s, yehe man
and his ayers), hath an aunchant and ondowghted right to do his
dessyer attonys. "Yea sewer," said a myry fellawe (for such as be
myrie will make myrye jests)--"even as good right as a pertre to yield
peres, and praty pygys to eat them."'

It is, of course, only for the spelling, or various spellings, of
these words that the bishop is responsible, they being here
arbitrarily brought together from various parts of his work merely to
form a specimen. There can be no doubt that he would have pronounced
the words 'people' and 'merry' in one uniform manner wherever they
occur; but it is curious to consider how little we can judge
respecting the pronunciation of our forefathers. Their _litera scripta
manet_; but how they vocalised it, we cannot always decide. If the
reader takes up any edition of Sternhold and Hopkins, printed less
than a hundred years ago, he may, I believe, read in Psalm lxxix--

O God, the Gentiles do invade,
thine heritage to spoil:
Jerusalem an heap is made--
thy temple they defile.

Any one who is aware how many of what are called 'vulgarisms' in
pronunciation are in fact 'archaisms,' will naturally think that the
ancient pronunciation of 'spoil,' like the modern vulgar one, was
'spile.' But if he goes to one old black letter--say that printed by
John Windet for the assignees of Richard Day in 1593--he will find in
the fourth line 'defoile;' and if he goes to another edition he may
find 'defoyle;' and he will learn that in speculating on such matters,
he must be on his guard against modernisers, and go to originals. Even
then the rhymes of our ancestors teach us much less of their
pronunciation than we might expect; and the curious glimpses which we
sometimes get from them, and from other sources, are only enough to
make us wish for more. Take, for instance, Master Holofernes's
vituperation of Don Adrian de Armado in _Love's Labour Lost_, and see
what you can make of it: 'I abhor such phantasms, such insociable and
point-devise companions, such rackers of orthography, as to speak
_dout_ fine, when he should say _doubt_; _det_, when he should
pronounce _debt_; d, e, b, t; not d, e, t; he clepeth a calf, _cauf_;
half, _hauf_; neighbour vocatur _nebour_; neigh abbreviated _ne_: this
is abominable, which we would call _abhominable_.' Such a passage is
curious, coming from one of whom it was asked: 'Monsieur, are you not
lettered?' and answered: 'Yes, yes; he teaches boys the Hor