1920-21.] Obituary Notices. 185 
the publication in 1899 of A Glossary of the Words and Phrases 'pertain- 
ing to the Dialect of Cumberland , by W. Dickinson, F.L.S., rearranged, 
illustrated, and augmented by E. W. Prevost, Ph.D., F.R.S.E. The ampli- 
fications and fresh matter contained in this volume constituted practically 
a new work, which would in itself have made Dr Prevost’s reputation as a 
painstaking and persevering compiler, but from then to the time of his 
death his labours in search of unrecorded words, elucidations of meanings, 
and illustrations of dialect usage were unceasing. In 1905 he published 
a supplementary volume which, like the earlier volume, contained a com- 
prehensive Digest of the Phonology and Grammar of the Dialect, by 
Mr S. Dickson Brown, M.A. Lond., F.R.G.S. Continuing his efforts with 
undiminished ardour, Dr Prevost has for the last fifteen years been adding 
to the stock of information already garnered ; and when he learned how 
fragile was his hold upon life, he devoted all his energies to complete 
his work while he still had power to do so. The application that this has 
involved has been continuous and close. Many pages of correspondence 
were devoted to discovering the exact significance of a single word, slight 
shades in difference of meaning being cleared up, and illustrative quotations 
sought for. New words kept cropping up constantly, for in the compila- 
tion of a glossary there is no finality. 
Dr Prevost just lived to draw to a close the task he had set for himself 
of compiling a second supplement of the Glossary ; and it was his last wish 
that, should he himself be prevented from finishing this supplement and 
seeing it through the press, the duty should be undertaken by Mr James 
Walter Brown of Carlisle, who had been in close collaboration with him 
upon dialect work for more than twenty years. 
The cost of publishing this supplement has been assured by the 
Philological Society of London, and it will be issued at an early date. 
Dr Prevost was deeply interested in music, and was a skilful organist. 
He had explored and inspected the mechanism and equipments of many 
of our cathedral organs, and in a letter to a friend three days before his 
death were the words, “ I am off* to Gloucester to see how the reconstruction 
of the organ is getting on.” 
In December 1918 Dr Prevost was found to have an ailment which 
might cause his death at any moment, and from that time he was con- 
demned to a life of physical inactivity. For the last few weeks he had 
been able to take more exercise, and so recently as last September he was 
well enough to go to Devonport to see H.M.S. Hood , in which his younger 
son is a midshipman. Soon after his return the threatened seizure occurred, 
and ended in his death at the age of sixty-nine years. 
