State

Idioms of the Mountains .Many expressions that are si ill in common use in llie western pari off INorlli Carolina dale back lo the middle Ages in England. .Mrs. Wilson sets forth some of I hem herewith. NOW and then we find writers who treat in a fun-making way the peculiarities of speech oc¬ casionally heard from the lips of a member of the older generation of Western North Carolina. I have no patience with such! The truth is: Those writers are only betraying their own ignorance. The charming idioms to which T refer had their beginning in the fourteenth century when England, restive under the rigid institutions of the Middle Ages — feudalism and the church— was beginning to show a faint effort to cast aside these political, social, and religious ideals. This was the age which produced a Wydiffe and a Chaucer. Then a century later these same expressions were a part of the great Renaissance, that period of re-birth or revival which gave distinction to a man as an individual and brought forth a Caxton, a Tyndale, a Spenser, and a Shakespeare. It is not surprising that such early English speech has remained so last¬ ing in the mountains of Western North Carolina. The Early Settlers To this magnificent wilderness with its gigantic peaks, its stupendous precipices, deep gorges, and winding streams came a sturdy band of tioneers, predominantly English. his group, whom Woodrow Wilson called "an indomitable people,” came to a repon of great fertility, a land abounding in game. Because of the great barrier formed by the Blue Ridge — thus cut off by lack of facili¬ ties for transportation — these hardy folk lived self-sustaining lives. Here they built their picturesque cabins. Mere, amid hardships, they clung tenaciously to the speech of their ancestors. The word " familiar " meant friend¬ ly to these mountain folk just as it aid in The Canterbury Tales where Chaucer described the Friar as “Full well beloved and familiar was he.” “HU” for it appears frequently in this same collection of stories. And By EDDIE W. WILSON here, also, may be found such plurals as I isles, nesles, and texles — the words being pronounced in two syllables. Love-making went on in the Caro¬ lina mountains and the lovers axed questions of each other as earlier lovers did in the pages of Chaucer. And ns the Good-wife of Bath was somewhat deef. this malady was known to exist in Western North Carolina, also. The melody of Spencer’s verse is interspersed with such words as clifl. elombe. ketch, lites (lunge), shyned, and misregard — words which were a part of the vocabulary of the English pioneers of the mountains. Certain of Shakespeare’s characters wore shoes called brogues and ate toilet . They allowed a thing to be true and aimed to do a given task. At times they were af eared. Two expres¬ sions which changed in form were “ne’er a" and “e’er a”; these became nary and ary. Still Survive Yes, the language of the Middle Ages and the Elizabethan period in England may still be heard in Western North Carolina. But imagine my surprise and delight when I was recently carried back to England of the eighth century by hearing one word. Eighth century! You know that was the period when the Angles and the Saxons were overrunning and conquering present England, absorb¬ ing tho inhabitants, and making the common speech of the English largely Anglo-Saxon. You see it happened this way: I was visiting my friend Mrs. Mollie Fisher of Cullowhco. Mrs. Fisher— or “Aunt Mollie” as a privileged number of us call her — will he ninety- two on April 7. She is a witty and lively talker, delightfully reminiscent of the past, surprisingly alert to the topics of the present. We were dis¬ cussing rationing together with our opportunity to go without, if neces¬ sary, in order that our men in the service and our Allies may have suf¬ ficient food. “Folks today want too much,” said Aunt Mollie. “ We used to get along with much less, and we were happy, too!” “Now, Aunt Mollie,” I teased. "You know you would have liked to have had plenty of Coca-Colas in those days!” "We didn't need such!” she re¬ torted. “We had cider and methig- lum.” Were my ears deceiving me? "Methiglum — Metheglin — Mead — Brewed honey and boiling wnfier. Can these all lie the same?” I ex¬ claimed to myself. Then I asked, “What was methiglum?” “Just boiling water poured over honey comb. Wo let that stand a spell. My, hut it made a good drink !’’ “Well, Aunt Mollie, your drink was truly an ancient one. Your ancestors brought the recipe from Euglaud !” I said. “It is far older than the pat¬ tern of the quilt there on your bed, older than the ballads I love to hear you sing." Back to Ancient Days Indeed, the methiglum of my dear old friend’s childhood days was the metheglin or mead which is men¬ tioned so frequently in Beowulf, that remarkable epic of the eighth century, which is considered the greatest of Old English poems — in fact, one of the finest epics of all literature. For years Aunt Mollie. who was born on Savannah Creek in Jackson County and has lived in that county all of her life, has been telling about the various rich experiences of her long career. And now at this particu¬ lar time she was opening up an en¬ tirely new field— no Elizabethan nor War-Between-thc-States associations here! No, her ancestors were even closely linked to the Age of Beowulf ! The I). A. Reynolds Basket riant at Yadkinville is the only factory in the state that manufactures tobacco baskets, turning out 50,000 of the shal¬ low containers in the six or seven months of annual production. 9