—that is, number of sheep: we find its allied word "toll," to count. "I toll ten cows," is no very uncommon expression. Then, too, we have the word "tole," used, as I believe it still is in America, of enticing animals, and thus metaphorically applied to other matters. So, in this last sense, Milton speaks of the title of a book, "Hung out like a toling sign-post to call passengers."[1]
Again, too, the bat is here called "rere-mouse" (from the Old-English hrere-mus, literally the raw-mouse), with its varieties rennie-mouse and reiny-mouse,[2] whilst the adjective "rere" is sometimes used, as in Wiltshire, for raw. On the other hand, the word fliddermouse, or, as in the eastern division of Sussex, flindermouse (from the High-German fledermaus), does not, to my knowledge, occur. In the Midland counties it is often known as "leathern wings" (compare ledermus); and thus, Shakspeare, with his large vocabulary, using up every phrase and metaphor which he ever met, makes Titania say of her fairies:—
(Midsummer Night's Dream, Act ii., sc. 3.)
To take a few words common, not only to the New Forest, but to various parts of the West of England, we shall see how strong is the Old-English element here in the common speech. The housewife still baits (betan, literally to repair, and so, when
- ↑ Apology for Smectymnus, quoted by Richardson. The word is even used by Locke.
- ↑ Miss Gurney, in her Glossary of Norfolk Words, gives "ranny" as a shrew-mouse. Transactions of the Philological Society', 1855, p. 35. The change of e into a is worth noticing, as illustrative of what was said in the previous chapter, p. 167, of the pronunciation of the West-Saxon.
