14 JANUARY 1899, Page 16

OLD AGE IN THE VILLAGE.

[To THE EDITOR OF THE " SPECTATOR:'] SIR,—Your correspondent, Mr. Gaye, challenges the accuracy of my explanation of the word " hnd-me-dud," which be derives from " dodman," a snail. In reply to his letter in the Spectator of January 7th, I refer him to Bailey's Dictionary, published in the reign of George II., where he will find,- " Dodman, a Shell-Snail. Country word." A few pages farther on he will also see,—" Dndman, a Malkin, a Scarecrow, a Hobgoblin, a Spright." Thus " dudman," a genuine old English word, still survives, though in corrupted form, and is commonly used, as every one familiar with Berkshire dialect knows, among the peasantry of this part of Wessex.—I am,