Even a glance at this comparative table reveals a peculiarity of the Wessex dialect which properly belongs neither to Mercian nor to Modern English, viz. the use of the diphthong ea (in which each vowel was pronounced separately) instead of simple a, before the sounds denoted by l, r, h, especially when another consonant follows.  We find accordingly such Wessex forms as eall, ceald, fealleth, _-feald_, gealla, healf, healt, nearu, eald, seald, weall, gearo, where the Old Mercian has simply all, cald, falleth, _-fald_, galla, half, halt, naru, ald, sald, wall, iara.  Similarly, Wessex has the diphthongs _{-e}a_, _{-e}o_, in which the former element is long, where the Old Mercian has simply _{-e}_ or _{-i}_.  We find accordingly the Wessex c{-e}ace, _{-e}ac_, _{-e}age_, sc{-e}ap, as against the Mercian c{-e}ke, _{-e}k_, _{-e}ge_, sc{-e}p; and the Wessex l{-e}ogan, l{-e}oht, as against the Mercian l{-i}gan, l{-i}ht.

I have now mentioned nearly all the examples of Old Mercian to be found before the Conquest.  After that event it was still the Southern dialect that prevailed, and there is scarcely any Mercian (or Midland) to be found except in the Laud MS. of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, which was written at Peterborough.  See the extract, describing the miserable state of England during the reign of Stephen, in Specimens of Early English, Part I.

It was about the year 1200 that the remarkable work appeared that is known by the name of The Ormulum, written in the North-East Midland of Lincolnshire, which is the first clear example of the form which our literary language was destined to assume.  It is an extremely long and dreary poem of about 10,000 long lines, written in a sadly monotonous unrimed metre; and it contains an introduction, paraphrases relating to the gospels read in the church during the year, and homilies upon the same.  It was named Ormulum by the author after his own name, which was Orm; and the sole existing MS. is probably in the handwriting of Orm himself, who employed a phonetic spelling of his own invention which he strongly recommends.  Owing to this circumstance and to the fact that his very regular metre leaves no doubt as to his grammatical forms, this otherwise uninviting poem has a high philological value.  In my book entitled The Chaucer Canon, published at Oxford in 1900, I quote 78 long lines from the Ormulum, reduced to a simpler system of spelling, at pp. 9-14; and, at pp. 15-18, I give an analysis of the suffixes employed by Orm to mark grammatical inflexions.  At pp. 30-41, I give an analysis of similar inflexions as employed by Chaucer, who likewise employed the East Midland dialect, but with such slight modifications of Orm’s language as were due to his living in London instead of Lincolnshire, and to the fact that he wrote more than 150 years later.  The agreement, as to grammatical usages, of these two authors is extremely close, allowing for lapse of time; and the comparison between them gives most indubitable and valuable results.  There is no better way of learning Chaucer’s grammar.