have been addressed in my hearing to obtuse and stupid folk. The former
requires no comment, and an explanation of the latter--_noggen_, hard,
rough, coarse--may be found in Johnson. "Nay, I did na say thee wor a
noggen-yed; I said Lawyer said thee were a noggen-yed," was a poor
apology, once spoken in Lancashire. And there also, in time-honoured
Lancaster, was made the following illustrative speech. A conceited young
barrister, with a _nez retroussé_ and a new wig, had been bullying for
some time a rough, honest Lancashire lad, who was giving evidence in a
trial, and at last the lawyer, thinking that he saw his opportunity,
turned sharply upon the witness and said, "Why, fellow, only a short
time ago you stated so and so." To which came the indignant answer,
"Why, yer powder-yedded monkey, I never said noat o' sort; I appeal to
th' company!"

I have a loving faith in children. Mixing with them daily--in church, in
school, and at their play--I think that I know something about them; and
I maintain that a disagreeable child is a sorrowful exception to the
rule, and the result of mismanagement and foolish indulgences on the
part of parents and teachers. But when this abnormal nuisance is found,
a peevish, fretful child--a child who is always wanting to taste, a
child who ignores the admirable purposes for which pocket-handkerchiefs
were designed, such an _enfant terrible_ as he who told the kindly
mother, offering to bring her 'Gustus to join him in his play, that "if
you bring your 'Gustus here I shall make a slit in him with my new
knife, and let out his sawdust"--when, I repeat, we come in contact with
such an obnoxious precocity as this, what word can describe him so
satisfactorily as the monosyllable--_brat_?

More detestable, because more powerful to do hurt, and with less excuse
for doing it, is _the Blab_; the unctuous, tattling Blab, who creeps to