The hard-headed Cheshireman may be deficient in legend, but he has
invented a number of wise sayings and proverbs which can hold their own
in quality and quantity with any other county. Some of the oldest,
however, given by Ray, are wrapped in obscurity. The following is a
selection:--
“---- by a proverbe certan
Good manners and conynge maken a man.”
Bradshaw (_Life of St. Werburgh_).
[He was a contemporary of William of Wykeham.]
“Cheshire, Chief of men.”
“_Stout, bold, and hardy withal, impatient of wrong, and ready to
resist the enemy or stranger that shall invade their country._”--Webb.
Fuller says: “_Its gentry is remarkable on a fourfold account--their
numerousness ... their antiquity, their loyalty, and their
hospitality._”
“Cheshire for men,
Berkshire for dogs,
Bedfordshire for naked flesh,
And Lincolnshire for bogs.”
“By waif, soc and theam,
You may know Cheshire men.”
[Powerful in their legal rights and tenacious of them.]
“As many Leighs as fleas, Massies as asses,
Crewes as crows, and Davenports as dogs’ tails.”
_Some of the great Cheshire families._
“There is more than one yew bow in Chester.”
_As many a Welshman had found out._
“Cheshire born and Cheshire bred,
Strong i’ th’ arm and weak i’ th’ yed.”
_Perhaps invented by neighbours “over the border” who had felt the
strong arm._
“To grin like a Cheshire cat.”
_No satisfactory explanation of this has ever been given. It has
formed the subject for inquiries innumerable in “Notes and Queries.”_
_There is another version: “To grin like a Cheshire cat chewing
gravel.”_
“It is better to marry over the mixen than over the moor.”
_It is better to marry an honest farmer from next door whom you know,
than a fine gentleman from a distance who may turn out a fraud._
“Enough and no more, like Mrs. Milton’s feast.”
_Milton married as his third wife Elizabeth Minshull of Wistanstow,
near Nantwich, who survived him. She was poor and proud, and her
enforced economy was not to the taste of her neighbours._
“When the daughter is stolen, shut the Pepper-gate.”
_Equivalent to “shutting the stable door when the steed is stolen.”
This originated in a former Mayor of Chester fastening up the
Pepper-gate after his daughter had eloped through it with her lover._
“If thou hadst the rent of Dee Mills--thou wouldst spend it.”
_These Chester mills yielded annually a large rent._
“As fair as Lady Done.”
_The wife of Sir John Done, hereditary bow-bearer of Delamere Forest.
Pennant, in his “Tour from Chester to London,” says that “when a
Cheshireman would express supereminent excellency in one of the fair
sex, he will say, ‘There is a Lady Done for you.’”_
“Higgledy Piggledy--Malpas shot.”
_All share alike._
_The well-known anecdote need not be quoted._
“All on one side, like Parkgate.”
_A single street with one side only, the river being on the other
side._
“Every man was not born to be Vicar of Bowdon.”
_One of the most valuable livings in Cheshire._
“To pull Lymm from Warburton.”
_Complete and absolute separation._
“Hanged hay never does cattle.”
_Bought hay, hung and weighed in the scales, is not economical. It
will not do (pronounced “doe”) cattle._
“To scold like a wych-waller.”
_I.e., a “salt-boiler” at one of the wyches of Cheshire._
“To catch a person napping, as Moss caught his mare.”
“I’ll tell thee, quoth Wood,
If I can’t rule my daughter, I’ll rule my good.”
“But when? quoth Kettle to his mare.”
_Of these three worthies history is silent._
“Like Goodyer’s pig, never well but when he is doing mischief.”
“He stands like Mumphazard, who was hanged for saying nothing.”
“Like the parson of Saddleworth who could read no book but his own.”
“Roint you witch! as Bessy Locket said to her mother.”
“No more sib (akin) than sieve and riddle that grew in a wood
together.”
“If he were as long as a lither, he might thatch a house without
a ladder.”
“It would make a dog doff his doublet.”
“She hath broken her elbow at the Church door.”
_A woman grown idle after marriage._
“Score twice before you cut once.”
_Used by curriers. Holmes’ “Academie of Armourie.”_
_Don’t cut your leather until you feel sure you have selected the right
place._
“Stoppord law, no stake no draw.”
_Stockport or Stopport--only those who contribute to an undertaking
may reap benefit from it._
“You may know a Mobberley man by his breeches.”
_An allusion to poachers in the neighbouring Tatton Park. They made
their breeches of buckskin._
“The Mayor of Altrincham lies in bed while his breeches are
mending.”
“The Mayor of Altrincham, and the Mayor of Over,
The one is a thatcher, the other a dauber.”
_These places were small and unimportant, and the mayors were
therefore sometimes chosen from men in humble ranks of life._
“A Stopport (Stockport) chaise.”
_Two women riding sideways on one horse._
“As thrunk as three in a bed.”
_Thrunk = crowded._
“It is time to yoke when the cart comes to the caples.”
“_In some part of England they call a horse a caple._”--Chaucer. Latin
= _Caballus_.
“Good to fetch a rich man sorrow and a dead man woe.”
“As much wit as three folks--two fools and a madman.”
“She hath been to London to call a strea a straw, and a waw a wall.”
_Adopting the London pronunciation and forgetting, or being ashamed
of, the county dialect._
“To come home like the parson’s cow, with a calf at her foot.”
“To look a strained hair in a can.”
“To shed riners with a whaver.”
“_To surpass anything skilful or adroit by something still more
so._”--Wilbraham. _Riner_ = _a toucher used at quoits_.
“Too-Too will in two.”
_Strain a thing too much and it will not hold._
“Well, well, is a word of malice.”
“You been like Smithwick, either clemed or bossten.”
_Too little or too much._
“Afraid of far enough.”
“Afraid of him that died last year.”
_Of that which is never likely to happen._