WEATHER LORE AND FARMING TERMS
‘There was no information for which Dr. Johnson was less grateful
than for that which concerned the weather.... If any one of his
intimate acquaintance told him it was hot or cold, wet or dry,
windy or calm, he would stop them by saying, “Poh! poh! you are
telling us that of which none but men in a mine or a dungeon can be
ignorant. Let us bear with patience, or enjoy in quiet, elementary
changes, whether for the better or the worse, as they are never
secrets.”’
Burney, _Boswell’s Life of Johnson_, G. Birkbeck Hill, vol. iv,
p. 360.
In all ranks of life the weather is the one great topic for casual
conversations and salutations; and thanks to the blessed uncertainty of
our English climate we have a wide field, and seldom need to repeat the
same remark two days running. Dialect-speakers, however, have the
advantage over us of the standard language, in that they possess so many
good descriptive adjectives and metaphorical expressions which we lack.
The rustic, moreover, accepts the weather as he finds it, and puts plain
facts into words, he does not abuse unalterable conditions in the way we
are so apt to do, as if a cold wind, or drizzling rain were a personal
insult not to be borne. Sometimes we even descend to unadulterated
slang, as did the two charming and well-dressed maidens I once heard
greet each other in the street thus: ‘Awful weather, isn’t it!’ said the
one. ‘Beastly!’ retorted the other, and they passed on. One was reminded
of the girl in the fairy-tale who was condemned for her sins to let fall
a toad each time she opened her mouth to speak.
[Sidenote: _Phrases describing the Weather_]
For describing the weather in realistic and at the same time
picturesque terms, some of the dialect phrases would be hard to beat.
Take for example these: It’s a donky day, Ben! Ey, rayder slattery.
Varra slashy! Ay, parlish soft. Here’s a sharp mwornin’, John! Ey, as
snell as a stepmother’s breath. A tell you ’tis a day wud blaw the
horns aff the kye [cows]. It fare to be a wunnerful glosy morning,
leastways I sweat good tidily. It fair teeam’d doon, it stowered, an’
it reek’d, an’ it drazzl’d, whahl ah was wet ti t’skin, an’ hedn’t a
dhry threed aboot ma. T’weather wor seea pelsy, followed wi’ sitch a
snithe, hask wind. A cold snarzling wind. When the air is so cold that
it will not allow any one to stand idle: There’s a good steward about.
On the Cumberland Fells there is always a _bone_ in the air. When the
day looks bright and pleasant, but there is a chill nip in the air,
it is a _sly_ day; when it is cold and foggy, it is _hunch-weather_,
because it makes men and animals hunch up their shoulders; when it is
very cold with a piercing wind it is _peel-a-bone_ weather; and when
it rains very hard it is: Raining pitchforks with the tines downwards.
A raging, blustering wind goes _wuthering_ across a bleak moor, whence
the name of Mr. Heathcliff’s dwelling _Wuthering Heights_. When the
sky shows streaks of windy-looking cloud, and the weather seems
doubtful it: Looks skeowy; an unusually bright day is: Too glisky to
last; when a fine rain is falling: It hadders and roäks. A kind of
hoar-frost peculiar to Dartmoor is known as _the ammil_, a term which
is apparently a figurative use of _amel_, i.e. enamel (cp. ‘_Esmail_,
ammel or enammel’, Cotgr.), used to denote the thin coating of
transparent ice which covers every twig, and leaf, and blade of grass.
On a calm, hot day, when the air near the surface of the ground is seen
to quiver in the sunlight: The summer-colt rides, or: The summer-goose
flackers; the Northern Lights are the Merry Dancers; heavy masses of
fleecy white cloud are Wool-packs, or they are the Shepherd’s Flock.
The evening star becomes the Shepherd’s Lamp, whilst the moon, more
prosaically, does duty as the Parish Lantern.
