MEAT IS SLANG? 129 



signify a word or phrase used with a meaning not recognized in polite 

 letters, either because it had just been invented or because it had passed 

 out of memory. If it is true that slang had its beginning in the argot 

 of thieves, it soon lost all association with its vulgar source, and polite 

 slang to-day bears hardly a remote suggestion of the lingo of this dis- 

 reputable class. In so short a period — but little more than a half 

 century — has the word, as well as the thing it signifies, separated itself 

 from its unsavory early association and worked its way up into good 

 society. 



Of slang, however, there are several kinds. There is a slang at- 

 tached to certain different professions and classes of society, such as 

 college slang, political slang and racing slang. But it must be borne 

 in mind that this differentiation has reference to the origin of the slang 

 in the cant of these respective professions. It is of the nature of slang 

 to circulate more or less freely among all classes of society. Yet there 

 are several kinds of slang corresponding to the several classes of society, 

 such as vulgar and polite, to mention only two general classes. Now, 

 it is true of all slang, as a rule, that it is the result of an effort to 

 express an idea in a more vigorous, piquant and terse manner than 

 standard usage ordinarily admits. In proof of this it will suffice to 

 cite awfully for very, employed by every school-girl as ' awfully cute ' ; 

 peach or daisy for something or some one especially attractive or ad- 

 mirable, as i she's a peach ' ; a walk-over for any easy victory, a dead 

 cinch for a surety, and the like. But it is not necessary to multiply 

 examples of a mode of expression which is perfectly familiar to all. 

 Every man's vocabulary contains slang terms and phrases, some more 

 than others. Often the slang consists of words in good social standing 

 which are arbitrarily misapplied. For although much current slang 

 is of vulgar origin and bears upon its face the bend sinister of its vul- 

 garity, still some of it is of good birth and is held in repute by writers 

 and speakers even who are punctilious as to their English. Some slang 

 expressions are of the nature of metaphors, and are highly figurative. 

 Such are to kick the bucket, to pass in your checks, to hold up, to pull 

 the wool over your eyes, to talk through your hat, to fire out, to go 

 back on, to make yourself solid with, to have a jag on, to be loaded, 

 to freeze on to, to freeze out, to bark up the wrong tree, don't monkey 

 with the buzz-saw, and in the soup. But of the different kinds of slang 

 and of its vivid and picturesque character more anon. 



Let us now, after this digression as to what constitutes slang, re- 

 turn to the former question of the historical aspect of slang, which was 

 engaging our consideration. Though the name is modern, slang itself 

 is, in reality, of venerable age, and was recognized in the plebeian speech 

 of Petronius, the Beau Brummel of Nero's time, whose ' Trimalchio's 

 Dinner ' is replete with the choicest slang of the Boman ' smart set.' 



VOL. LXVIII.— 9. 



