Of mouth of childer and soukand
Made þou lof in ilka land,
For þi faes; þat þou for-do
Þe fai, þe wreker him unto.
For I sal se þine hevenes hegh,
And werkes of þine fingres slegh;[1]
Þe mone and sternes mani ma,
Þat þou grounded to be swa.
What is man, þat þou mines of him?
Or sone of man, for þou sekes him?
Þou liteled him a litel wight
Lesse fra þine aungeles bright;
With blisse and mensk þou crouned him yet,
And over werkes of þi hend him set.
þou under-laide alle þinges
Under his fete þat ought forth-bringes,
Neete and schepe bathe for to welde,
In-over and beestes of þe felde,
Fogheles of heven and fissches of se,
Þat forth-gone stihes of þe se.
Laverd, our Laverd, hou selkouth is
Name þine in alle land þis.
The above Psalm is a specimen of the Northumbrian Psalter (Surtees Society), a translation which, from its large proportion of obsolete words, must have been compiled about 1250, though it has come down to us only in a transcript made sixty years later. This is the earliest well-marked specimen of the Northern Dialect, spoken at York, Durham, and Edinburgh alike; it was now making its way to Ayr and Aberdeen, and driving out the old Celtic dialects before it. This was the speech
- ↑ Sly (sapiens) has here a most exalted sense; it has been sadly degraded. ‘Nasty sly girl!’ says one of Mr. Trollope's matrons, speaking of her son's enchantress.