[Sidenote: _Weather Rhymes and Sayings_]
To the countryman who lives by tilling the soil, or by tending sheep
and cattle, the prospect of fair days or foul is all-important; we
therefore find in the dialects a mass of weather-lore, in part based
on old superstition, in part on trustworthy observation. Sun, moon,
and stars, clouds and wind, the habits of animals, and the various
signs of the approach of winter, or the advent of spring, are all
observed and studied, and then, in course of time, the results of this
observation have become crystallized in popular sayings and homely
rhymes.
When the sky has a _cruddled_ appearance, that is, when it is covered
with small fleecy clouds called Hen-scrattins (Sc. n.Cy. Midl.), it
means that the weather will be: Neither long wet nor yet long dry. The
same is said of the long streaky clouds called Filly-tails (Sc. n.Cy.),
Mares’-tails (gen. dials.), and Goat’s-hair (Nhb.). When a thick band of
cloud lies across the west, with smaller bands above and below, it is:
Barbara and her barns [children], a sign of stormy weather (Yks.). The
name is an allusion to St. Barbara, whose father was about to strike off
her head, when a lightning flash laid him dead at her feet. Hence she
was supposed to command the thunderstorm, and was invoked as a
protectress. When dingy packs on Criffel lower, Then hoose yer kye an’
stuik yer duir, But if Criffel be fair an’ clear, For win’ or weet ye
needn’t fear (Cum.). A small dark cloud such as Elijah’s servant beheld
when he looked toward the sea from the top of Carmel, is called a
Dyer’s-neäf [hand], and betokens rain as it did in Ahab’s time, for: A
dyer’s neaf an’ a weather-gall Shepherds warn at rain’ll fall (Yks.). A
Weather-gall (n.Cy.) is the stump of a rainbow left visible above the
horizon. A Weather-breeder (n.Cy. n.Midl. e.An.) is a fine warm day out
of season, regarded as the precursor of stormy weather. When streaks of
light are seen radiating from the sun behind a cloud, the sun is said to
be _drawing wet_, for the Sun-suckers (Chs. Shr.) are sucking up
moisture from the earth, to form rain. Roger’s blast (e.An.) is a kind
of miniature whirlwind, which suddenly on a calm day whirls up the dust
on the road, or the hay in the field, high in the air, to herald the
approaching rain.
[Sidenote: _Signs of Wet Weather_]
It is a sign of coming wet weather if the moon is on her back (Sc.
Midl. e.An.), for she holds the water in her lap; if a halo is seen
round her, variously termed a _wheel_ (Brks. Hmp. Som.), a _bur_
(n.Cy. n.Midl. e.An. s.Cy.), and a _brough_ (Sc. Irel. n.Cy.), e.g. The
bigger the wheel, the nearer the wet; If t’bur i’ t’muin be far away,
Mek heaste an’ hoose yer cworn an’ hay; A far-aff broch a near-han’
shoor, A near-han’ broch a far-aff shoor; or if the evening star _leads
the moon_, that is, if it is in front, or on the right-hand side of
the moon. A Setterda’s moon, Cum it once in seven year, it cums too
soon (Lin.), for: Saturday new, and Sunday full, It allus rines, and
it allus ool (Glouc.). If curleys whaup when t’day is duin, We’ll
hev a clash [downpour] an’ varra suin (Cum.). The guinea-fowl or
_come-back_ invokes rain (Nrf.); and the call of the green woodpecker
is the warning signal: Wet! wet! wet! (Shr. Som.). It is a sign of
rain when _th’ craws plaays football_, that is, when the rooks gather
together in large bodies, and circle round each other; when the ducks
_do squacketty_ (Som.), or when they throw water from their bills over
their heads (Yks.); when the swallows fly near the surface of the
ground; when the crickets chirp more loudly than usual; when a cat
scratches the table legs, or _makes bread_, or sneezes (Sc.), or in
washing her face, draws her paw down over her forehead; if a cock flies
up on to a gate, and there crows (Wal.); if a dog eats grass (Sc.); if
the _packmen_ [snails] are about (War.); If paddocks crowk in t’pow
[pool] at neet, We may expect baith win’ an’ weet (Cum.); if a peacock
cries frequently (Dev.); if you meet a _shiny-back_ (War.), or common
garden beetle; if you kill a _rain-clock_ [beetle], or _rain-bat_
(n.Cy. Wor.), an _egg-clock_ [cockchafer] (Lan.), or _God’s horse_ [the
sun-beetle](Cum.). If it rains on Friday it will rain on the following
Sunday (Cum.). The shooting of corns, or of an old sore, is a sign of
wind and rain (Yks.). If a rake is carried in harvest-time with its
teeth pointing upwards it is certain to rake down rain (Dev.). If the
cat frisk about the house in an unusually lively manner, wind or stormy
weather is approaching (Lan.). The shrew-mouse prognosticates in which
quarter the wind will prevail during the winter by making the opening
of its nest in the contrary direction (Nhp.). It is a very common
saying that: When the wind is in the east, It’s neither good for man
nor beast; but: The wind in the west Suits every one best (Lan.) A
streak of thin white cloud, somewhat in the shape of a boat, is called
Noah’s Ark (Sc. n.Cy. n.Midl. e.An.). If it lies north and south it
denotes rain, but lying east and west it denotes fine weather (Cum.).
