e_, shriek;
_sid_, seed, i.e. saw; _pecked_, pitched, fallen headlong;
_bruck_, brook; _douked_, ducked; _'out_, hold; _bonk_, bank;
_wham_, home; _wunna_, was not; _winder-rags_, shreds; _djed_,
dead; _toud_, told; _what'n'ee_, what do you; _a nour_, an hour;
_sid_, seen; _lung_, long; _wun_, were.

SOUTHERN (Group 2): WILTSHIRE.

The following well-known Wiltshire fable is from _Wiltshire
Tales_, by J. Yonge Akerman (1853). I give it as it stands in the
Preface to Halliwell's Dictionary; omitting the "Moral."

The Harnet and the Bittle.

A harnet zet in a hollur tree--
A proper spiteful twoad was he;
And a merrily zung while he did zet
His stinge as shearp as a bagganet;
Oh, who so vine and bowld as I?
I vears not bee, nor wapse, nor vly!

A bittle up thuck tree did clim,
And scarnvully did look at him;
Zays he, "Zur harnet, who giv thee
A right to zet in thuck there tree?
Vor ael you zengs so nation vine,
I tell 'e 'tis a house o' mine!"

The harnet's conscience velt a twinge,
But grawin' bowld wi' his long stinge,
Zays he, "Possession's the best laaw;
Zo here th' sha'sn't put a claaw!
Be off, and leave the tree to me,
The mixen's good enough for thee!"

Just then a yuckel, passin' by,
Was axed by them the cause to try;
"Ha! ha! I zee how 'tis!" zays he,
"They'll make a vamous munch vor me!"
His bill was shearp, his stomach lear,
Zo up a snapped the caddlin' pair!

Notes.--Observe _z_ and _v_ for initial _s_ and _f_; _harnet_,
hornet; _bittle_, beetle; _zet_, sat; _proper_, very; _twoad_,
toad, wretch; _a_, he; _stinge_, sting; _bagganet_, bayonet.

_Thuck_, that; _clim_, climb; _giv_, gave; _zet_, sit; _ael_, all.

_Th' sha'sn't_, thou shalt not; _mixen_, dung-heap.

_Yuckel_, woodpecker; _axed_, asked; _vamous munch_, excellent
meal; _lear_, empty; _caddlin'_, quarrelsome.

SOUTHERN (Group 3): ISLE OF WIGHT.

The following colloquy is quoted in the _Glossary of Isle of Wight
Words_, E.D.S., 1881, at p. 50.

I recollect perfectly the late Mr James Phillips of Merston relating
a dialogue that occurred between two of his labourers relative to
the word _straddle-bob_, a beetle.... At the time of luncheon, one
of them, on taking his _bren-cheese_ (bread and cheese) out of a
little bag, saw something that had found its way there; which led
to the following discours