326 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 



A striking feature of the English speech on American lips is the 

 leveling of the long a-sound heard in such words as ' past/ ' fast/ 

 ' plant/ ' command/ ' dance/ ' path/ etc. This could hardly be the 

 result of climatic influence, however, for it does not appear that the 

 climate has had the effect of producing any modification in the pro- 

 nunciation of such terms in any part of America. The prevailing pro- 

 nunciation of these terms is the same, at the south and at the north 

 alike. Such a variation must, therefore, be inherent in the natural 

 growth of the English language on American soil. For it must be 

 borne in mind that just as the English speech, as any other living or- 

 ganism, has been growing and developing during the centuries in 

 England, so, likewise, in America it has been growing and developing 

 during the last three centuries, but not necessarily in the same manner. 

 Those employing the language in Great Britain and in the United States 

 are no longer a homogeneous people with the same national ideals and 

 destiny. On the contrary, they are two separate and distinct nations 

 with different forms of government and with different aims and aspira- 

 tions. Add to this the fact that the nations have been estranged by 

 political differences which resulted in wars and that they are separated 

 by the physical barrier of a vast ocean. In the face of these obstacles 

 it is not at all surprising that the English speech has not gone on 

 developing pari passu on both sides of the Atlantic. The wonder is 

 that the present variations are not really greater and more striking 

 than they are. 



Another contributing cause of variation of American English from 

 the British norm must not be overlooked, the more especially as it has 

 proved a prolific factor. In our new country some conditions of life 

 arose which were totally unlike those existing in the old country. 

 Such strange conditions called imperatively for the invention of new 

 names and thus gave rise to the employment of new phrases and new 

 locutions. These had to be coined immediately for the emergency. 

 Since the most distinctive traits of the American are initiative and 

 wealth of resource, no time was lost in making such additions to the 

 English speech as seemed to supply a felt need, and that, too, without 

 any special reference to British models and precedents. Hence a large 

 class of terms distinctively American and bearing upon their face the 

 trade-mark ' made in America ' found their way into the English 

 vocabulary on this side of the Atlantic, much to the disgust of the 

 British precisians and purists, who proceeded forthwith to put these 

 new coinages under the ban and to brand them with the bend sinister 

 of ' Americanism.' Of this class are many terms indicating mechan- 

 ical inventions and appliances, such as ' elevator ' instead of the British 

 ' lift/ to mention only a single example of a long catalogue of useful 

 things which American genius has given to the world. Here also be- 