Or again, it is held that if the Ark remains three days, the wind will
pass into the quarter to which the Ark points. South for rain; north
for cold; east for all that is ill; and west to everybody’s gain (Wm.).
[Sidenote: _Popular Meteorology_]
If a robin sings on a high branch of a tree it is a sign of fine
weather, but if one sings near the ground the weather will be wet
(Shr.). An old saying about the _wood-seer_ (Nhp.), the little green
insect found in the white froth deposited on plants, is that when its
head is turned upwards it betokens fine weather, and when downward, the
reverse.
In changeable weather the rain is said to come and go _by planets_
(Der. Lei. e.An.), or if rain falls with great violence, but very
locally, it is said to fall _in planets_ (n.Cy.), phrases which must be
remnants of old astrological beliefs.
The presence of sea-gulls inland is generally taken as an indication of
stormy weather: Sea-mo, sea-mo, bide on t’sand, Theer nivver good
weather when thoo’s on t’land (Cum.); but this is not always the case. A
Devonshire rhyme runs: When the say-gulls cry by lan’, ’Tis time to take
the zellup [seed-leap, i.e. seed-basket for sowing] in han’; When the
say-gulls cry by say, ’Tis time to draw the zellup away. In Shetland
there is an old rhyme concerning the movements of the _rain-goose_, or
red-throated diver: If the rain göse flees ta da hill, Ye can geng ta da
haf whin ye will; But whin shö gengs ta da sea, Ye maun draw up yir
boats an’ flee. According to an old Cumberland saying: If’t cums on rain
when t’teyde’s at flowe, You may yoke t’plew on any knowe [knoll]; Bit
if it cums when t’teyde’s at ebb, Then lowse yer plew an’ gang to bed.
Perhaps the commonest of all sayings concerning the weather is: A red
sky at night Is the shepherd’s delight; A red sky in the morning Is the
shepherd’s warning. The wording varies slightly in different districts,
but the sense is always the same, cp. ‘When it is evening, ye say, It
will be fair weather: for the sky is red. And in the morning, It will be
foul weather to-day: for the sky is red and lowring,’ _St. Matt._ xvi.
2, 3. Another very common adage is: Rain before seven, fine before
eleven. Among the Yorkshire Dales people will tell you that when you see
the cattle on the tops of the hills, it is a sign of fine weather. The
early mist called the _pride of the morning_ (n.Cy. Midl. Dor.), _harr_,
and _hag_, foretells a fine day. A moorn hag-mist Is worth gold in a
kist; A northern harr Brings fine weather from far (Yks.).
