Theear, hoaf oot o’ seet, a bye corner I teùk, An’ thoo dūdn’t cū’ nār; nūt a smile nor a leùk Dūd té kest to poor me, as I dark’t i’ my neùk, An’ wūnder’t I’d trustit i’ thee. Thoo stack till Bess Bruff like a cockelty būr; An’ she cūtter’t wi’ thee jūst to greg Harry Scūrr;— When t’ cūshi’n com’ in thoo teùk t’ cūshi’n tull hur, An’ thoo glimed, when thoo kiss’t her, at me. But Harry an’ Bess meàd it up iv a crack; An’ noo, ’at thū’s hed a begonk, thoo cū’s back; But if _thū’s_ fūnd oot _thine_, I’ve fūnd oot _my_ mistak’, An’, I’ll ho’d mysel’ heart-heàl an’ free. Sooa Neddy, gud lad, dro’ thy steàk, an’ be gā’n; Amang thy oald chances thū’s m’appen finnd yan Ma’ be fain, though thū’s snaip’t her, to hev the’ ageàn, But, Eddy! that yan isn’t me. REMARKS ON THE CUMBERLAND DIALECT. The dialect of Cumberland, spoken in its purity only in the central parts of the county, may be admitted to be deficient in rhythm; and remarkable as it is for force and expression, its harshness of cadence renders it scarcely available for any poetry except the humorous or descriptive. By those unaccustomed or unattached to it, it may probably be considered hard and coarse even in prose compositions. Its principal peculiarity is to be found in its vowel and diphthongal sounds, which, for the most part, are made either broader or deeper than in ordinary pronunciation; and this may be indicated with sufficient ease and distinctness, by means of phonetic spelling, when written or printed, to enable any reader with a little practice and care to pronounce broad Cumbrian with tolerable correctness. The most important instance of this vowel peculiarity exists in the pronunciation of the long A and the short U, the former of which is sounded generally _yah_ and the latter _uh_; thus to secure the Cumbrian pronunciation—ale must be spelled _yahl_ and ace, _yahss_, lame is made _lyahm_, name _nyahm_, etc., etc., all monosyllabic, or, to prevent the accent being laid upon the Y, and so making two syllables, these words might be written _leahm_, _neahm_. As regards the U, the first syllable of cunning is in Cumberland lengthened out exactly to the sound of the German _kuhn_, and come is made _kuhm_. These sounds can only be conveyed by the interposition of the H. When I first scribbled in the folk-speech of Cumberland I wrote it after this fashion, and the efficacy of the method was proved by the fact that intelligent or painstaking readers, knowing nothing of the dialect as spoken, were able to repeat the verses called “Branthet Neuk Boggle” in a style that might have satisfied even an exigeant professor of our Cumbrian philology.