“Pekokys and pertrikys perboylyd _schyn_ be.”[43] --(Liber Cure Cocorum, p. 29.) “For þer bene bestes þat _schyn_ be rost.”[44] --(_Ibid._ p. 34.) “Alle _schun_ be draȝun, Syr, at þo syde.”[45] --(_Ibid._ p. 35.) “Seche ferlies _schyn_ falle.”[46] --(Robson’s Met. Rom. p. 12, l. 4.) III. Nothing is more common in the present poems than the use of _hit_ as a genitive = its, which is also found in the Lancashire romances. “Forþy þe derk dede see hit is demed ever more, For _hit_ dedeȝ of deþe duren þere ȝet.”[47] --(Patience, l. 1021.) “And, as hit is corsed of kynde & _hit_ coosteȝ als, Þe clay þat clenges þer-by arn corsyes strong.”[48] --(_Ibid._ l. 1033.) “For I wille speke with the sprete, And of _hit_ woe wille I wete, Gif that I may _hit_ bales bete.”[49] --(Robson’s Met. Romances, p. 5, ll. 3, 4.) The present dialect of Lancashire still retains the uninflected genitive:-- “So I geet up be strike o’ dey, on seet eawt; on went ogreath tilly welly coom within two mile oth’ teawn; when, os tha dule woud height, o tit wur stonning ot an ale heawse dur; on me kawve (the dule bore eawt _it_ een for me) took th’ tit for _it_ mother, on woud seawk her.”[50] (Tummus and Meary). Thus much for the dialectical peculiarities of our author. The scanty material at our disposal must be a sufficient excuse for the very meagre outline which is here presented to the reader. As our materials increase, the whole question of Early English dialects will no doubt receive that attention from English philologists which the subject really demands, and editors of old English works will then be enabled to speak with greater confidence as to the language and peculiarities of their authors. Something might surely be done to help the student by a proper classification of our manuscripts both as to date and place of composition. We are sadly in want of unadulterated specimens of the Northumbrian and East-Midland idioms during the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. There must surely be some records of these dialects in our university libraries which would well repay editing.[51] [Footnote 25: Polychronicon R. Higdeni, ap. Gale, p. 210, 211. See Garnett’s Philological Essays, p. 43, and Specimens of Early English, p. 338.] [Footnote 26: It is to be regretted that Garnett did not enter upon details, and give his readers some tests by which to distinguish the “five distinctly marked forms.”] [Footnote 27: In English works of the fourteenth century the _-en_ of the Midland, and the _-es_ of the Northumbrian is frequently dropped, thus gradually approximating to our modern conjugation.] [Footnote 28: We are here speaking of works written in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries.] [Footnote 29: Robert of Brunne, in his “Handlyng Synne,” often employs it instead of _-en_, but only for the sake of the rhyme.]