Gauvison

'And why sud ye, Mr. Arthur? 'specially aboot such a gauvison as awd Barjona. He's like a coo, has twea sides to his tung, a rough un and a smooth un; but neebody minds him, sir, nae matter which side he licks 'em with.'

Gauvison.—It is customary amongst the country people of Yorkshire, when wishing to designate a person as awkward and foolish to call him "a gurt Gauvison!" Whence comes the word "Gauvison?" Is it, as I have heard it asserted, the name of an old Yorkshire highwayman; and if so why should his name be used with such a significance?

At this inn we hear the Craven dialect in all its purity, but as a certain anonymous writer has said in that speech, "What a fearful girt gauvison mun he be at frames to larn th' talk of another country afore he parfitly knaws his awn," I will not attempt to transfer this peculiar language to print.