Superstitious: A correspondent informs me that in some parts of Mid-Lothian the people constantly use the word "superstitious" for "bigoted;" thus, speaking of a very keen Free Church person, they will say, "He is awfu' supperstitious."
Kail in England simply expresses cabbage, but in Scotland represents the chief meal of the day. Hence the old-fashioned easy way of asking a friend to dinner was to ask him if he would take his kail with the family. In the same usage of the word, the Scottish proverb expresses distress and trouble in a person's affairs, by saying that "he has got his kail through the reek." In like manner haddock, in Kincardineshire and Aberdeenshire, used to express the same idea, as the expression is, "Will ye tak your haddock wi' us the day?" that fish being so plentiful and so excellent that it was a standing dish. There is this difference, however, in the local usage, that to say in Aberdeen, Will you take your haddock? implies an invitation to dinner; whilst in Montrose the same expression means an invitation to supper. Differences of pronunciation also caused great confusion and misunderstanding. Novels used to be pronounced novels; envy envy; a cloak was a clock, to the surprise of an English lady, to whom the maid said, on her leaving the house, "Mem, winna ye tak the clock wi' ye?"
The names of children's diseases were a remarkable item in the catalogue of Scottish words:--Thus, in 1775, Mrs. Betty Muirheid kept a boarding-school for young ladies in the Trongate of Glasgow, near the Tron steeple. A girl on her arrival was asked whether she had had smallpox. "Yes, mem, I've had the sma'pox, the nirls[63], the blabs[64], the scaw[65], the kinkhost[66], and the fever, the branks[67] and the worm[68]."
There is indeed a case of Scottish pronunciation which adds to the force and copiousness of our language, by discriminating four words, which, according to English speaking, are undistinguishable in mere pronunciation. The words are--wright (a carpenter), to write (with a pen), right (the reverse of wrong), rite (a ceremony). The four are, however, distinguished in old-fashioned Scotch pronunciation thus--1, He's a wiricht; 2, to wireete; 3, richt; 4, rite.
I can remember a peculiar Scottish phrase very commonly used, which now seems to have passed away. I mean the expression "to let on," indicating the notice or observation of something, or of some person.--For example, "I saw Mr. ---- at the meeting, but I never let on that I knew he was present." A form of expression which has been a great favourite in Scotland in my recollection has much gone out of practice--I mean the frequent use of diminutives, generally adopted either as terms of endearment or of contempt. Thus it was very common to speak of a person whom you meant rather to undervalue, as a mannie, a boddie, a bit boddie, or a wee bit mannie. The Bailie in Rob Roy, when he intended to represent his party as persons of no importance, used the expression, "We are bits o' Glasgow bodies."
An admirable Scotch expression I recollect from one of the Montrose ladies before referred to. Her niece was asking a great many questions on some point concerning which her aunt had been giving her information, and coming over and over the ground, demanding an explanation how this had happened, and why something else was so and so. The old lady lost her patience, and at last burst forth: "I winna be back-speired noo, Pally Fullerton." Back-speired! how much more pithy and expressive than cross-examined! "He's not a man to ride the water on," expresses your want of confidence and of trust in the character referred to. Another capital expression to mark that a person has stated a point rather under than over the truth, is, "The less I lee," as in Guy Mannering, where the precentor exclaims to Mrs. MacCandlish, "Aweel, gudewife, then the less I lee." We have found it a very amusing task collecting together a number of these phrases, and forming them into a connected epistolary composition. We may imagine the sort of puzzle it would be to a young person of the present day--one of what we may call the new school. We will suppose an English young lady, or an English educated young lady, lately married, receiving such a letter as the following from the Scottish aunt of her husband. We may suppose it to be written by a very old lady, who, for the last fifty years has not moved from home, and has changed nothing of her early days. I can safely affirm that every word of it I have either seen written in a letter, or have heard in ordinary conversation:--
"Montrose, 1858[69].
"My Dear Niece--I am real glad to find my nevy has made so good a choice as to have secured you for his wife; and I am sure this step will add much to his comfort, and we behove to rejoice at it. He will now look forward to his evening at home, and you will be happy when you find you never want him. It will be a great pleasure when you hear him in the trance, and wipe his feet upon the bass. But Willy is not strong, and you must look well after him. I hope you do not let him snuff so much as he did. He had a sister, poor thing, who died early. She was remarkably clever, and well read, and most intelligent, but was always uncommonly silly[70] In the autumn of '40 she had a sair host, and was aye speaking through a cold, and at dinner never did more than to sup a few family broth. I am afraid she did not change her feet when she came in from the wet one evening. I never let on that I observed anything to be wrong; but I remember asking her to come and sit upon the fire. But she went out, and did not take the door with her. She lingered till next spring, when she had a great income[71], and her parents were then too poor to take her south, and she died. I hope you will like the lassie Eppie we have sent you. She is a discreet girl, and comes of a decent family. She has a sister married upon a Seceding minister at Kirkcaldy. But I hear he expects to be transported soon. She was brought up in one of the hospitals here. Her father had been a souter and a pawky chiel enough, but was doited for many years, and her mother was sair dottled. We have been greatly interested in the hospital where Eppie was educate, and intended getting up a bazaar for it, and would have asked you to help us, as we were most anxious to raise some additional funds, when one of the Bailies died and left it feuing-stances to the amount of 5000 pounds, which was really a great mortification. I am not a good hand of write, and therefore shall stop. I am very tired, and have been gantin[72] for this half-hour, and even in correspondence gantin' may be smittin'[73]. The kitchen[74] is just coming in, and I feel a smell of tea, so when I get my four hours, that will refresh me and set me up again.--I am, your affectionate aunt,
ISABEL DINGWALL."
This letter, then, we suppose written by a very old Forfarshire lady to her niece in England, and perhaps the young lady who received it might answer it in a style as strange to her aunt as her aunt's is to her, especially if she belonged to that lively class of our young female friends who indulge a little in phraseology which they have imbibed from their brothers, or male cousins, who have, perhaps for their amusement, encouraged them in its use. The answer, then, might be something like this; and without meaning to be severe or satirical upon our young lady friends, I may truly say that, though I never heard from one young lady all these fast terms, I have heard the most of them separately from many:--