BRITISH AND AMERICAN TONGUES

Otago Witness, Issue 3870, 15 May 1928, Page 77

BRITISH AND AMERICAN TONGUES

HOW THE KING'S ENGLISH IS UNDERGOING A REMARKABLE CHANGE. WHERE EGGS ARE “CACKLEBERRIES.” By Major F. A. C. Forbes-Leith, ' F.R.G.S. (Copyright.—For the Otago Witness.; When I first visited the United States of America, I felt very lonely and lost in the vast city of New York on my arrival. I wandered out to find a little recreation, and eventually found my way to a music hall—as it would be called there, “ a vaudeville show.” When I took my seat, the stage was held by a very lean young man who was apparently suffering from adenoids. He was making very strange noises with his throat and nose to a very buxom young woman. It sounded something like this: Al-lus, Al-lus, tal-lus, Shal-lus go to Dal-lus, And buy ourselves a pal-lus,. For I’ve been waitin’ yee-lrs. I have a natural aptitude for picking up foreign tongues quickly, so by about the fifth verse I was able to understand him, and gathered that he was inviting a young lady named Alice to go with him to a place called Dallas where they could buy themselves a palace for which he had been waiting many years. All my life I had regarded the American as an English-speaking race, but from that moment I realised that I should have to set to work to learn a new language. THE ENGLISH ACCENT. On the following day I had another surprise. A British “friend of mine introduced me to a native of New York who said, “ Pleastermeecher.” I was delighted to find that I could understand him, but soon he remarked that I spoke with an English accent. I admitted this fact, and told my acquaintance that I had always been under the impression that the “English language, as we know it now, had been invented in a country known as England, and that my smattering of that language that I possessed had been picked up in that country. As I had recently had my hair cut rather close, and as my wife tells me that I look like a Prussian when this operation has been performed, I thought at first that he might have mistaken me for a German. I presume that what he really intended to convey to me was the fact that I spoke English without an American accent. He was a very delightful, good-natured fellow, but after listening to him for an hour I came to the conclusion that he spoke “ no known language.” THE BACK STUD COMEDY. Half an hour later a further difficulty arose which convinced me still more that in description and accent the British and American tongues are things quite apart. I happened to lose my back collar stud, and seeing a man’s* outfitting shop close at hand I strolled up to the counter and quietly asked for this article. The Hebrew gentleman at the counter gave me a blank stare, and, thinking that perhaps he was a recently arrived immigrant who had yet to learn both English and American, I repeated my request with a little more clarity. The customers on either side showed signs of interest in me, but<my request apparently conveyed rid? meaning whatsoever to the man at," the counter. He spat out his chewing gum, and calling to one of his colleagues described me as a guy, and asked him if he knew anything about back s'tuds.' I got a little annoyed and impatient then, so I proceeded to demonstrate what it was that I required. A general chorus arose from the assistants and the two other customers, “ Say,- you want a collar button.” AN ACCOMPLISHED WAITER. This experience made me verv nervous, and it was only after a great effort that I summed up enough courage to enter a restaurant for a belated breakfast. I thought that if I ordered ham and eggs I should be easily understood. The waiter spoke English, but he conveyed my order to the kitchen in his own language thus: “Hog’s hips and cackleberries for one, and make the berries sunny side up.” The latter description indicated that the yolks should be uppermost and fried only on one side. When visiting foreign countries I have always made a particular point of learning the language from conversation with the native on all possible occasions rather than from the conventional text book. That night I had a further lesson when I was taken to a night club of doubtful’repute 1- a cheerful friend of mine. My fir whispered something in the ear of the waiter, who immediately brought along a flaskshaped bottle and put it on the table in front of us. The hostess of this club, who was apparently acquainted with my friend, rushed up to the table in a fury and cursed the waiter. ANOTHER LESSON. “ You fool,” said she, * doncherno that this hooch is for the suckers? Go and get something good for these regular guys.” I understood from this that the waiter, a man of mean intelligence, had

brought us some inferior liquor that was intended for the unwary people from the country who had money to burn, and that we, as special patrons, were to be given something a trifle less poisonous. Our party increased in numbers a little later on in the evening, and my friend’s bill was somewhat high. To have paid in cash would have run him rather short, and he mentioned this fact to the hostess, who replied, “ Doncher worry, bo, just gimme a sheet from ver dough diary.” I found out that what she was asking him to do was to write a cheque for the amount of his indebtedness. After these few remarks one can imagine my surprise on reading in the newspapers some time later that a very famous English playwright, when interviewed soon after his arrival in New York, told them that he considered that the Americans spoke much purer English than we do in our own country. EASY TO LEARN. Whilst not wishing to join issue on this matter with such a celebrity, I feel that he was being slightly sarcastic or else he must have made that remark after a good lunch which had probably been preceded by a certain amount of thoraxic lubrication of a post-Volstead variety, which enables one to see the world temporarily through rose-coloured spectacles, and which also has’ a particularly deadening effect on the sensibilities of the eardrums. there is one point about the American language which stands to its credit, however; it is very easily learned. I picked it up very quickly, and soon I was able to enter a “coffee pot ” (a cheap night eating house) with a firm tread and say, “ Gimmeahotdawg ana cupercorfee ” —which, being translated, was an invitation to the man behind the counter to serve with a hot frankfurter sausage sandwiched in a roll well spread with mustard, and a cup of coffee.

I do this without any trace of nervousness and I am understood, but I find that whenever I return to England I get quite a thrill when I hear the London cockney shout, “ Fine, laarge shrimps.”