This was plain speaking enough, but there is something quite inimitable in the matter-of-factness of the following story of an advertisement, which may tend to illustrate the Antiquary’s remark to Mrs. Macleuchar, anent the starting of a coach or fly to Queensferry.  A carrier, who plied his trade between Aberdeen and a village considerably to the north of it, was asked by one of the villagers, “Fan are ye gaen to the toon” (Aberdeen).  To which he replied, “I’ll be in on Monanday, God willin’ and weather permitting an’ on Tiseday, fither or no.”

It is a curious subject the various shades of Scottish dialect and Scottish expressions, commonly called Scotticisms.  We mark in the course of fifty years how some disappear altogether; others become more and more rare, and of all of them we may say, I think, that the specimens of them are to be looked for every year more in the descending classes of society.  What was common amongst peers, judges, lairds, advocates, and people of family and education, is now found in humbler ranks of life.  There are few persons perhaps who have been born in Scotland, and who have lived long in Scotland, whom a nice southern ear might not detect as from the north.  But far beyond such nicer shades of distinction, there are strong and characteristic marks of a Caledonian origin, with which some of us have had practical acquaintance.  I possess two curious, and now, I believe, rather scarce, publications on the prevalent Scotticisms of our speaking and writing.  One is entitled “Scotticisms designed to Correct Improprieties of Speech and Writing,” by Dr. Beattie of Aberdeen.  The other is to the same purpose, and is entitled, “Observations on the Scottish Dialect,” by the late Right Honourable Sir John Sinclair.  Expressions which were common in their days, and used by persons of all ranks, are not known by the rising generation.  Many amusing equivoques used to be current, arising from Scotch people in England applying terms and expressions in a manner rather surprising to southern ears.  Thus, the story was told of a public character long associated with the affairs of Scotland, Henry Dundas (first Viscount Melville), applying to Mr. Pitt for the loan of a horse “the length of Highgate;” a very common expression in Scotland, at that time, to signify the distance to which the ride was to extend.  Mr. Pitt good-humouredly wrote back to say that he was afraid he had not a horse in his possession quite so long as Mr. Dundas had mentioned, but he had sent the longest he had.  There is a well-known case of mystification, caused to English ears by the use of Scottish terms, which took place in the House of Peers during the examination of the Magistrates of Edinburgh touching the particulars of the Porteous Mob in 1736.  The Duke of Newcastle having asked the Provost with what kind of shot the town-guard commanded by Porteous had loaded their muskets, received the unexpected reply, “Ou, juist sic as ane shutes