AS you have not unfrequently admitted into your Miscellany curious pieces of composition in the dialects of our country, I have procured from the Shetland Islands a specimen of the language still spoken among the common people there, with the hope of seeing it perpetuated in your pages. I had endeavoured to procure in manuscript or print some glossary or list of words peculiar to that group of Islands; but, instead of such a work, received the following facetious letter, which was many years since sent by a gentleman of Shetland to his friend in Liverpool; several copies of it have been circulated in manuscript, but I am assured that it has never appeared in print. The narrative, it is plain, has been contrived to embody in it as many words and phrases peculiar to the vulgar language of the district as its compass would admit of. Though the translation with which I have accompanied it, has undergone the revisal both of scholars and a native of the country, it is still, I fear, not free from errors; for this is the only specimen of the Zetlandic tongue that I have seen; and my knowledge of the Anglo and Scoto-Northumbrian dialects does not furnish me with a key to some of its terms and phrases. I have, however, endeavoured to render it as easy and literal as I can. The words of the original should, I am told, be pronounced exactly as they are spelled. J. H.
Twartree deys sinsyne, wir Jonie wrett me tree or fower lynes wi Andru Hey, itt wiz kummin dis weigh whidder or no, an se he tuik hit wi him. Heez a fyne sheeld dat Andru, gude lukk sitt i his fes—an sek an a boorlie man az heez growan tù an wid be ower weel faard gin hitt wiz na fore yun busks o’ hare it he heaz apun his fes. O dwyne yun fasin, gin hit beena da vyldest itt ivvir dere faan apun yitt. I kenna whatt itts lek, bitt am shùre itts no lek nethin kirsint. Se mith I gitt helt az I tink hit wid gluff da ful teef himsell. What tinks du whinn Andru kam in, I wiz dat weigh drumfoondit, itt I kent him no for a sertan tyme. I nevvir gat sek an a flegg i ma lyfe insep e nycht kummin fre da ela, itt I mett Tammie o’ Skae (saal be in gloary) abùn Trullia watter, rydin apo Peter o’ Hundegird’s blessit hoarse, wi a sheep best a fore him. Or dan annidder tyme it I kam apo Jeemie Tamsin markin up wir pellat Rùll i da hùmin o’ da eenin aboot twa bocht lent abùn da krù dekk o’ Oxigill i da hill o’ Valafiel, bitt hit wiz na fur himm itt I glufft, bitt du kens I nevvir hedd ne gritt lekkin fur da hills, at datt partiquhalar tyme o’ nycht, an whinn I lichtit apo himm, hee wiz staandin wee hiz feet paald fornent a brugg, a lokkin da rùll aboot da kraig, wee a bluidie tnyfe atill hiz teeth an da rumple o’ da steag[1] wiz waadg’d up till a grett mukkle odias whyte stean, se itt da kretar kùd na hae ne pooster ta mùv neddir da te weigh or da tidder, mair iz ginn heed been shoarded in a
↑A staig or stag in Zetland, is a young stallion: in the north of England, a colt of a year old.
Two or three days since our John wrote me three or four lines by Andrew Hey, who was coming this way whether or not, and so he took it with him. He is a fine fellow that Andrew. Good luck sit on his face! And such a stately man as he is grown too: and would be over well looking if it was not for yon bushes of hair that he has upon his face. O confound yon fashion! if it be not the ugliest that they ever fell upon yet. I know not what it is like, but am sure it is not like any thing christened. So might I get health, as I think it would frighten the foul thief himself. What think you, when Andrew came in, I was that way stupefied, that I knew him not for a certain time I never gat such a fright in my life, except one night coming fra the market that I met Tommy of Skae (his soul be in glory!) above Trullia water, riding upon Peter of Hundegird’s blessed horse, with a sheep beast before him. Or than another time, that I came upon Jemmy Tamsin fastening our stallion colt in the dusk of the evening about two sheep folds in length above the sheep-cote dike of Oxigill, in the hill of Valafiel; but it was not of him that I was afraid; but you know I never had any great liking for the hills at that particular time of night. And when I lighted upon him, he was standing with his feet striding out before a brow, and holding the colt by the neck, with a bloody knife between his teeth, and the rump of the colt was wedged up to a very great, large, white stone, so that the creature could not have power to move either the one way or the other, more than if he had been fastened in a noose. And so
