108 On some un-noted Wiltshire Phrases. 



their ancestral tongue, and try, indeed, to translate them into what 

 they consider more polite language — not always with success. I 

 remember many years ago talking to a parishioner about a neighbour 

 in whose convalescence after a long illness she had taken the deepest 

 interest, and being assured that she " now hoped that her recovery 

 would be premature " ! Had my informant been talking to one of 

 her own commeres, she would probably have said that " now as So- 

 and-so had got well, she hoped as she'd kip well/' 



A little learning is, however, proverbially a dangerous thing. I 

 copy from a letter written to me during a temporary absence from 

 home, the following startling sentence : — " The auxiliary teacher is 

 indisposed, and I fear that the seeds of an incipient decline are 

 corroding the root of her existence." 



To talk so tall as this, I for one prefer our good old Wiltshire 

 Saxon, albeit it is not everyone who would at first hearing under- 

 stand the latter. I once mortally offended an Italian friend who 

 prided himself on his perfect knowledge of English, by assuring 

 him that I would introduce him to a native, of whose talk he would 

 not understand ten consecutive words. This my friend absolutely 

 refused to believe. But the introduction took place, and at a very 

 early period in the conversation I had to intervene in order to 

 explain what was meant by there being a " maain zoight o' turmuts 

 to-year ! " 



I may add, par parenthese, that if the Italian carried away no 

 very high opinion of Wiltshire intelligence, the opinion formed by 

 Wiltshire of himself was equally humble, for only a few days after- 

 wards, on my mentioning to a parishioner that my friend was a 

 very skilful musician, the latter replied that he had " thought that 

 the Italians were too savage to know anything about music ! " 



The following words have, as has been already stated, been all 

 gleaned from actual conversations. But before putting them down 

 here, I have consulted all the local English glossaries to which I 

 could obtain access, and have also sent copies of them to some half- 

 dozen friends in different corners of the kingdom, in order to 

 ascertain whether any of them are known in their respective 

 districts. To those gentlemen who have so kindly helped me by 



