ANTIQUITIES OF SELBORNE. 



325 



words in husbandry and common life, still subsisting among the 

 country people. 



What probably first drew the attention of the Saxons to this 

 spot was the beautiful spring or fountain called Well-head,* which 



induced them to build by the banks of that perennial current ; 

 for ancient settlers loved to reside by brooks and rivulets, where 

 they could dip for their water without the trouble and expense 

 of digging wells and of drawing. 



It remains still unsettled among the antiquaries at what time 

 tracts of land were first appropriated to the chase alone for the 

 amusement of the sovereign. Whether our Saxon monarchs 

 had any royal forests does not, I believe, appear on record ; but 

 the Constitutions de Foresta of Canute, the Danej are come down 



The wicker-work that binds and fattens down a hedge on the top is called ether, from ether an 

 hedge. When the good women call their hogs they cry sic, sic,f not knowing that sic is Saxon, 

 or rather Celtic, for a hog. Coppice or brush wood our countrymen call rise, from hris, frondes; 

 and talk of a load of rise. Within the author's memory the Saxon plurals, housen and peason, 

 were in common use. But it would he endless to instance in every circumstance : he that wishes 

 for more specimens must frequent a farmer's kitchen. I have therefore selected some words to 

 show how familiar the Saxon dialect was to this district, since in more than seven hundred years 

 it is far from being obliterated. 



* Well-head signifies spring-head, and not a deep pit from whence we draw water. For par- 

 ticulars about which see Letter I. to Mr. Pennant. 



f Z<Ka, porcus, apud Lacones ; un Porceau chez les Lace'demoniens : ce mot a sans double este 

 pris des Celtes, qui discent sic, pour marquer un porceau. Encore aujour'huy quand les Bretons 

 rhassent ces animaux, ils ne disent point autrement, que sic, sic. Antiquite de la Nation, et de 

 a Langue des Celtes, par Pezron. 



