Gill charges the Eastern
counties
with _kiver_ for
_cover_, and _ta_, for _to_.
_cover_, and _ta_, for _to_.
James Russell Lowell
Wright.
_Resce_ is one of the Anglo-Saxon
forms of the word in Bosworth's A. -S. Dictionary. Golding has _shet_.
The Yankee always shortens the _u_ in the ending _ture_, making _ventur,
natur, pictur_, and so on. This was common, also, among the educated of
the last generation. I am inclined to think it may have been once
universal, and I certainly think it more elegant than the vile _vencher,
naycher, pickcher_, that have taken its place, sounding like the
invention of a lexicographer to mitigate a sneeze. Nash in his 'Pierce
Penniless' has _ventur_, and so spells it, and I meet it also in
Spenser, Drayton, Ben Jonson, Herrick, and Prior. Spenser has
_tort'rest_, which can be contracted only from _tortur_ and not from
_torcher_. Quarles rhymes _nature_ with _creator_, and Dryden with
_satire_, which he doubtless pronounced according to its older form of
_satyr_. Quarles has also _torture_ and _mortar_. Mary Boleyn writes
_kreatur_. I find _pikter_ in Izaak Walton's autograph will.
I shall now give some examples which cannot so easily be ranked under
any special head.
Gill charges the Eastern counties with _kiver_ for
_cover_, and _ta_, for _to_. The Yankee pronounces both _too_ and _to_
like _ta_ (like the _tou_ in _touch_) where they are not emphatic. When
they are, both become _tu_. In old spelling, _to_ is the common (and
indeed correct) form of _too_, which is only _to_ with the sense of _in
addition_. I suspect that the sound of our _too_ has caught something
from the French _tout_, and it is possible that the old _too too_ is not
a reduplication, but a reminiscence of the feminine form of the same
word (_toute_) as anciently pronounced, with the _e_ not yet silenced.
Gill gives a Northern origin to _geaun_ for _gown_ and _waund_ for
_wound_ (_vulnus_). Lovelace has _waund_, but
there is something too dreadful in suspecting Spenser (who _borealised_
in his pastorals) of having ever been guilty of _geaun! _ And yet some
delicate mouths even now are careful to observe the Hibernicism of
_ge-ard_ for _guard_, and _ge-url_ for _girl_. Sir Philip Sidney
(_credite posteri! _) wrote _furr_ for _far_. I would hardly have
believed it had I not seen it in _facsimile_. As some consolation, I
find _furder_ in Lord Bacon and Donne, and Wittier rhymes _far_ with
_cur_. The Yankee, who omits the final _d_ in many words, as do the
Scotch, makes up for it by adding one in _geound_. The purist does not
feel the loss of the _d_ sensibly in _lawn_ and _yon_, from the former
of which it has dropped again after a wrongful adoption (retained in
_laundry_), while it properly belongs to the latter. But what shall we
make of _git, yit_, and _yis_? I find _yis_ and _git_ in Warner's
'Albion's England,' _yet_ rhyming with _wit, admit_, and _fit_ in Donne,
with _wit_ in the 'Revenger's Tragedy,' Beaumont, and Suckling, with
_writ_ in Dryden, and latest of all with _wit_ in Sir Hanbury Williams.
forms of the word in Bosworth's A. -S. Dictionary. Golding has _shet_.
The Yankee always shortens the _u_ in the ending _ture_, making _ventur,
natur, pictur_, and so on. This was common, also, among the educated of
the last generation. I am inclined to think it may have been once
universal, and I certainly think it more elegant than the vile _vencher,
naycher, pickcher_, that have taken its place, sounding like the
invention of a lexicographer to mitigate a sneeze. Nash in his 'Pierce
Penniless' has _ventur_, and so spells it, and I meet it also in
Spenser, Drayton, Ben Jonson, Herrick, and Prior. Spenser has
_tort'rest_, which can be contracted only from _tortur_ and not from
_torcher_. Quarles rhymes _nature_ with _creator_, and Dryden with
_satire_, which he doubtless pronounced according to its older form of
_satyr_. Quarles has also _torture_ and _mortar_. Mary Boleyn writes
_kreatur_. I find _pikter_ in Izaak Walton's autograph will.
I shall now give some examples which cannot so easily be ranked under
any special head.
Gill charges the Eastern counties with _kiver_ for
_cover_, and _ta_, for _to_. The Yankee pronounces both _too_ and _to_
like _ta_ (like the _tou_ in _touch_) where they are not emphatic. When
they are, both become _tu_. In old spelling, _to_ is the common (and
indeed correct) form of _too_, which is only _to_ with the sense of _in
addition_. I suspect that the sound of our _too_ has caught something
from the French _tout_, and it is possible that the old _too too_ is not
a reduplication, but a reminiscence of the feminine form of the same
word (_toute_) as anciently pronounced, with the _e_ not yet silenced.
Gill gives a Northern origin to _geaun_ for _gown_ and _waund_ for
_wound_ (_vulnus_). Lovelace has _waund_, but
there is something too dreadful in suspecting Spenser (who _borealised_
in his pastorals) of having ever been guilty of _geaun! _ And yet some
delicate mouths even now are careful to observe the Hibernicism of
_ge-ard_ for _guard_, and _ge-url_ for _girl_. Sir Philip Sidney
(_credite posteri! _) wrote _furr_ for _far_. I would hardly have
believed it had I not seen it in _facsimile_. As some consolation, I
find _furder_ in Lord Bacon and Donne, and Wittier rhymes _far_ with
_cur_. The Yankee, who omits the final _d_ in many words, as do the
Scotch, makes up for it by adding one in _geound_. The purist does not
feel the loss of the _d_ sensibly in _lawn_ and _yon_, from the former
of which it has dropped again after a wrongful adoption (retained in
_laundry_), while it properly belongs to the latter. But what shall we
make of _git, yit_, and _yis_? I find _yis_ and _git_ in Warner's
'Albion's England,' _yet_ rhyming with _wit, admit_, and _fit_ in Donne,
with _wit_ in the 'Revenger's Tragedy,' Beaumont, and Suckling, with
_writ_ in Dryden, and latest of all with _wit_ in Sir Hanbury Williams.
