parlance, an assignment which a reporter knows will fail"; to place a person is to "call to mind the place of his birth"; the word push "is in quite common use to characterize the followers of racing, base-ball, rowing, athletics, &c." If the promise of the preliminary circular, that "every page, before going to press, will pass through the hands of trained experts of the American Dialect Society" for criticism, was faithfully kept, it would appear that the trained experts, like Jupiter, occasionally nodded.

IX

A work of very different character, different indeed from all the others, and the only one since Bartlett that is not founded on the labors of that diligent compiler, is Thornton's "American Glossary, an Attempt to Illustrate Certain Americanisms upon Historical Principles." Emphasis in the modest subtitle is to rest, not on the word attempt, considering that the author is decidedly successful in accomplishing his purpose, but on the word certain, for the book is by no means intended to give anything like a complete list of Americanisms, however one may be pleased to define that term, Prof. Thornton's plan having been to select expressions "of recognized standing or special interest" and trace their pedigree; "the reader who wishes to investigate such phrases as Adam-and-Eve-on-a-Raft or get-a-wiggle-on will

have to pursue his research elsewhere." In view of this limitation, it must be said that some of the entries in the book are a little surprising, such for instance as the eagle from Harper's Ferry, a fast horse, fingers and toes, hanging shelf, Hartford Convention, higher law, not worth a row of pins, Ohioan, to ask no odds, pipe-laying, Wilmot proviso and wooden nutmegs. These constitute, however, as do the perhaps 450 words of British origin, a very petty fraction of the entire number, this being about 3500, which are illustrated by no fewer than 14,000 citations, every one accurately dated. It is not strange that they are not very well balanced, regrettably few in some cases and rather unnecessarily multiplied in others. Perhaps 61 is not too many under Yankee, considering the importance of the word and the obscurity that surrounds its history; but one must wonder whether it was really worth while to give 33 for half-horse-half-alligator. The wonder, however, is that the compiler got so many together; and he writes me that he has gathered enough material for a third volume, the present work consisting of two. How he got it all I do not know; it is really a marvelous collection to be brought together by a single author; and it throws a flood of light on hundreds of points that were previously obscure. It reminds one in a way of Richardson's English dictionary, the first later than Johnson that was not founded on his labors, and the first to give "a collection of usages, and those usages explained to suit

the quotations." After somewhat careful study of Thornton, I have discovered only one single error, his defining chunk as "a worthless horse," and this is due to a not unnatural misunderstanding of the solitary case in which he noted the use of the word. The work is certainly of very high and quite unique value.

X

"The American Language, a Preliminary Inquiry into the Development of English in the United States," by H. L. Mencken, is a tall octavo of over 380 pages, planned much after De Vere, not a vocabulary but a work of history and review. After an interesting general introduction, the author sketches the beginnings of "American" and the period of its growth; considers the differences between British and American English today and the probable tendencies of "American"; adds some supplementary matter relating to proper names in this country, and American proverbial expressions and slang, concluding with a prophecy that American practice is likely to determine the final form of the language. A valuable bibliography is appended. The work is a mine of information, as may be inferred from the fact that the index of words and phrases noted contains over 5000 entries, and it is written (like De Vere's, which it quite eclipses and supersedes) in a readable style that entertains as well as instructs. Aside from a very few errors in fact,

really the only fault that the present writer finds with it is Mr. Mencken's rashness in making a good many general statements altogether too sweeping and universal. A few instances will show: "Lawn fete," he says, is "commonly pronounced feet"; "Americans almost invariably accent" the word inquiry on the first syllable; "We change the ph (f) sound to plain p in diphtheria, diphthong and naphtha"; "Cog still retains a pure o, but one seldom hears it in log"; "Two sons-in-law is never heard-one always hears two son-in-laws"; "In common speech, the word is always deef"; and, most amazing of all, this libel on the grammar of the United States: "Such phrases as 'I see nobody' or 'I know nothing about it' are heard so seldom that they appear to be affectations when encountered; the well-nigh universal forms are 'I don't see nobody' and 'I don't know nothing about it.'" Such statements are likely to be pounced upon by British writers as complete admissions by a leading American authority (for as such Mr. Mencken is sure to be recognized) of the distinct inferiority of our speech to that of Great Britain on points on which no such inferiority really exists among Americans as a whole, the blunders noted being either extremely vulgar or extremely local. Undoubtedly in his next edition (and it is to be hoped that several editions of this great work will be called for) Mr. Mencken will make a number of his statements less sweeping.

CHAPTER THREE

EXOTIC AMERICANISMS

"Every one knows an Americanism when he sees it."―The King's English, Oxford, 1906, page 25.

"Those whose pleasure it is to call America 'God's own country' tell us that they are the sole inheritors of the speech which Chaucer and Shakespeare adorned. It is their favorite boast that they have preserved the old language from extinction. They expend a vast deal of ingenuity in the fruitless attempt to prove that even their dialect has its roots deep down in the soil of classical English. And when their proofs are demanded they are indeed a sorry few. A vast edifice of mistaken pride has been established upon the insecure basis of three words-fall, gotten and bully."-Charles Whibley, American Sketches, Edinburgh, 1908, page 209.

This is a list of more than eleven hundred expressions supposed by Bartlett, Farmer, Clapin or Thornton to be peculiar to this country, with evidence (generally in the form of a quotation from a British writer) that most of them are certainly, and all of them probably, of foreign origin. "Evidence," I say, prima facie evidence, not conclusive proof, especially when the citation is of comparatively recent date; the term in question may be of American birth. However, the instance quoted is in every case the first