a. Sc. and north. dial. [A deriv. of CANT a., either native or of Low German origin: cf. Flem. and LG. kantig, similarly related to kant, there referred to.] Cheerful, lively, gladsome; esp. in Sc. manifesting gladness and cheerfulness; in north of England rather = lively, brisk, active: a. of persons.
a. 1724. Gaberlunzie Man, ii. He grew canty, and she grew fain.
1725. Ramsay, Gentle Sheph., I. i. I’ll be mair canty wi’t, and ne’er cry dool.
c. 1775. Mrs. Grant, Roy’s Wife. O, she was a cantie quean.
1789. Burns, To Dr. Blacklock. And are ye hale, and weel, and cantie?
1837. Dickens, Pickw. (1847), 406/2. Three or four … canty old Scotch fellows.
1845. E. Brontë, Wuthering Heights, xxii. 193. My mother lived till eighty, a canty dame to the last.
1864. Atkinson, Whitby Gloss., s.v., ‘She’s a canty aud deeam for her years.’
1866. Carlyle, Remin. E. Irving, 135. Canty, shrewd and witty fellows, when you set them talking.
b. of things.
1725. Ramsay, Gentle Sheph., I. ii. Little love or canty cheer can come Frae duddy doublets, and a pantry toom.
1786. Harvest Rig, in Chambers, Pop. Hum. Sc. Poems (1862), 34. Till they do lilt some canty song.
1789. Burns, J. Anderson. And mony a canty day, John, We’ve had wi’ ane anither.
