A Scots mist will weet an Englishman to the skin. A proverb, evidently of Caledonian origin, arising from the frequent complaints made by English visitors of the heavy mists which hang about our hills, and which are found to annoy the southern traveller as it were downright rain.

Keep your ain fish-guts to your ain sea-maws. This was a favourite proverb with Sir Walter Scott, when he meant to express the policy of first considering the interests that are nearest home.  The saying savours of the fishing population of the east cost.

A Yule feast may be done at Pasch.  Festivities, although usually practised at Christmas, need not, on suitable occasions, be confined to any season.

It’s better to sup wi’ a cutty than want a spune. Cutty means anything short, stumpy, and not of full growth; frequently applied to a short-handled horn spoon.  As Meg Merrilies says to the bewildered Dominie, “If ye dinna eat instantly, by the bread and salt, I’ll put it down your throat wi’ the cutty spune.”

“Fules mak feasts and wise men eat ’em, my Lord.”  This was said to a Scottish nobleman on his giving a great entertainment, and who readily answered, “Ay, and Wise men make proverbs and fools repeat ’em.”

A green Yule[138] and a white Pays[139] mak a fat kirk-yard. A very coarse proverb, but may express a general truth as regards the effects of season on the human frame.  Another of a similar character is, An air[140] winter maks a sair[141] winter.

Wha will bell the cat? The proverb is used in reference to a proposal for accomplishing a difficult or dangerous task, and alludes to the fable of the poor mice proposing to put a bell about the cat’s neck, that they might be apprised of his coming.  The historical application is well known.  When the nobles of Scotland proposed to go in a body to Stirling to take Cochrane, the favourite of James the Third, and hang him, the Lord Gray asked, “It is well said, but wha will bell the cat?” The Earl of Angus accepted the challenge, and effected the object.  To his dying day he was called Archibald Bell-the-Cat.

Ye hae tint the tongue o’ the trump. “Trump” is a Jew’s harp.  To lose the tongue of it is to lose what is essential to its sound.

Meat and mass hinders nae man. Needful food, and suitable religious exercises, should not be spared under greatest haste.

Ye fand it whar the Highlandman fand the tangs (i.e. at the fireside).  A hit at our mountain neighbours, who occasionally took from the Lowlands—­as having found—­something that was never lost.

His head will ne’er rive (i.e. tear) his father’s bonnet.  A picturesque way of expressing that the son will never equal the influence and ability of his sire.

His bark is waur nor his bite. A good-natured apology for one who is good-hearted and rough in speech.