3 Hen. VI, I. ii. 42, 43.
Wretch (War. Wor. Glo. Bck.), used as a term of endearment, sympathy, or compassion, e.g. I set a deal o’ store by Lucy, poor wratch! cp.:
Excellent wretch! Perdition catch my soul,
But I do love thee!
Oth. III. iii. 90, 91.
Preservation of Historical Forms
Side by side with these historical meanings preserved in the dialects, are the historical forms. Many a word which we meet in the dialects in some unfamiliar shape, can be shown to be no mere vulgar mispronunciation or misspelling, but a genuine old form, once under distinguished patronage in our earlier literature. Or again, formations which appear to be ignorant errors in grammar can be shown to be grammatically regular, the divergence of the standard form being due to analogy, or some other influence. It is surprising to find what a number of cases there are where a word in literary English has become corrupt, whilst in the dialects it has followed its normal development. To take some examples of these justifiable dialect forms: alablaster (n. and midl. counties) for alabaster, e.g. It’s a straange nist bairn, it’s skin’s that clear it’s like alablaster, cp.:
Why should a man, whose blood is warm within,
Sit like his grandsire cut in alablaster?
M. Ven. I. i. 83, 84.