Ray, in his _Gloss. Northanymbr._, has "unlead, nomen opprobrii;" but he gives a false derivation: Grose, in his _Provincial Glossary_, "unleed or unlead, a general name for any crawling venomous creature, as a toad, &c. It is sometimes ascribed to a man, and then it denotes a sly wicked fellow, that in a manner creeps to do mischief. See Mr. Nicholson's Catalogue." In the 2d edition of Mr. Brockett's _Glossary_, we have: "Unletes, displacers or destroyers of the farmer's produce." This provincial preservation of a word of such rare occurrence in Anglo-Saxon, and of which no example has yet been found in old English, is a remarkable circumstance. The word has evidently signified, like the Gothic, in the first place _poor_; then _wretched_, _miserable_; and hence, perhaps, its opprobrious sense of _mischievous_ or _wicked_. "In those rude times when wealth or movable property consisted almost entirely of living money, in which debts were contracted and paid, and for which land was given in mortgage or sold; it is quite certain that the serfs were transferred with the land, the lord considering them as so much live-stock, or part of his _chattels_." A vestige of this feeling with regard to dependants remains in the use of the word _Man_ (which formerly had the same sense as _lede_). We still speak of "a general and his men," and use the expression "our men." But, happily for the masses of mankind, few vestiges of serfdom and slavery, and those in a mitigated form, now virtually exist. S.W. SINGER. April 16. 1850. [Footnote 1: It occurs many times in the Moeso-Gothic version of the Gospels for [Greek: ptochos]. From the Glossaries, it appears that iungalauths is used three times for [Greek: neaniskos], a young man; therefore lauths or lauds would signify simply _man_; and the plural, laudeis, would be _people_. See this established by the analogy of vairths, or O.H.G. virahi, also signifying people. Grimm's _Deutsche Gram._ iii. 472., note. "Es konnte zwar _unlêds_ (pauper) aber auch _unlêths_ heissen."--_D. Gr._ 225.] [Footnote 2: Sir F. Palgrave has given this extract in the Appendix to his _Rise and Progress of the English Commonwealth_, p. ccccvii., where, by an error of the press, or of transcription, the word stands _lich_. It may be as well to remark, that the corresponding word in Latin formulas of the same kind is "catallis," _i.e. chattels_. A passage in Havelok, v. 2515., will clearly demonstrate that _lith_ was at least one kind of _chattel_, and equivalent to _fe_ (fee). "Thanne he was ded that Sathanas Sket was seysed al that his was, In the King's hand il del, _Lond_ and _lith_, and other _catel_, And the King ful sone it yaf Ubbe in the hond with a fayr staf, And seyde, 'Her ich sayse the In al the _lond_ in al the _fe_.'"]