328 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 



expected to call for a jug and basin, since there a pitcher means only 

 a little jug and a bowl is used exclusively for serving food in. On the 

 street, instead of a letter box near a lamp post, you see a pillar box 

 near a lamp pillar, and you perhaps meet a person pushing a peram- 

 bulator, called ' pram ' for short, instead of a baby-carriage. For dry- 

 goods you go to a mercer's, where you will find white calico sold for 

 muslin. For cloth you go to a draper's, for wooden ware to a turnery, 

 for hardware to an ironmonger's, for milk, butter and eggs to a cow- 

 keeper's or a dairy, and for fish, game and poultry to a fish shop. If 

 you desire any of your purchases sent to your address, you order them 

 sent by express-carrier, carriage paid. 



If at any time you desire the services of a scrub-woman to clean 

 your apartments, you send for a charwoman. If you wish to have some 

 furniture upholstered, you request the upholder to undertake the work 

 for you. If you need the services of a doctor, you call in a medical 

 man. You must be careful to address surgeons and dentists by the 

 common democratic title 'mister,' since the English custom does not 

 warrant you to address them as ' doctor.' If you are well, to your 

 inquiring friends you are reported ' fit,' if unwell, ' seedy,' if sick, 

 invariably ' ill.' 



To an American ear British orthoepy offers quite as noteworthy 

 surprises as the idiomatic diction does. Of course it is to be presumed 

 that there should be more or less marked variations in the matter of 

 habitual utterance of certain sounds, especially the long o- and the long 

 a-vowel, as in ' fast,' ' dance,' ' sha'n't,' etc., which are at striking vari- 

 ance with American usage. Indeed, these sounds are so characteristic 

 that, like the English custom of ending almost every sentence with a 

 question, when clearly natural and not an affectation, they serve as a 

 shibboleth of British nativity. But notable eccentricities are to be 

 observed in the English mode of pronouncing many proper names such 

 as Derby, pronounced ' darby ' ; Berkeley, pronounced ' barclay ' ; Mag- 

 dalen, pronounced ' maudlin ' ; Cadogan, pronounced ' kerduggan ' ; 

 Marylebone, pronounced ' merrybone ' ; Cholmondeley, pronounced 

 ' chumly ' ; Marlborough, pronounced ' mobrer ' ; Albany, pronounced 

 so that the first syllable rhymes with Al- in Alfred, etc.. It is unneces- 

 sary to multiply examples. Suffice it to say that there is a large class 

 of these words the spelling and pronunciation of which seem to an 

 American rather curiously divorced. Certainly American usage offers 

 no parallel where there is so complete a divorce of orthoepy from or- 

 thography. American usage makes for phonetic spelling and tends 

 to make the conventional pronunciation and spelling conform some- 

 what, at least. 



Having drawn attention to a few Briticisms, we are now prepared 

 to discuss some of our Americanisms which seem to excite in the pure 



