_Ch'am_, is I am, that
is, _ich am_; _ch'ill_, is I will, _ich will_. See
Shakespeare's King Lear, Act IV., Scene IV. What is very
remarkable, and which confirms me greatly in the opinion which I
here state, upon examining the first folio edition of Shakespeare,
at the London Institution, I find that _ch_ is printed, in
one instance, with a mark of elision before it thus, _'ch_, a
proof that the _i_ in _iche_ was sometimes dropped in a
common and rapid pronunciation. In short, this mark of elision
ought always so to have been printed, which would, most probably,
have prevented the conjectures which have been hazarded upon the
origin of the mean- of such words _chudd_, _chill_, and
_cham_. It is singular enough that Shakespeare has the
_ch_ for _iche_ I, and _Ise_ for I, within the
distance of a few lines in the passage above alluded to, in King
Lear. But, perhaps, not more singular than that in Somersetshire
may, at the present time, be heard for the pronoun I,
_Utchy_, or _ichA(_, and _Ise_.
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