158 



the words and idioms of the Cumbrian dialect, and his intimate 



knowledge of the Cumbrian character. The geologist has been 

 thought to represent Professor Sedgwick ; but Gibson himself tells 

 us that he had no one in particular in view in writing this sketch ; 

 but says that one day, when he was riding over Walna Scar into 

 Torver, the idea crossed his mind as to what one of the farm lads 

 of Torver or the neighbourhood would think about the labours of 

 a geologist, and following out the train of thought he composed 

 the sketch. "Bobby Banks' Bodderment" has, I think, taken a 

 greater hold upon the popular mind than anything he ever wrote. 

 The poetical portion of it is certainly a masterpiece, for with a 

 very limited vocabulary — "Ten things an' yan, Bobby, ten things 

 an' yan" — he manages to give us snatches of songs in almost every 

 variety of Cumbrian measure, and in some measures that had never 

 been attempted in that dialect before. Bobby's explanation of 

 how those snatches of song were made, seems to me to afford us 

 a hint as to how Gibson's own songs were composed. He says, 

 " I didn't mack them, they mead theirsels." And the best songs 

 are surely not those that are made by rule or measure, but which 

 come unsought for, and, in Bobby's phraseology, "mack theirsels." 

 This, however, was not always the case with Gibson's productions 

 in the dialect, for he told me that he produced one of his dialect 

 songs by composing it first and translating it into the Cumberland 

 dialect afterwards. This was "Breezy St. Bees;" and it is still to 

 be found both as at first composed, and as he translated it into the 

 dialect. 



Of his songs, "Lai Dinah Grayson," or " M'appen I may," is 

 much the most popular. It has been set to a popular measure by 

 Mr. Metcalfe, and is published by him in one of his series entitled 

 Songs and Ballads of Cumberland, with Music. His various pieces 

 in the dialect were collected together and published in 1869, by 

 Mr. Coward of Carlisle, in a volume entitled " The Folk-Speech 

 of Cumberland and some Districts adjacent." It includes one or 

 two poetical pieces in the dialect peculiar to Furness, and also one 

 or two in the dialect of Lockerbie and the Scottish border. A 

 second edition appeared in 1872. 



