202
NOTES AND QUERIES. [11 s. i. M AK . 12, 1910.
MS. stands absolutely alone here, and alone
gives the text correctly. I have lately
examined MS. Mm. 2. 5 in the Cambridge
University Library, and find (as expected)
that its text is here wrong.
I draw the following practical conclusion. In examining any MS. of ' The Canterbury Tales/ the first point to be considered is the state of the last six lines of the Friar's Pro- logue and the first eight lines of the Friar's Tale. And I throw out these two questions that will some day have to be solved, viz., (1) Why is the Harleian MS. here correct ? and (2) What are the names of the other MSS. (if any) that are here correct likewise ? So far, I find none ; but I know of eight that have gone wrong.
WALTER W. SKEAT.
" WIMPLE " AS APPLIED TO RUNNING
WATER.
LEXICOGRAPHERS and glossarists tend to overlook one of the meanings of this word as used in Scotland with reference to running water. Jamieson in the ' Scottish Dic- tionary, 1 after entering the three forms " wimpil,** " wympil,** and " womple," gives as two synonyms " wrap ** and " fold," and adds two apposite illustrations from Gavin Douglas and one from Spalding's ' Troubles.* He follows this with a second application of the term in the sense of "to perplex ; applied to a legal decision, 3 '- which he supports with the sentence from Fountain- hall, " This was thought an odd and wimpled interlocutor.' 1 Thus far the notion of wrapping or folding is presented distinctly enough, both directly and indirectly, all the extracts duly responding to the definition.
When we reach, however, the next head of the lexicographer's article, we find it less easy to grasp his argument and to acquiesce in his conclusion. As his third meaning of " wimpil, ** &c., he gives "To move in a meandrous way, applied to a stream, ** and quotes in illustration this couplet from Allan Ramsay :
With me thro' howms and meadows stray, Where wimpling waters make their way.
Surely the obvious inference from the poet*s language is that, whatever may be the character of the stream whether it is moving right onward or meandering the epithet " wimpling " is applied not to it, but to the surface of its waters. These display features suggestive of wrapping folding, apart altogether from the given li of the current. They are concerned in the
completion of a grand ceaseless progress
rregular, wonderfully chequered, pic-
turesquely discursive and they wimple,
or perform countless involutions and evolu-
ions, as they go. The attention is recalled
to this essential consideration by the etymo-
ogical statement with which Jamieson
3loses his account of this Scottish verb.
' Teut. urimpel-en, n he writes, " velare ;
nvolvere, implicare ; Flandr. wompelen, n
ihus clearly suggesting the sparkling folds,
the "multitudinous laughter," and the
rippling movement of running water.
In his allusions to streams Burns frequently uses "wimple."' He has it twice in ' Hallowe'en. In the second stanza of this poem he lays the scene of his action Among the bonnie, winding banks Where Boon rins, wimplin', clear.
That is to say, he thinks of the river both as winding because of the conformation of its banks, and as wimpling owing to the character of its channel. It is the same with the second instance, which occurs in the famous descriptive passage beginning : Whiles owre a lin the burnie plays, As through the glen it wimpl't.
With regard to the former of these examples two capable editors , agree in explaining that it means " meandering.-* These are Angus Macpherson in the handy "People's Centenary Edition" of 1859 and Scott Douglas in his generally admir- able presentation of the ' Poetical Works.* The second use of the word is not glossed by Macpherson, who probably thought a repetition of a synonym superfluous ; and it is defined by Scott Douglas as " sported,'* which leaves much to the reader's imagina- tion. In reference to the wimpling worm of ' Scotch Drink,* the earlier of these editors gives ' ' twisting ** as the equivalent, while the later chooses " winding.** Macpherson's is perhaps the preferable explanation, as it is more suggestive than the other of the wraps and folds incidental to the process of wimpling. Burns's further use of the term is either quietly ignored by both expositors or explained in accordance with their preconceived notion of meandering.
Christopher North, with his easy and vigorous command of even the nuances of Lowland Scotch, introduces " wimple ** in a notable passage of description given in the ' Noctes * for January, 1835 (* Noctes Ambrosianee,* iv. 220). He makes the Ettrick Shepherd discuss the Scottish climate with its whimsical moods and the contrasts it presents within comparatively short