[Sidenote: _Foretelling the Seasons_
_The Farmer and the Weather_]
But popular meteorology does not confine itself to foretelling the
weather of the immediate future; there are plenty of prophetic
utterances concerning the seasons, and their effects on the crops of
weeks and even months ahead. For instance: If the ice will bear a man
before Christmas, it will not bear a mouse afterwards. If the sun shine
through the apple-tree on Christmas Day there will be an abundant crop
of apples in the following year. If the wind is in the west at noon
on Candlemas Day it will be a good year for fruit. If Cannlemas Day
be lound [calm] and fair, Yaw hawf o’ t’winter’s to come an’ mair; If
Cannlemas Day be murk and foul, Yaw hawf o’ t’winter’s geean at Yule
(Yks.). A January spring is worth naething. If in February there be no
rain, The hay won’t goody, nor the grain, All other months of the year
Most heartily curse a fine Februeer (Dev.). If the cat in February lies
in the sun, she will creep under the grate in March (Dev.). So many
frogs in March, so many frosts in May (Rut.). A peck of March dust is
worth a king’s ransom. When the oak is before the ash, The summer will
be dry and mash [hot] (Bdf.). If the oak before the ash, Then we’re
sure to have a plash, If the ash before the oak, Then we’re sure to
have a soak (Nhb.). When the hair-beard [the field woodrush] appear,
The shepherd need not fear (Nhp.). Rain on Good Friday and Easter Day
Brings plenty of grass but little good hay (Glo.). Cold May, Long
corn, short hay (Rut.). A wet May, Maks lang-tail’d hay (Yks.). A lecky
[showery] May, plenty o’ hay, A lecky June, plenty o’ corn (Nhb.).
A wet May and a winnie [windy], Makes a fou stackyard and a finnie
[plentiful] (Sc. n.Cy.). A dry summer never begs its bread (Som.). If
it sud rain on St. Swithin’s Day, We’re feckly sarrat [served] wi’
dwallow’d hay (Cum.). If it rains on St. Swithin’s Day, even if only
a few drops, the apples are _christened_, and early sorts may then
be picked. Very hot weather in July, August, and September breeds
hard frosts for January (Dev.). If the buck rises with a dry horn on
Holyrood morn, Sept. 14, it is a sign of a Michaelmas summer. A warm
October presages a cold February (Dev.). As the weather is in October,
so it will be next March (Dev.). Where the wind is at Holland-tide, the
Season of All Saints, it will be most of the winter (Glo.). If there’s
ice in November will bear a duck, There’ll be nothing after but sludge
and muck. Many hips, many haas, Many frosts, many snaas. When patches
of snow linger after the rest has melted, these are _snowbones_, and
more snow will come to fetch them away.
When children see the snowflakes falling they say: There’s the old
domman [woman] a-picking her geese, An’ sellin’ the feathers a penny
apiece (Oxf.); They’re killing geese i’ Scotland, An’ sending t’feathers
here (Yks.); The folk i’ the eas’ is plotin’ their geese, An’ sendin’
their feathers ti huz (Nhb.); Keelmen, keelmen, ploat yor geese, Caad
days an’ winter neets (Nhb.).
[Sidenote: _Tusser’s ‘Husbandrie’_]
From weather lore we are naturally led to turn to the farm and the
farmer, and here, at the outset, we are reminded of that father of
English ‘Husbandrie’, Thomas Tusser. Writers on Literature tell us that
he was one of the most popular authors of his time, judging from the
number of editions through which his work--_A Hundreth Good Pointes of
Husbandrie_, afterwards enlarged to _Fiue hundred pointes of good
Husbandrie_--passed in the first forty years after its publication in
1557. A further testimony to the popularity of the book lies in the
fact that copies of any one of the thirteen editions of this period are
very scarce, and nearly all imperfect. It certainly is a most attractive
handbook to farming, and one can easily imagine how the family copy
would be thumbed by father and son, consulting it on every occasion for
its practical advice, useful information, and homely maxims, till the
book fell to pieces. A glance at Tusser’s ‘Table of the pointes of
husbandrie mentioned in this booke’ will show that he does not confine
himself strictly to agricultural subjects. Here we find: ‘A description
of life and riches,’ ‘Against fantastical scruplenes,’ ‘A Christmas
caroll,’ ‘A Sonet against a slaunderous tongue,’ sandwiched in between
such titles as: ‘Seedes and hearbes for the kitchen,’ ‘A medicine for
faint cattle,’ ‘Howe to fasten loose teeth in a bullocke,’ and the
‘Abstract’ for every month in succession. His verses may not be
poetical, but they contain much matter plainly expressed in little room,
and their good rhythm and rhyme made them easy to remember. For example:
Get into the hopyard, for now it is time,
to teach Robin hop on his pole how to climb.
