PATTERSON ON NEWFOUNDLAND DIALECT. Ixxi 
horns or pieces of wood projecting from the quarters. It thus avoids 
the danger of either of the booms knocking the fishermen overboard. [ 
cannot ascertain the origin of the name, but it is believed that it was 
brought from either England or Ireland. 
Among the curious words connected with their fishing I would 
farther note the following : downer, a heavy squall of wind ; sunker, a 
breaker ; roughery, a heavy sea on ; colla7’, a mooring laid down for the 
purpose of fastening the fishing punt or craft to it, the rope has a 
loop at the end for pulling over the stern of the boat, and this gives its 
name to the mooring ; faggots, small piles of fish on the flakes ; high rat, 
a boat with a board along the edge to prevent the water coming over, 
called a washboard, a term applied to objects which have a similar 
arrangement ; thus a man boarding in town complained that he had to 
sleep in a bed without any washboard ; rode, the hemp cable by which 
the vessel, boat or punt rides on the fishing ground and waferhorse, a 
pile of fish after having been washed, usually three or four feet wide, 
about the same height, and as long as may be. 
Voyage, is used to express not their passage from one place to 
another, but the result of their trip. A good voyage is one in which 
they have been successful in their object whether fishing or trading and 
a bad voyage the reverse. 
From their fishing seems also to have come the use of the word sign 
in the phrase, ‘a sign of” to express a small quantity. One at table 
being asked if he would have any more of a certain dish replied, ‘just a 
sign.” When after reaching the fishing grounds and seeking spots where 
fish were to be found, they first caught some, it afforded a sign of their 
presence, just as a gold miner speaks of a “show” of gold. When they 
caught them in greater abundance they spoke of having ‘‘a good sign of 
fish.” Hence the term I believe came to be applied generally to denote a 
small quantity. 
Being so much dependent on the weather, as might be expected they 
have peculiar words and expressions regarding it. Thus a calm day is 
civil and a stormy one is coarse. ‘This last is given by Halliwell as in 
various dialects of England, and it is also common in Scotland. A very 
sharp cutting wind driving small particles of congealed moisture, which 
cut the face in a painful manner, is expressively called a barber. On 
some of the coasts of the provinces, the term is applied toa vapor arising 
from the water in certain states of the atmosphere, and this sense is 
i 
