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  • (pl. noun) - I cannot help observing one application of the word few, peculiar to the northern counties, for which there seems to be no justifiable reason. When speaking of broth, the common people always say, "Will you have a few broth?" and in commending the broth will add, "They are very good." This is also an appropriation so rigidly confined to broth that they do not say a few ale, a few punch, nor a few milk, a few furmenty, nor a few of any other liquid. I would rather suppose that they hereby mean, elliptically, a few spoonfuls of broth, for broth cannot be considered as one of those hermaphroditical words which are both singular and plural, such as sheep and deer.

    --Samuel Pegge's Anecdotes of the English Language, 1803

    January 14, 2018