BLOWN-MILK, skimmed milk. I suppose from the custom of blowing the cream off by the breath. BLUBBER," the part of a whale that contains the oil," Todd's John. But it is the fat of whales. BLUE. To look blue, is to be disconcerted. BLUFFNESS, "surliness," Todd's John. Rather arrogance, or a self-confident manner. BLUSH, resemblance. He has a blush of his brother, i. e. he bears a resemblance. BLUSTERATION, the noise of a braggart. Blustering. BOB, to disappoint. Dry bob is an old word for a merry joke or trick. BOB, a bunch. Isl. bobbi, nodus. Fr. bube. BOBBY, smart, neat, tidy. There was Sam, O zoons! Wiv's pantaloons, An' gravat up owre his gobby-o; An' Willy, thou, Wi' the jacket blue, Thou was the varry bobby-o. Song, Swalwell Hopping. BODWORD, an ill-natured errand. An old word for an ominous message. Su.-Got. and Isl. bodword, edictum, mandatum. BOGGLE, BOGGLE-BO, a spectre or ghost. Welsh, bugal, fear. BOGGLE about the stacks, a favourite play among young people in the villages, in which one hunts several others. Formerly barley break. She went abroad, thereby A barley break her sweet, swift feet to try.-Sidney, Arcadia. BOILING. The whole boiling means the entire quantity or whole party. BOKE, BOUK, to nauseate so as to be ready to vomit, to belch. Perhaps from Sax. bealc-an. Jam. V. Ray. BOLL, BOLE, the body or trunk of a tree. BO-MAN, a hobgoblin or kidnapper. Su.-Got. bol. I'll rather put on my flashing red nose, and my flaming face, and come wrapped in a calf's-skin, and cry bo, bo!-Robin Goodfellow. BONDAGERS, cottagers obliged to work for farmers, when called upon, at certain stipulated wages. BONNY, beautiful, handsome, cheerful. Dr. Johnson derives this word from Fr. bon, bonne, good; but as it is so universally in use in the North, I have little doubt it came originally from the Scotch.-Shakspeare appears to have understood it in its different meanings. We say that Shore's wife hath a pretty foot, A cherry lip, a bonny eye, a passing pleasing tongue. Match to match I have encountered him, And made a prey for carrion kites and crows, Then sigh not so but let them go, To ferry me over the Tyne to my honey, The Water of Tyne. Whe's like me Johnny Song, The Keel Row. BOODIES OF BABBY-BOODIES, broken pieces of earthen ware or glass, used by female children for decorating a play-house, called a boody-house, made in imitation of an ornamented cabinet. Then on we went, as nice as owse, Song, Jemmy Joneson's Whurry. BOON, a service or bonus, done by a tenant to his landlord, or a sum of money as an equivalent. BOON-DAYS are those which the tenants are obliged to employ for the benefit of their lord gratis. Vast quantities of land in the Northern counties are held under lords of manors by customary tenure, subject to the payment of fines and heriots, and the performance of various duties and services on the boon days. BOOR, BOUR, the parlour, or inner room through the kitchen, in which the head person of the family generally sleeps. Isl. bouan, to dwell. Spenser uses bower, a lady's apartment. Fair Rosamond's bower, at Woodstock, is familiar to every reader. BOORLY, boorish, rough, unpolished. Teut. boer, a boor. BOOSÉ, BUESS, BUSE, an ox or cow stall; properly the place beside the stakes where the fodder lies. Sax. bosig. Isl. bas. BOOT, something given to equalise an exchange. Old Fr. bote. BOOTED, or BOLTED BREAD, a loaf of sifted wheat meal, mixed with rye; better than the common household bread. V. Skin. bolt. BOOTHER, BOULDER, a hard flinty stone, rounded like a bowl. BORROWED-DAYS, the three last days of March. March borrowit fra Averill Three days and they were ill. Gloss. Compl. Scotl. These days being generally stormy, our forefathers, as Dr. Jamieson remarks, have endeavoured to account for this circumstance by pretending that March borrowed them from April, that he might extend his power so much longer. The superstitious will neither borrow nor lend on any of these days, lest the articles should be employed for evil purposes. BOTHERATION, plague, trouble, difficulty. From bother, to perplex or puzzle. BOTTOM-ROOM, a single seat in a pew. BOUGHT, a fold where ewes are put at milking time. Teut. bocht. BOUK, to wash linen, or rather to steep it or soak it in lye, with a view of whitening and sweetening it. Then the thread is sod and bleaked, and bucked and oft layed to drieng, &c.—Barthol. 302 b, l. 17, c. 97. Buck is used by Shakspeare, as well for the liquor in which clothes are washed as for the clothes themselves. Every body remembers Falstaff's ludicrous adventure in the great buck-basket. The process of bouking linen, adopted by the older Northumbrian house-wives, would, I fear, be considered too homely for their more Southern neighbours to imitate, and therefore I refrain from particularizing it. BOUK, Bowk, bulk, quantity, or size; the body of a tree. Su.Got. bolk. Chaucer uses bouke, for the trunk of the human body, which Mr. Tyrwhitt says, is probably from Sax. buce, venter. BOUN, to make ready, to prepare, to dress. Old Eng. boon, boun, bowne. BOURD, to jest. V. Todd's John. BOUT, a contest or struggle; often applied to a jovial meeting of the legitimate sons of Bacchus, where The dry divan Close in firm circle; and set, ardent, in For serious drinking.—Thomson, BOWDIKITE, a contemptuous name for a mischievous child, an insignificant or corpulent person. BOWERY, plump, buxom, and young; applied to a female in great health. Box, a club or society instituted for benevolent or charitable purposes. It is customary for the members to have an annual dinner called the head-meeting day. The oldest institution of this kind, I have been able to trace, is that of the keelmen of Newcastle and the neighbourhood, who, on this occasion, after assembling at their hospital, walk in procession through the principal streets of the town, attended by a band of music, fiddles, &c. Much greater interest was formerly taken in this business by the parties concerned, who made it a point of honourable emulation to rival each other in the grandeur of their apparel, especially in the pea-jacket, the sky-blue stockings, the long-quartered shoes, and large silver buckles. Cold was the heart of that female, old or young, connected with the " Keel lads o' coaly Tyne," who could look unmoved on such a spectacle; and if the fair ones did sometimes indulge in scenes which I neither wish to describe nor see repeated, their rencounters, generally commencing without any previous malice, were rarely again remembered. BOX AND DICE. A game of hazard, formerly much practised |