PATTERSON ON NEWFOUNDLAND DIALECT. xlvii 
Barvel, sometimes pronounced barbel, a tanned sheepskin used by 
fishermen, and also by splitters, as an apron to keep the legs dry, but 
since oilskin clothes have come into use, not now generally employed. 
Wright in his ‘‘ Dictionary of Obsolete and Provincial English,” marks 
it as Kentish, denoting ‘‘a short leather apron worn by washerwomen or 
aslabbering bib.” Recently I heard of its being used by a fisherman 
on our Nova Scotia coast, to describe the boot or apron of a sleigh or 
carriage. 
Barm is still commonly, if not exclusively used in Newfoundland for 
yeast, as it is in some parts of England. So Od7Jlefs, for small sticks of 
wood has now, with most English-speaking people, gone out of use. 
But it is quite usual in Newfoundland to hear of buying or selling b7//ets, 
putting in billets, &e. The word, however, seems to have been intro- 
duced from the Norman French. 
Brews.—This is a dish, which occupies almost the same place at a 
Newfoundlander’s breakfast table, that baked beans are supposed to do 
on that of a Bostonian. It consists of pieces of hard biscuit, soaked 
over night, warmed in the morning, and then eaten with boiled codfish 
and butter. This is plainly the old English word usually written brewis, 
and variously explained. Johnson defines it as ‘‘a piece of bread soaked 
in boiling fat pottage made of salted meat.” This is about the New- 
foundland sense, substituting, as was natural, fish for meat. Webster 
gives it as from the Anglo-Saxon, and represents it as obsolete in the 
sense of broth or pottage, “* What an ocean of brews shall I swim in,” 
(Beaumont & Fletcher), but as still used to denote ‘bread soaked in 
gravy or prepared in water and butter.” This is the relative New 
England dish. Wright gives it in various forms brewet, brewis, &c., as 
denoting pottage, but says that in the North of England they still have 
“4 brewis, made of slices of bread with fat broth poured over them.” 
Child is used to denote a female child. This is probably going out 
of use, as gentlemen, who have resided for some time on the island, say 
they have never heard it, but I am assured by others, that on the occasion 
. : ue : 5) (ee 
of a birth they have heard at once the enquiry, ‘‘ Is it a boy ora child? 
Wright gives it as Devonshire, and it was in use in Shakspeare’s time, 
“Winter's Tale,” III, 3, “A boy or a childe, I wonder.” In two 
instances I have heard of its being used in this sense some years ago in 
ova Scotia. 1e one was by an old man originally from the Uni 
Nova Scot ith by Id man originally f the United 
States, who used Shakspeare’s enquiry ‘‘ A boy or achild.” Again ina 
