THE AMEEICAN LANGUAGE

Evening Post, Volume XLVII, Issue 41, 17 February 1894, Page 2 (Supplement)

THE AMEEICAN LANGUAGE

In these times of six-day steamers the nations mix too freely for many actual misunderstanding to arise as to signification of words, but it would not be difficult to set down a page or two of perfectly useful American words which are either not used at all in England or are usediu a sense that would make them incomprehensible in America to five Englishmen out of six. There, are, moreover, Bubtie differences in the use of common words which might well lead to error. " Corn "in America always means maize. Wheat is distinguished as "grain." To be clever often means, especially in Now England, to be kindly or good natured — not acute, intelligent or "smart." A person described in America as being "queer" is, not a little " out of sorts," as with us, but mildly insane. "Mad," of course, usually means angry (as in Acts xxvi. 11); " crazy " is the right word for insanity. A lady who described herself as " knocked up " would be thought to have indelicately confessed to a condition sometimes affecting young married women, but not usually spoken of. " Clear " applied fo a fluid means, not transperant, but " undiluted " " Sauce "is used to mean vegetables in New England. * Long sauce " means carrots, parsnips, and so on ; short sauce " signifies potatoes, turnips, and the like. " Longsweetening " and " long sugar " mean treaclo, more usually, however, called by the correct name of molasses. A railway " Bleeper " is not a crosstie, but a sleeping compartment — wherein arose the expressive proverb "to wake up the wrong passenger," which is the equivalent of our own " to have the wrong pig by the ear." A " cracker " is of course, not a firework, but a biscuit, the last word being applied to email loaves such as we call French rolls. " Chores " (odd jobs in the house) often occurs in American books, and (as one generally hoars it pronounced by English people with a k) it may be worth while to mentiou that it in of the same root as our English " charwoman,"andispronounced"tBhores." A charwoman in America might probably be a " choreslady : " there ara also " washerladies," " salesltulios," " foreladies," " domestic holps," and "hired girls," but no servants or women. A "despatch" is a telegram; a "doggery" or " dive " is a low public house ("saloon"); "a hog in togs" is a Jack in office; and "a lnme duck" is a defaulting stockbroker. Bulls and bears in Wall-street are " longs " and "shorta." A "dodger" is a email cake or buscuit, and also sometimes an advertising handbill ; a "casket" is a coffin; a "fakir" or " crook " is a swindler ; " gall " in, not bitterness of nature, but impudence. "To hump oneself "is to make haste, which may, perhaps, be old, seeing that " hnmp " is etymologically of the same root as " hop." In a fight a " socdolager " is a final knock down. It is supposed by some to have been corrupted humorously from "doxology," coming at the end of an encounter as the doxology comes at the end of divine service. I may say, however, that I personally suspect it of being Dutch in origin. The American use of "guess," it may perhaps be permitted me to observe in closing, is grievously misunderstood by most English people. The American guesses, quite correctly, in order to draw conclusions from imperfect evidence. He would frequently "presume," "calculate," i or " believe," where English writers insist that he shall still "guess."! Nobody ever heard an American say, exoopt on the English stage, " I guoss and calculate." The respective employment of the words enumerated is governed by perfectly clear, though un formulated principles, and tho expressions are certaiuly not incapable pf defence at greater length than the present opportunity permits.

Afghanistan haB a population of 0,000,000 ami no missionary ; India one missionary to 27">,000 people; Persia one to 2,000,000. Of the 21,000,000 widows in India, 78,000 are child-widows under 9 years, and 207,388 from ten to fourteen years of age. The alarming idea has been broached (says the London Hospital) that the widespread prevalence of diphtheria in the metropolis may be due to the fetid airleseness of our modtro fiats.