Sc. and dial. Also fisle, fissil. [echoic: cf. FIZZLE.]
1. intr. To make a slight continued noise; to rustle; to move with such a noise.
1711. Ramsay, Wks., I. Gloss. Fistle to stir.
1789. D. Davidson, Seasons, Winter, 232.
| Or icicle drop frae the bended twig, | |
| Wi’ fissling din, amang the leafless bri’rs. |
1816. Scott, Antiq., ix. ‘He heard the curtains o’ his bed fissil.’
1823. Galt, Ringan Gilhaize, III. 65. The wind again began to fisle, and the signs of a tempest were seen in the changes of the royal Councils.
1851. Greenwell, Coal-trade Terms, Northumb. & Durh., 26. Fissle, Fistle, to make a crepitant noise or faint crackling.
1856. T. Aird, Poet. Wks., 132, A Summer Day.
| To budge not, till the little mouse of night | |
| Creeps from her hole, and fissles through the grass. |
1859. All Year Round, No. 34, 17 Dec., 179/1. The dead leaves were fistling in troops down the lanes as if returning gay, in companies, from the funeral of Summer.
2. To move about restlessly or uneasily; to fidget.
1783. Burns, Ep. to J. Lapraik, xxii.
| But, to conclude my lang epistle, | |
| As my auld pen’s worn to the grissle; | |
| Twa lines frae you wad gar me fissle, | |
| Who am, most fervent, | |
| While I can either sing or whissle, | |
| Your friend and servant. |
1855. Robinson, Whitby Gloss., Fizzling, fidgeting as a person in a state of bodily uneasiness.
1863. Robson, Bards of Tyne, 319, Lizzie Liberty.
| Whole patriot bands, of foreign lands, | |
| Do fyke and fistle sair about her: | |
| O bonny Lizzie Liberty, | |
| Nae happiness is felt without her. |
