Though the word #twired# is not explained in Mr. Blunden's glossary
and the meaning is not evident from the context, we guess that he is
using it here of shape, in the sense of 'contorted', which would range
with the quotation from Burton (given in some dictionaries) 'No sooner
doth a young man see his sweetheart coming, but he ... slickes his
haire, twires his beard [&c.]'. Here _twires_, as latest edition of
_O.E.D._ suggests, may be a misprint for _twirls_. Older dictionaries
give wrong and misleading definitions of this word; and a spurious
_twire_, to sing, was inferred from a misreading 'twierethe' for
'twitereth' in Chaucer's _Boethius_, III m. 2. Modern authorities only
allow _twire_, to peep, as in Shakespeare's 28th Sonnet,
'When sparkling stars twire not, thou gildst the even'
(whence some had foolishly supposed that _twire_ meant twinkle) and in
Ben Jonson, _Sad Shepherd_, II. 1, 'Which maids will twire at, 'tween
their fingers'. The verb is still in dialectal use: _E.D.D._ explains it
'to gaze wistfully or beseechingly'.
27. 'The tiny frogs
Go yerking'. (69)
#Yerk.# The intrans. verb is to kick as a horse. The trans. verb is
quoted from Massinger, Herrick, and Burns, who has 'My fancy yerkit up
sublime': i.e. roused, lashed.