somerset.

A PEEL.

A pillow. Somerset and Devon. PILLUM. Dirt. Devon.

A PICKSEY. A fuiry. Somerset, Devon, and Cornwall. Picksey-led, bewildered, led astray, particularly in the night, by a Jack-a-lantern, which is believed to be the work of the Picksies.

A PLOUGH. A waggon, or cart, or plough, together with the team which draws it, is called by no other name in several parts of Somersetshire.

TO DRIVE THE PRAY. To drive the cattle from the moor. Sedgemoor. French, près, a meadow.

RETCHUP, SO pronounced, though the original is probably Rightship. Truth, Somersetshire. As, there is no retchup in that child.

A RAIL. A revel, a country wake. Devon.

A SLICE. A fire shovel. Bristol.

STIVE. Dust. Pembrokeshire. Dust is there only used to signify sawdust.

To SAR. To earn. Sedgemoor. As, To sar seven Shitlings a week. The same word is also used as a corruption of serve; as, To sar the pigs.

A SCUTE. A reward. North of Devon.

To SLOTTER. To slop, to mess, to dirt. Devon.

STURE. Dust.
Dust. Devon.

TO SLOCK. To pilfer, or give privately; and a Slockster, pilferer. Devon and Somerset.

To for AT.

All over Devon.

TH for S in the third person singular of verbs. Devon. As, It rainth-He livth to Parracomb-Whene he jumpth, all shakth.

TIDY. Neat, decent. West of England.

To TINE. To light, &c. As, Tine the candle. Somerset. Pronounced, in Devon, Tin.

TO TINE is likewise used in the neighbourhood of Sedgemoor for to shut. As, Tine the door-He has not tined his eyes to sleep these three nights.

A

A TUTTY. Pronounced also, in other places, a Titty.
nosegay. Somerset.
TWILY. Restless. Somerset.

Toily.

Somerset. Perhaps a corruption of

TUTT-WORK. Job-work, as distinguished from work by the day. Somerset and Devon; and in the Cornish and Derbyshire mines. Probably derived from the French tout. UNKID, or UNCUT, Dull, melancholy. Somerset.

VITTY. Neat, decent, suitable. Cornwall. Perhaps a corruption of Fit, or Fetive.

To VANG. To give, reach, hand. Devon. As, Vang me the bread.

VORTHY. Forward, assuming. Somerset and Dorset.The original is, perhaps, forthy, derived from the adverb forth.

WISHT. Dull, gloomy. Cornwall,

Some of your correspondents will perhaps be able to inform you, that the use of most of these words is more extensive than is here set down. What is now sent is from the actual observation of one who is no great traveller,

1793, Dec.

MR. URBAN,

S

THE following illustrations of some of the local expressions, may not, perhaps, be unacceptable; and the instances, which I have subjoined of their usage by our great poets of elder days, may serve to evince the utility of such collections in critical inquiries, if, indeed, the thing requires any proof. To the authenticity of your correspondent's list, as far as it relates to Somerset, I can, and gladly do, bear testimony.

DON and DOFF are well known to be contracted from do on, and do off. From don is also formed the substantive donnings. Doff occurs frequently in Shakespeare and Spenser, and twice in Milton.

"I praise thy resolution: doff these links."

"Nature in awe to him
Had dofft her gawdy trim."

Samps. Agon

Ode on the Nativity.

JEMMIES. Hinges. Grose, in his Provincial Glossary, gives Jimmers, and a North-country word, in the same sense. In Somerset, I believe, the more common pronun ciation to be jimmels, perhaps from the French jumelle, a twin, gemellus.

To MOOCH, to play truant. Otherwise mich, or meech, Somers. "Shall the blessed son of heaven prove a micher, and eat black-berries." Shakespeare, Hen. IV. Part I. Act Grose has "michers, thieves, pilferers, Norf."

2.

MOILED, troubled, fatigued. Most likely from moile, or mayle, the ancient mode of writing; and the present West Country mode of pronouncing the name of that laborious animal, the mule.

NESH is used by Chaucer, I think, though I cannot now point out the particular passage; but I am certain that I have met with it in some old author of note.

PLOUGH, for a waggon and horses, comes probably from plaustrum, or rather from the Italian, plaustro; the diphthong u being sounded by the Italians like the English ou.

SCUTE, a reward. Bp. Fleetwood mentions a French gold coin, named a scute, of the value of 3s. 4d. current in England in 1427. See Chronicon Preciosum.

TIDY, neat, decent. Dol Tear-sheet calls Falstaff, "thou whoreson little tydie Bartholomew Boar-pig." Hen. IV. P. ii. Act 2.

TINE, to light. As, tine the candle. Thus Milton,

as late the clouds

Justling, or push'd with winds, rude in their shock,
Tine the slant lightning."-

Par. L. B. X. l. 1073.

TINE, to shut. Verstegan gives, "betined, hedged about," in his list of old English words; and adds, "We use yet in some parts of England to say tyning for hedging." Antiquities, Ed. 4to. 1634, p. 210. In Somerset an inclosed field is frequently called a tining, in opposition to a down or open common.