Notes

lovely member. A certain amount of blarney is supposed to be admissible to keep your sheep from straying to a rival's flock.

to married Toad. Though they sometimes say marry (see the first song) they prefer married. The d before the T of Toad is very awkward to pronounce, yet the reciter, whose normal speech is of the laziest, like that of all his kindred, got it out quite plainly.

mossiful, unmerciful. Dog really used a bad word here, which is always put in his mouth. He uses the same word in "Finger Quashy." So much does it belong to him that it occurs as a descriptive adjective to the dog in the tune for the third Quadrille figure, which will be found among the dance tunes. The word is not really very bad, but it was not considered appropriate to a book which may find its way into the nursery, so in every case another one is substituted.

'tick, stick. The pig was killed for the wedding festivities, which were only just beginning. See note on weddings in "Gaulin."

play in the ring, play Sally Water, see Ring Tunes.

doning, being done.

never make him marry you, never let him, etc.

cut your eye, turn your eye aside. Where we use transitive cut they put intransitive cut eye.

wheeling, turning them in the dance.

run come, came running up.

bear an' bear, was patient for a while. A picturesque way of describing Dog's self-restraint. He bears it and he bears it again.

no see, etc., don't you see how long his mouth is. This is always the joke about Dog. About Puss it is:—"You face too (very) short. Cut off half inch you don't have nose."

upstarted, angry.

palm, touch or hold with the hand.

fe him, his.