143 THE LIFE OF THE FIELDS. 



say " fall " for autumn ; " fall " is the usual American 

 term for that season, and fall is most appropriate for 

 the downward curve of time, the descent of the leaf. 

 A slender slip of womanhood in the undeveloped period 

 is alluded to in the villages as a " slickit " of a girl. 

 " Slickit " means thin, slender, a piece that might be 

 whittled off a stick with a knife, not a shaving, for a 

 shaving curls, but a "slickit," a long thin slice. If 

 any one be carving awkwardly with the left wrist 

 doubled under, the right arm angularly extended, and 

 the knife sawing at a joint, our village miners and coun- 

 try Californians call it " cack- " or " cag-handed." Gag- 

 handed is worse than back -handed ; it means awkward, 

 twisted, and clumsy. You may see many a cag-handed 

 person hacking at a fowl. 



Hamlet folk are very apt to look a gift horse in 

 the mouth, and if any one should receive a present 

 not so large as expected, it would be contemptuously 

 described as a "footy" little thing. "Footy" pro- 

 nounced with a sneering expression of countenance 

 conveys a sense of despicableness, even to those who 

 do not know its exact definition, which may be taken 

 as mean. Suppose a bunch of ripe nuts high up and 

 almost out of reach ; by dint of pressing into the 

 bushes, pulling at the bough, and straining on tiptoe, 

 you may succeed in "scraambing" it down. " Scraam- 

 bing," or " scraambed," with a long accent on the aa, 

 indicates the action of stretching and pulling down- 

 wards. Though somewhat similar in sound, it has 

 no affinity with scramble ; people scramble for things 

 which have been thrown on the ground. In getting 

 through hedges the thorns are apt to " limm " one's 