_Maies husbandrie._
When frost will not suffer to dike and to hedge,
then get thee a heat with thy beetle and wedge.
_Decembers husbandrie._
Keepe [scare away] crowes, good sonne,
see fencing be done.
_Octobers abstract._
Good dwelling giue bee,
or hence goes shee.
_Septembers abstract._
By sowing in wet,
is little to get.
_Marches abstract._
The better the muck,
the better good luck.
_Works after haruest._
Then there are everywhere the simple and kindly moral maxims, so
characteristic of their author, such as the advice concerning
trespassing sportsmen:
To hunters and haukers, take heede what ye saie,
milde answere with curtesie driues them awaie.
_Good husbandlie lessons._
or concerning sick servants:
To seruant in sicknesse see nothing ye grutch,
a thing of a trifle shall comfort him mutch.
_Afternoone workes._
[Sidenote: _Husbandry in Rhyme_]
‘Good husbandlie lessons’ stored up in rhymes in the manner of Tusser
may still be found in rural districts. For example: When the cuckoo
comes to the bare thorn, Sell your cow and buy your corn (Sus.). When
the slae tree is white as a sheet, Sow your barley, whether it be dry or
weet (Nhb.). When elum leaves are as big as a farden, It’s time to plant
kidney-beans in the garden. When the moon is at the full, Mushrooms you
may freely pull; But when the moon is on the wane, Wait ere you think to
pluck again (Ess.). Shear you sheep in May, and shear them all away
(Wor.). If you marl land, you may buy land; If you marl moss, there is
no loss; If you marl clay, you fling all away (Lin.).
There is an old farmer’s saying in Rutland: One boy is a boy, two boys
is half a boy, and three boys is no boy at all. According to a
Cumberland adage, the ‘good husband’--as Tusser would call him--says:
Come, goway to yer wark wid me, lads; while ‘unthrift his brother’ says:
Howay to yer wark, lads, and leaves them to go by themselves.
It is interesting to recognize familiar sayings under a figure taken
from farming. For instance: to have other oats to thresh, or another rig
to hoe, is equivalent to other fish to fry; to shear [reap] one’s own
rig, is to paddle one’s own canoe; to plough the headlands before the
butts, is to begin a thing at the wrong end. The _headland_ is the strip
of land left unploughed at the ends of a field on which the plough
turns, hence: to turn on a mighty narrow adlant, means to have a narrow
escape. _Pay-rent_ is a good practical synonym for profitable, e.g. A
proper pay-rent sort o’ pigs; A rare pay-rent piece o’ beans.
A _way-ganging_ crop is the last crop belonging to a tenant before he
leaves a farm, a phrase which is picturesquely applied to an old man
nearing his end.
[Sidenote: _Decay of old Farming Customs_]
Numbers of the old agricultural terms so common a generation or two
ago, have now become obsolete, since the implements to which they
belonged have given place to newer machinery. Twenty or thirty years
ago one was accustomed to hearing the thud of the flail resounding on
the barn floor, but now the threshing-machine does the work, and we
have to look in dictionaries if we want to understand what was meant
by a _dreshel_, and what parts of it were the _handstaff_, _soople_,
and _capel_, and what happened to the barley when submitted to the
_faltering-iron_. Reaping-machines, again, have superseded the older
methods of _shearing_ with the _sheckel_, the _badging-hook_, or the
_fagging-hook_. We seldom hear the sound of the mower whetting his
scythe, nor do we see Phillis hasting out of her bower ‘With Thestylis
to bind the sheaves’. These are sounds and sights to read of in poetry,
like the whilome glories of our wayside hedgerows, now cloaked under a
grey pall of dust thrown over them by the passing motor.
