EXPRESSIVE SCOTTISH PHRASES

Otautau Standard and Wallace County Chronicle, Volume XI, Issue 522, 18 May 1915, Page 7

EXPRESSIVE SCOTTISH PHRASES

There are certain words and phrases composed of words not to be found m the dictionary, but which are m daily conversational use m various parts of Scotland to convey expressive meanings which the users appear to think cannot be adequately conveyed by the contents of our recognised vocabulary. I have culled a few of these gems, which I have heard m use m Forfarshire, Fifeshire, and Midlothian, and which, so far as I know, have not hitherto appeared m print. It is very likely that my little list can be supplemented. I think it was m Fife that I first heard tbe expression "Jessy-Kitty." It was used to . describe a young man with more girlishhess than manliness about him; for example, a fellow who threw a stone or a snowball like a woman. The Scottish "Jessy-Kitty" corresponds to the North of England " lassie-lad." Not far removed from " Jessy -Ki*tty" is the name "Sammy Dreep," which apparently is applied' to' a man with little vigor of character — m fine, a creature without any " smeddum " and little gumption — not much better than he who m Forfarshire is impatiently, denounced as a " dozened eediot." (Another expression which may fitly be placed m the same category as the two already mentioned is " Nosey Wax." This hails from Forfarshire, and denotes a simpleton who may be easily imposed upon. It is commonly used m some such way as this : — A person is asked to do something or go somewhere, and he, or she, will reply: " Nae fear; dinna ye tak' me for a nosey wax. Im no' m wi' a trip or a cairt o' hay." / Of course the assumption is that the person to whom the request is addressed is being taken advantage of. I have found a very interesting phrase m use m Midlothian — namely, " Trail the bauchle." This is applied to people who do not obey the Biblical injunction, " Withdraw thy foot from thy neighbor's' house lest he weary of thee"; but who are continually on tlie move — when they have the chance — from house to house or from shop to shop indulging m idle gossip or spreading scandal. One may m certain districts regularly hear some individual described thus: " Och, she's juist a regular trail the bauchle." It will be agreed that the phrase is not only appropriate but pungent. A loafer who prefers to live upon what he can pick up either from charity or dust-bins is called m some districts a "cinder mavis"; which may be regarded as equivalent to gutter-ranger. The phrase does not imply anything connected with Cinderella. There is- no romance about it. " '

Some phrases appear to have beer, coined simply from a whimsical disregard for and desire to be independent of . ordinary English. For example, we haye "pooch lids" instead of pocket flaps. .In ' Johnny Gibb of Guehetneuk ' and m William Beattie's 'Poems of Buchan ' there are to be found a number of Scottish words never now heard south of Aberdeenshire. Take the veiy opening words of Johnny Gibb : " Heely, beely, Tarn, ye glaikit stirk !" Tarn is forcibly reminded that he has not on the "bin' shelvins" of his cart; and Beattie employs such' phrases as " deil-he-licket" ("nothing") and " dreigh o' drawin'" ("slow at giving"). "Jock, whean did Tarn win hame last nioht?" "Faith, dinna speer at me. Lang afore 10 o'clock I wis sleepin' the sleep o' the juks." In this answer we have another example of that wayward originality which twists a conventional phrase out of its accepted setting. We are a perverse race, we Scots. The "Sammy Dreep " of the south would m Aberdeenshire be described as a " peer vratch," or (with disregard of gender), a " teem-heidit yow " (emrptyheaded owe). — John o* Groat {' Scotsman'),