Misused Words.

Star (Christchurch), Volume LXIV, Issue 829, 1 August 1933, Page 6

Misused Words.

TK a home-made will a Christchurch man A wrote “ all my belongings and all my shares,” and in the next paragraph “ all my belongings” only. The Supreme Court was asked to decide whether “ belongings ” in the second paragraph included shares. The Court decided that it did not, holding that the testator, for all practical purposes, had ‘‘made his own dictionary.” With this decision “ Touchstone ” cordialIv agrees. A belonging, in the singular, is that which belongs to a person or thing; but in the plural the word applies especially to effects, or the things a man has about him, as clothes, furniture and so on. From a very old writer the following note on belongings is taken: *“ Belongings ’ as an old expression now (1873) reinstated in its former rights, is peculiar to the very latest period of our language. The more of such vernacularisms we call up from the past, the better.” The very fact that the word is classed as idiomatic or vernacular strengthens the argument for placing the testator’s own value on it as far as that value could be ascertained from the context. TOUCHSTONE.