#Wide# as a subst. is hardly recognized. Tennyson is quoted, 'The
waste wide of that abyss', but as _waste_ is a recognized substantive
the authority is uncertain.
In the above examples we have taken such words as best answered our
purpose, neglecting many which have almost equal claims. The richness of
the vocabulary in unusual words and in words carrying unusual meanings
forbids complete examination; as will be seen by a rough classification
of some of those which we have passed over.
To begin with the words which our author uses well, we will quote as an
example all the passages in which #writhe# occurs. The transitive
verb which is perhaps in danger of neglect is very valuable, and it is
well employed. These passages will also fully exhibit the general
quality of Mr. Blunden's diction.
'But no one loves the aguish mist
That writhes its way at eventide
Along the copse's waterside'. (3)
'But now the sower's hand is writhed
In livid death '. (25)
'To-morrow's brindled shouting storms with flood
The purblind hollows with a leaden rain
And flat the gleaning-fields to choking mud
And writhe the groaning woods with bursts of pain'. (42)
'The lispering aspens and the scarfed brook-grasses
With wakened melancholy writhe the air'. (53)
#Dimpling# is well and poetically used in
'While the woodlark's dimpling rings
In the dim air climb'. (21)
and also _quag_ (verb) (2), _seething_ (3), _channelled_ (9), _bunch_
(11), _jungled_ (11), _rout_ (verb) (12), _fluster_ (13), _byre_ (13),
_plash_ (shallow water) (19), _tantalise_ (neut. v.) (36), _hutched_
(43), _flounce_ (44), _rootle_ (45), _shore_ (verb) (59). _Lair_ (verb)
(43) does not seem a useful word.
Next, words somewhat obscurely or fancifully used are _starving_ (1),
_stark_ (10), _honeycomb_ (15), _cobbled_ (of pattens) (16), _lanterned_
(24), _well_ (49), _bergomask_ (for village country dances?) (25),
_belvedere_ (of the spider's watch tower) (26).
While the following seem to us incorrectly used: _mumbling_ (23) used of
wings; the word is confined to the mouth whether as a manner of eating
or of speaking: _crunch_ (28) where the frosts crunch the grass: whereas
they only make it crunchable. _maligns_ (54) used as a neuter verb
without precedent, _chinked_ (58) of light passing through a chink:
and note the homophone chink, used of sound. And then the line
'The blackthorns clung with heapen sloes' (55)
contains two reprehensible liberties, because _clung_ in its
original proper sense means congealed or shrivelled; to _cling_ was an
intransitive verb meaning to adhere together: its modern use is to stick
fast [to something]--and secondly, _heapen_ is not a grammatical form;
the p.p. is _heaped_.