droke n also droch, drogue, drook.Cp EDD drock sb² 'a small watercourse' s w cties, droke 'a furrow; a passage, groove' Co; DC ~ 'a copse' Nfld (1772-); SEARY 146.
   1 A valley with steep sides, sometimes wooded and with a stream; freq in place-names. Cp GULCH n.
   [1771] 1792 CARTWRIGHT i, 210 I sent Fogarty forward to Foul-weather Droke to prepare for the night; while I walked to Condon Tickle and measured the breadth of it. I then went over Lower Table to the Droke. 1848 Journ of Assembly Appendix, p. 299 Job's Cove Droke [Western Bay]. 1995 J A Folklore viii, 288 I tooked her [the gun] and the powder-harn and shotbag and starts up yander through the droke. You know the little pond at the top of the hill. When I cumed in sigh' o' un, the first thing I see is a loo' (loon) sitting about the middle uv un. 1907 DUNCAN 269 Across the droch, lifted high above the maid and me, his slender figure black against the pale-green sky, stood John Cather on the brink of Tom Tulk's cliff. 1937 DEVINE 5 Mr Munn's identification of 'droke' as a Devonshire usage is 'a valley with sides so steep as to be extremely difficult of ascent.' 1953 Nfld & Lab Pilot ii, 112 Ben Droke ... rises to an elevation of 713 feet. [1954] 1972 RUSSELL 21 'And where did they live?' 'Just up the droke a piece.' M 71-103 We sometimes went berry picking in nearby areas, but we were cautioned not to wander too far because in certain drokes, small valleys, lived fairies who might spirit us away.
   2 A thick grove of trees (in a valley); a belt or patch of trees; cp HAT, TUCK². Freq in phr droke of woods. [1822] 1866 WILSON 330-1 On our right hand, in looking along the ridge of the land, it was an extended barren covered with its mantle of snow; numerous ponds were to be seen in every direction, with here and there a 'droke' of woods; and the thick forest skirting the seashore. 1881 KENNEDY 92 The country hereabouts was marshy, with belts or 'drogues' of wood scattered about exactly like groups of islands in a sea. 1890 HOWLEY MS Reminiscences 28 Got in to end of our line and camped a short distance below in a droke of woods. 1895 J A Folklore viii, 39 Droke of wood, denoting a wood extending from one side of a valley to the other. 1910 PRICHARD 89 These barrens show great spreads of sulphur-coloured reindeer moss. and a loose scattering of trees, which gather here and there into clumps, or 'drogues,' of spruce, of juniper, or of birch. 1937 DEVINE 19 ~ A thick grove of trees; also pronounced drook. T 89-64 An' there's a droke o' woods down the back of our camp, an' now the next mornin' everything was all altered. 1980 Evening Telegram 8 Nov, p. 6 What happens of course is that the moose are driven from the tucks and drokes far back into the country into the thick woods.

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