OUR CHANGING SPEECH

Northern Advocate, 25 November 1925, Page 11

OUR CHANGING SPEECH

WORDS LOSE THEIR MEANINGS.

It is surprising how many a word loses its meaning in the course of much less than a lifetime. When young folk declare, behind my back, that I am a "bit potty" they mean that I am weak in the head, or "touched," writes "An Old Buffer" in the "Daily Mail." Fifty years ago it was people in the early stage of consumption whom we spoke of as "touched," arid "potty" was the slang term for what you now term "fishy." If you say that Smith is a "gorger" you mean that he "does himself too well" at table. A gorger in my young days was a gorgeously dressed young fellow —a " kmit," as he was ealled a few years ago. When you say that a. thing was a "scream," or "screaming," you mean that it was very funny. We meant merely that it jvas splendid or first rate. A "muff" to you signifies an effeminate sort of person with a marked distaste for any athletic pursuit likely to entail danger. "Muffs" in our days were weak-minded people. Who minds being spoken of as a '' chap'' nowadays? . '' Chap'' in my youth was a term of contempt, as "fellow" used to be a century previously.. '' Huggermugger'' meant underhand or deceitful to mid-Vic-torians. Nowadays all "huggermugger" means is a muddle. "He has a screw loose" is a term you use when implying that a man is eccentric or a little weak in tlio head. We used it to suggest that a man's financial position or reputation was unsound, or of two former friends between whom a coolness had arisen. A "snob" to us by no means applied only to any person who attached exaggerated importance to social distinctions. The terms signified a, noncollegiate townsman at Oxford or Cambridge. A "blackguard" did not mean a man of any moral turpitude; it signified a very poor, dirty, and ragged person, often a regular churchgoer of exemplary life and principles. Nor was a "cad" a man who broke what a celebrated sporting nobleman called "the laws that do matter." He was merely a fellow who was always borrowing money and worming tips out of his acquaintances.