RUN 
RU'NNER, s. One that runs; that which runs.— The 
ships, built in this fashion, were found better runners than 
any made before. Biblioth .—A racer. 
Fore-spent with toil, as runners with a race 
I lay me down a little while to breathe. Shakspeare. 
A messenger.—To Tonson or Lintot his lodgings are bet- 
ter known than to runners of the post-office. Swift .—A 
shooting sprig.—In every root there will be one runner, 
which hath little buds on it, which may be cut into. Morti¬ 
mer .—One of the stones of a mill.—The mill goes much 
heavier by the stone they call the runner being so large. 
Mortimer. [Erythropus .] A bird. Ainsworth. 
RU'NNET, s. [gepunnen, Sax. coagulated.] A liquor 
made by steeping the stomach of a calf in hot water, and 
used to coagulate milk for curds and cheese. It is sometimes 
written rennet, which see.—The milk of the fig hath the 
quality of runnet to gather cheese. Bacon. 
RU'NNING, adj. Kept for the race.—He will no more 
complain of the frowns of the world, or a small cure, or the 
want of a patron, than he will complain of the want of a 
laced coat, or a running horse. Law. 
RU'NNIN G, s. Act of moving on with celerity.—A run¬ 
ning that could not be seen of skipping beasts. Wisd. xvii. 
19.—Discharge of a wound or sore. 
RU'NNION, s. See RoniOiV. A paltry scurvy wretch. 
RUNNQDE, a town ofHindostan, province of Malwah, 
belonging to the Mahratlas. Lat. 25. 7. N. long. 78. 15. E. 
RUNNYMEDE, in England; 5 miles east of Windsor, 
in Surrey. This spot is celebrated for the conference held 
thereon the 15th June, 1215, between king John and the 
barons of England, when the former was compelled to sign 
magna charta, and charta de foresta. It is now divided 
into several inclosures. 
RUNRIG, an ancient inconvenient distribution of com¬ 
mon field land, by which small portions or ridges of land 
were let to different individuals in a mixed manner. 
The circumstances of land being distributed in alternate 
ridges as the properly or possession of different tenants or 
holders, was unquestionably a consequence of early farming 
townships. It is a sort of arrangement which must have 
first taken place on account of some imperfect and confused 
notion or intention of doing justice in an equal manner to 
all the tenants or holders of land in such farming villages, 
by allotting to, or bestowing upon, every one of them the 
same number of ridges near their houses, and an equal num¬ 
ber in remote situations. And in order to render the absur¬ 
dity of such a mode of holding and occupying land still 
more preposterously complete, if possible, such ridges were, 
in many cases, not unfrequently exchanged; so that one 
tenant possessed, in the succeeding year, the land which 
was held or occupied by his neighbour the preceding one. 
It is remarked, that in many parts of the highlands of Scot¬ 
land, the land under this distribution has been first ploughed, 
without leaving any boundaries, except the furrows between 
the ridges; then the field was divided, by putting small 
branches of trees into the ground, in order to mark off every 
tenant’s portion before the field was sown. No man knew 
his own land until the seed was to be put into the ground ; 
and it became almost impossible for him to have the same 
portion of land any two successive years. This is a mode 
of division, it is supposed, which is analagous to that which 
Caesar has asserted to have prevailed among the ancient Gauls; 
which must absolutely debar the very least improvement. 
This inconvenient and improper method of proceeding 
was greatly fostered by the feudal notions of the times; in 
which he that could muster the greatest number of retainers, 
generally constituted to himself the greatest estate. But in 
the present times nothing can be more absurd than to see 
two or three, or perhaps four men, yoking their horses toge¬ 
ther in one plough, and having their ridges alternately in the 
same field, with or without a bank of unploughed land be¬ 
tween them, by way of boundary. These diminutive pos¬ 
sessions, it is said, were carried to such a length, that in 
some parts of Scotland, towards the northern extremity, the 
RUN 447 
term a horse's foot, the sixteenth part of a plough-gate of 
land, is not yet wholly laid aside. The land is stated to be 
like a piece of striped cloth, with banks full of weeds and 
ridges of corn in constant succession, from one end of a 
field to the other. Under such management, all such occu¬ 
piers or possessors must have concurred in one opinion with 
regard to the time and manner of ploughing every field, the 
kind of grain to be sown, the season and weather fit for 
sowing, and whether they and their horses were to be em¬ 
ployed or idle. So late as even thirty or forty years ago, 
this practice is stated to have prevailed, not only over the 
greater part of the county of Perth, but, with very few excep¬ 
tions, over all other parts of Scotland. Since that period, 
however, it has been, it is said, gradually going into disuse; 
and that the benefit of laying it aside entirely is so apparent 
that any remains of the runrig system, which may still be 
met with, must soon give way and disappear. 
RUNSWICK, a small fishing town of England, in 
Yorkshire; 8j miles north-west of Whitby. 
RUNT, s. [runte, in the Teutonic dialects, signifies a bull 
or cow, and is used in contempt by us for small cattle ; as 
kefyl, the Welsh term for a horse, is used for a worthless 
horse.] Any animal small below the natural growth of the 
kind. 
Reforming Tweed 
Hath sent us runts even of her church’s breed. Cleaveland. 
A pigeon. The Spanish runt is the longest body of all the 
pigeons; it is short-legged and loose-feathered, and does not 
walk so upright as the Leghorn runt. These are of a very great 
variety of colours, but are apt to have accidents in sitting, 
from their sitting too heavy, and often breaking their eggs. 
The Friesland runt is a large pigeon, and has all its fea¬ 
thers reverted, and looking as if placed the wrong way. 
The Roman runt is a pigeon of the same general make 
with the common kind, but so large and heavy, that it can 
hardly fly. 
The Smyrna runt is middle-sized, and is feather-footed, 
and that to such a degree sometimes, as to look as if there 
were wings upon the feet; the feathers of these are sometimes 
four of five inches long, and often pull the eggs and young 
out of the nests. 
The common runt is the common blue pigeon, kept for 
the table, and known to every body. Moore’s Columb. 
p. 42. 
RUNTHWATE, a village of England, in Westmoreland, 
north-west of Howgill. 
RUNTON, a parish of England, in Norfolk; 3 miles 
west-by-north of Cromer. 
RUNWELL, a village of England, in Essex; 5 miles 
north-west of Rayleigh. 
RUNWELL, a village of England, in Somersetshire, 
between Taunton and Wellington. 
RUNWICH, a village of England, in Gloucestershire, 
north-west of Stroud. 
RUOLQ, a small town in the north of Italy, duchy of 
Modena, situated on a navigable canal; 8 miles north-north¬ 
east of Novellara. 
RUPEE, s. An East Indian silver coin, worth about two 
shillings and four-pence.—In silver fourteen roopecs make a 
masse. Sir T. Herbert. 
RUPELMONDE, an inland town of the Netherlands, in 
the province of east Flanders, on the Scheldt, where that 
river receives the Rupel. Population 2000; 8 miles south- 
by-west of Antwerp, and 26 east-by-north of Ghent. 
RUPERSDORF, or Hohen Rupersdorf, a petty 
town of Lower Austria, on the Sulzbach; 17 miles north- 
north-east of Vienna, containing, with its surrounding parish, 
2300 inhabitants. 
RUPERT, a learned and pious Benedictine abbot in the 
twelfth century, was a native of Flanders, and born in the 
territory of Ypres, in the year 1091. He embraced the 
monastic life at a very early age, in the abbey of St. Law¬ 
rence, near Liege, where • his application to his studies was 
incessant, till he had made an extraordinary progress in all 