The decay of old customs belonging to farming is chiefly noticeable in
connexion with the ingathering of the harvest, and the celebration of
its completion. Many causes have combined of late years to make farming
an anxious and unremunerative industry, so that there is no longer the
real joy in harvest that there used to be; a fact which must be reckoned
together with the changes which have been wrought by the introduction of
machinery, and by the increase in means of locomotion which brings
hireling harvesters from distant parts, and carries away the young
people who used to grow up on the same farm where their fathers and
grandfathers had always worked.
[Sidenote: _The Harvest Home_]
In olden days, harvest time was the great social season of the year
on the farm, when master and man worked and rejoiced together in common
bonds of fellowship, and finally celebrated the festival of the Harvest
Home as one family. Tusser thus describes the old-time harvest:
In haruest time, haruest folke, seruants and all,
should make all togither good cheere in the hall;
And fill out the black boule of bleith to their song,
And let them be merie all haruest time long.
Once ended thy haruest, let none be begilde,
please [pay] such as did helpe thee, man, woman, and childe.
Thus dooing, with alway such helpe as they can,
thou winnest the praise of the labouring man.
_Augusts husbandrie._
The principal reaper was in some districts named the _harvest-lord_
(Lin. e.An.). It was his duty to go first in the row, and to regulate
the motions of the rest of the band. Tusser, who was an Essex man, says:
Grant haruest lord more by a penie or twoo,
to call on his fellowes the better to doo:
Giue gloues to thy reapers, a larges to crie,
and dailie to loiterers haue a good eie.
_Augusts husbandrie._
Next to him came the _harvest-lady_, the second reaper, who took the
_harvest-lord’s_ place if the latter were absent. In Shropshire the last
man of the whole band was termed the _lag-man_. Often three or four
reapers would each take a ridge and compete with one another as to who
should finish first. This was called _kemping_ (Sc. Irel. n.Cy.). The
_largess_ was a gift of money demanded by the reapers, either during the
harvest or at its conclusion. After receiving it, the custom was to cry
out three times: Halloo largess! This was the ceremony of _crying a
largess_ to which Tusser alludes in the verse quoted above. It continued
to be practised in parts of East Anglia till the latter half of last
century.
[Sidenote: _The Last Sheaf of Wheat_]
When the reaping of the last cornfield was all but finished, a small
patch of grain was left standing. It was then tied at the top with a
piece of ribbon, or the stalks were roughly plaited together, to form a
sheaf, and then the reapers placed themselves a few yards off, and
threw their sickles at it, competing for the honour of winning the _last
cut_. This last handful to be reaped was the trophy of the harvest-home
feast. It was frequently dressed up to appear like a rude human figure,
gaily decorated, and carried home in triumph. Afterwards it was usually
placed above the door of the farm-kitchen, or over the chimney-piece, to
remain there throughout the winter to bring good luck, and ward off
witchcraft. The ceremonies connected with this last sheaf, and the names
by which it was known varied in different places. It was called: the ben
(e.An.); cailleach (Irel.); churn or kirn (Sc. Irel. n.Cy.);
claaick-sheaf (Sc.); cripple-goat (I. of Skye); frog (Wor.); gilach
(Irel.); granny (Irel.); hare (Irel. Dev.); maiden (Sc.); mell (n.Cy.);
or when made up into a figure it was: the corn-baby; kirn-baby;
kirn-doll; mell-doll; harvest-queen. But perhaps the best-known name of
all is the south-west-Country _neck_, a term originally borrowed from
Scandinavia, cp. Norw. and Swed. dial. _nek_, a sheaf. Much has been
written about the ceremony of _Crying the neck_. A full account of it is
given in Hunt’s _Popular Romances of the West of England_, and a long
correspondence on the subject was kept up in the _Western Morning News_
in August 1898. Mrs. Hewitt, writing in 1900, says the custom ‘still
obtains in some parishes in the west of England’. She describes it thus:
‘When the last sheaf of wheat is cut at the end of August, the reapers
take the very last handful of straw and plait the ends together, tying
them with lengths of bright-coloured ribbons; then, lifting it high
above their heads, wave their sickles frantically, and shout:
We-ha-neck! we-ha-neck!
Well aplowed! well asowed!
We’ve areaped! and we’ve amowed!
