The Providence news. (Providence [R.I.]) 1891-1906, 1892-01-04
SOME SCOTCH IDIOMS
That Bloom Bright Among the Gorse
and Heather.
CONF USIONS OF SHALL AND WILL.
Odd Phrases in Connection with Food
How Novelist Gets Over Certain
Dinculties-A Horse That Was Not
Long Enough to Fill the Bill.

Perhaps tho commonest errors that
Scotchmen-evsn well educated Scotch
men-maks are In the use of "shalP and
will" Everybody, we suppose, knows
the good old story Of the Scotchman drown
ing In the Thames, who shouts cut, II will
be drowned, and nobody shall help me-"
A We'll known lady novelist In Scotland
says that her rule for the use Of these aux
iiaries Il to substitute the one for the other
when correcting her proofsheets. Knowing
that In the heat of composition she 10 most
likely to use the word that nature prompts,
which. she being scotch, is nine cases out
Of ten likely to be wrong. she thinks her
plan a capitsl substitute for instructive
knowledge.
Scotch people have some curious express
sions In connection with food. Thus they
sup" their broth. aud they speak Of broth
or porridgs in the plural. e. g., "rd like
few broth or "They are too salt" The
English usage, as ''sweet butter" for fresh
butter, sweet milk" for new milk. A
soup plate u called q deep plate; broiled
steak il "brandered;" tes is infused" or
more commonly masked" and the kettle
is said ITO come to the boil" In phrases
such as bread and butter, bread and milk.
bread and cheese, the order Of the words is
usually reversed In Scotland, as milk and
bread"
Some Scotch idioms which are in daily
use are exceedingly absurd. For instance,
the phrase "the length Of" instead Of las
far as" is continually used when speaking
Of actual distance Vscount Melville, who
was a thorough Sootchman, once asked
Pitt for the loan Of . horse tho length Of
Highgate Hill. meaning Of course that the
animal was to carry him as far as that
locality Pitt regretted that he had not q
horse Of the required length. but sent him
his longest. It Is quito common, too to
hear an anxious mother In Scotland telling
her children to "ohange their feet. instead
of their shoes, on wet day.
Besides changing his feet-or himself, as
the expression Is when he is thoroughly
wet-a Scotchman does other equally
strange things, or. at all events, speaks of
doing them; such a. looking over win
dow, going into q box In search Of some
thing, sitting into the fire when he is cold,
walking through his sleep, sitting under
his clergyman when he attends his church
or putting his horses into his carriage. He
has also the unusual power OF being able
to feel q smell. As II fearful to commit
himself to an unwArranted statement. he
can only say tnSt nc - Qulto DcttcTs not
that he Is quite we'll
"Honestlike" in Scotland has no moral
significance; it Is equivalent to good look
ing. When you are failing fast" you are
not on the verge Of bankruptcy, as would
occur to an English ear. but becoming fee
BILE In health. When q Scotchman tells
you that he did not mind" what you said
he Is not guilty Of deliberately paying no
heed to you; his memory only has been at
fault. And Scotch father who "chal
lenges" his son for telling fbs does not
mean to fight him. but merely rebukes
him.
The weather Is rs much, perhaps more, a
subject Of conversation in Scotland as in
England. but a Scotchman uses different
terms in charscterizing it. Thus he speaks
of soft day for rainy day, blowy for
windy weather, fresh for a thaw. 1t
rains hard in Scotland, not fast. and the
weather there is coarse. not rough.-Lon
don Tit-Bits.