ENGLISH DIALECTS. 
59 
Mary. Still, however skilfully employed here and there by poets 
and novelists, the dialects are now no longer literary languages. 
They exist in real living use only in the mouths of the peasantry. 
Even this- use of them is yielding to the continual encroachments 
of the standard English and the assaults of the schoolmaster. A 
rapid change is going on. A person who was brought up in East 
Lancashire tells me, that when he returned home after rather more 
than twenty years absence the dialect had so changed that his 
brothers hardly understood the old dialect which he remembered 
and was still able to speak. He remembers the use of three forms, 
that used in his childhood, the form now used, and an intermediate 
form ; e. g. — 
1810. 1855. 1877. 
Tliocht thowt thought 
Nicht neet night 
Eocht reighked reiched (reached) 
Shooch shuff shoe 
Many old words and idioms are being lost — "ch' for C I;' e.g., 
' 'chill/ ' 'chould,' which we find in the Exmoor Scolding, is now 
quite extinct in Devon. ' Utchy ' is said to be still used near 
Crewkerne, in Somerset. 
The English Dialect Society was established in 1873 for the 
purpose of noting and preserving what remains of these old forms 
of speech. It has done good work in issuing an excellent biblio- 
graphical list of works published, or known to exist in MS., 
illustrative of the English dialects, reprints of scarce glossaries, 
and several original glossaries. There is still a good deal of work 
to be done. It is hoped, however, that the whole of the work 
contemplated may be accomplished within the next four or five 
years. Mr. A. J. Ellis's general survey of the pronunciation of 
English dialects, to be included in the forthcoming fifth part of his 
Treatise on Early English Pronunciation, will greatly aid the 
labours of the Society, and lead, it is hoped, to a more exact and 
thorough knowledge of this interesting department of philological 
study than has been possible hitherto. 