Hurrah! hurrah! hurrah!
Well-a-cut, well abound!
Well-a-zot upon the ground!
We-ha-neck! we-ha-neck!
Hurrah! hurrah! hurrah!’
_Nummits and Crummits_, p. 96.
[Sidenote: _Crying the Mare_]
The exact manner of performing the ceremony and the words used vary in
different districts, the variations being mostly due to the fact that
this custom has been blended together with another called _Crying the
mare_ (Irel. Chs. Shr. Hrt.). Indeed, many writers have been hereby led
to confuse these two customs, which were originally quite distinct.
_Crying the mare_ was performed by the farm men who were first to finish
harvest in the neighbourhood. It was a mode of triumphing over their
neighbours by offering the services of an imaginary mare to help a
laggard farmer. The men assembled in the stackyard, or on some strip of
rising ground, and there divided themselves into two bands, and chanted
in loud voices the following dialogue. First band: I have her, I have
her, I have her. Second band: What hast thee? (Every sentence is
repeated three times.) A mare. Whose is her? H. B.’s (naming their
master whose corn is all cut). Where shall we send her? To C. D. (naming
some neighbour whose corn is left standing, and who therefore may be
supposed to need the loan of a mare). In parts of Shropshire it was
customary, some sixty or seventy years ago, actually to send a horse,
mounted by the head reaper.
The cart carrying home the last load was styled the Harvest-cart. It
was often decked out with ash-boughs and garlands, whilst on it rode
boys singing the traditional song appropriate to the occasion:
Mester ... ’es got ’is corn,
Well shorn, well mawn,
Never hulled ower, yet never stuck fast,
And ’is ’arvest-cart’s comin’ home at last.
Then came the harvest-home banquet, the _churn-supper_, _mell-supper_,
or _hockey_ (Hrt. e.An.), to which the labourers’ wives and children
were also invited. When the feasting was over, and the usual
harvest-songs had been sung, the rest of the evening was spent in
dancing and general rustic merriment.
The day when the farm hands resumed the usual order of work, which
would be paid for by the usual allowance of wages and drink, was known
in parts of Shropshire by the name of Sorrowful Monday.
[Sidenote: _Terms relating to Agriculture_]
Since farming is an industry covering the land, and not confined to
particular districts, like coal-mining or salt-making, it would be
possible to collect several different series of dialect terms relating
to land-tenure, haymaking, reaping, ploughing, &c., each belonging to a
specified geographical area. If we were travelling through the country
at the time of the _haysel_, or hay-harvest, we should have to call a
hay-cock a hay-cock wherever we met one, but it might locally be known
by the name of a _hatchel_, a _hob_, a _jockey-cock_, a _keil_, or a
_wad_, or by some other name equally unfamiliar to our ears. Or again,
later in the season, if we went into a cornfield and looked at the
sheaves set up to dry, each pile would be a yellow corn-stook and
nothing more to us with our limited vocabulary of the harvest field, but
it might stand there as a _hattock_, a _hile_, a _kiver_, a _mair_, a
_stitch_, &c., according to the district where it had been set up.
Farm labourers everywhere are accustomed to wear some sort of rough
gaiters to protect their legs from cold and wet, often it is worsted
stockings without feet, which serve this purpose, especially for walking
in snow. The various names for these gaiters in the different dialects
form a curious list. They are: bams, baffles, bofflers, cockers,
galligaskins, gamashes, hoggers, kitty-bats, loags, martyens, moggans,
scoggers, whirlers, yanks, &c. But one of the biggest lists of dialect
names might be found belonging to the slight refreshment taken by
labourers between meals, either at eleven o’clock or four in the
afternoon. Here is a selection of some of the names: bagging, bait,
bever, clocking, coger, dew-bit, docky, down-dinner, downdrins, elevens,
four-hours, jaw-bit, lump, nammet, i.e. noon-meat, O.E. _nōn-mete_,
nocket, nuncheon, undern.
