[Generally held to be derived from TICKLE a. or v., and so to go with TICKLE sb.2 (see quot. 1908); but some would identify it with Eng. dial. stickle ‘a rapid shallow place in a river.’ In Nova Scotia also tittle.] A name given on the coasts of Newfoundland and Labrador to a narrow difficult strait or passage.
1770. Chart S. E. Part Newfoundland, [A locality at the head of St. Mary’s Bay marked] Tickles.
1792. G. Cartwright, Jrnl. Labrador, Gloss., Tickle, a passage between the continent and an island, or between two islands, when it is of no great width.
1837. New Sailing Direct. Newf. (ed. 3), 25, note. The word Tickle is a local name, in common use at Newfoundland, and signifies a passage between islands or rocks.
1861. L. L. Noble, Icebergs, 277. No sooner were we clear of the ‘tickle,’ or narrows, than ‘Iceberg ahead!’—‘Ice on the lee bow!’ was cried by the man forward.
1868. Admirally Chart, No. 225 (Labrador), Indian Tickle. Ibid. (1871), No. 291 (Newf.), Change Island Tickles…. Stag Harbour Tickle.
1881. Standard, 15 July, 4/8. In many of the ‘tickles,’ ‘guts,’ ‘runs,’ ‘sounds,’… and inlets there are still to be found tiny villages which date from those old Acadian times.
1905. Daily Chron., 28 April, 3/3. See him clinging to the bowsprit, conning the vessel through tortuous ‘tickles.’
1908. Abp. Howley, in Newfoundld. Quarterly, March, 2. The Tickle…. It has always been supposed that this name is a plain English word, implying a passage of some danger, so that it is a ‘ticklish’ matter to get safe through.