If we turn to the animals on the farm, the sheep in its various stages
of growth and commercial value would probably be found to possess the
largest number of names. It would puzzle most people, other than those
to the manner born, to define all the technical terms in use, such as:
chilver, cull, dinmont, gimmer, he-der, shear-hog, wether-hog, theave,
thrinter, twinter, two-tooth.
[Sidenote: _Calls to Animals_]
More interesting, however, than mere names of the animals are the
words used by the farmer and his men in dealing directly with the
beasts under their control. A study of wagoners’ words raises one’s
notion of the intellectual level of cart-horses considerably.
All sorts of exact directions are conveyed to them through the
medium of interjections such as the following: Boc! Chee-eggin!
Come-other-whoa! Cubba-hoult! Hait! Hap! Har! Hauve! Joss! Kip! Mather!
Mock-mether-hauve! Ree! Ware-whoop! Weesh! Whet-gee! Wo-cum-huggin!
Woor-ree! Wug! The word _hait_ is found in Chaucer, cp. ‘The carter
smoot, and cryde, as he were wood, Hayt, Brok! hayt, Scot! what spare
ye for the stones,’ _Freres Tale_, ll. 244, 245. So too are _kip_, and
_joss_, cp. ‘Thise sely clerkes rennen up and down, With keep, keep,
stand, stand, Iossa, warderere,’ _Reves Tale_, ll. 180, 181.
Then there are all the mysteriously alluring cries which summon
creatures to the shippon, sty, or pen; and the authoritative words of
command which drive them in the way they should go. To take a few
examples. Cows may be addressed thus: Coop! Cush, cush!--cp. O.N. _kus!
kus!_ a milkmaid’s call--Hoaf! Hobe! Mull! or Mully! Proo! Proochy!
Prut! Calves: Moddie! Mog, mog, mog! Pui-ho! Sook, sook! Sheep: Co-hobe!
Ovey! Pigs: Check-check! Cheat! Dack, dack! Giss! or Gissy! Lix!
Ric-sic! Shug, shug, shug! Tantassa, tantassa pig, tow a row, a row!
Tig, tig, tig! Turkeys: Cobbler! Peet, peet, peet! Pen! Pur, pur, pur!
Geese: Fy-laig! Gag, gag, gag! Ob-ee! White-hoddy! Ducks: Bid, bid, bid!
Diddle! Dill, dill! Wid! Wheetie! Pigeons: Pees! Pod! Rabbits: Map!
It must be very confusing for animals transported to a distance to
understand the calls of a new and strange dialect. I have more than
once tried the effect of imitating the seductive tones of the Yorkshire
_Co-oop_ in addressing an Oxfordshire cow. But with her foot securely
planted on her native heath, she would either pay no heed whatever, or
else she would turn upon me the gently indulgent eye of a consciously
superior intelligence.
[Sidenote: _Sheep-scoring Numerals_]
In olden times it was customary among sheep-farmers and shepherds in
the Lake District and in the northern counties generally, to use Celtic
numerals for counting sheep. The traditional forms varied in different
localities, as may be seen from the various series which have been
collected and put on record by folklorists. The following are the
numbers up to ten formerly in use near Keswick: Yan, tyan, tethera,
methera, pimp, sethera, lethera, hovera, dovera, dick.
The custom of counting sheep by means of such numbers has now been
obsolete for about a hundred years, but it is a curious link with our
Celtic predecessors, coming down as it does so near to our own times.
Our Anglo-Saxon forefathers never amalgamated with the Celts, and the
Celtic language never seriously influenced English. The Celtic
loan-words borrowed by the Anglo-Saxons are comparatively few, and those
few, chiefly names of places and things of no special importance. From a
linguistic point of view it is strange to find such an everyday
implement as a set of numerals persisting in the spoken speech of a
people who hardly knew another word of the language of which these
formed part, and who of course had their own numerals. It is perhaps not
too romantic an explanation to suggest that among the few Celts who
became subjects to the foreign invaders were the humble shepherds who
had always tended sheep on the north-country moors and fells. The new
settlers would doubtless find it useful to keep them on in their
hereditary occupation, and in taking over the shepherd, they also took
over his system of numeration, which in his mind was indissolubly
associated with the sheep under his care.