BRITICISMS VERSUS AMERICANISMS 335 



tion in the constitution of our English speech, and only traces here 

 and there are seen of non-Saxon elements surviving in a word or an 

 idiom as an enduring monument to the influence of other tongues 

 upon our own on American soil. Some of these foreign loans, it is 

 true, are confined to certain localities, and consequently are to be 

 viewed in the light of solecisms, or at best provincialisms. They cir- 

 culate freely in a limited area, but are not recognized as legal tender 

 throughout the length and breadth of the country. Such expressions 

 are confined chiefly to the western portion of the United States and 

 very rarely find their way east. It is questionable whether they are 

 entitled to be termed Americanisms except in the most liberal interpre- 

 tation of that phrase, because they are not everywhere current and are 

 not readily intelligible, not ' understanded of the people.' 



It seems appropriate at this juncture to say a word concerning dia- 

 lects in America. The assertion is sometimes made that there are no 

 dialects in America, that the railroad and printing press, the two 

 potent and indispensable agencies in our modern civilization, have 

 leveled out all eccentricities and peculiarities of speech and reduced 

 our language to a uniform standard throughout our entire country. 

 This statement is, in the main, true. Yet it requires only a little 

 reflection to see that the assertion is not absolutely accurate and in 

 accord with the facts. Certainly a brief residence in the several prin- 

 cipal sections of the United States would bring convincing refutation. 

 There is the western dialect, as implied in the comments in the preced- 

 ing paragraph. There is also the Yankee dialect of New England, 

 the salient features of which Lowell described very fully in his famous 

 ' Biglow Papers.' There is no less truly the southern dialect with 

 its definite peculiarities of idiom and utterance. These dialects are 

 quite sharply defined by their respective characteristics of colloquial 

 speech. Each dialect has its own phrases and locutions familiar enough 

 within its own geographical divisions, but not readily understood, 

 perhaps unknown, elsewhere. For instance, the native southerner 

 ' reckons ' and ' don't guess,' whereas the Yankee to the manner born 

 does not ' reckon,' but ' guesses ' a tort et a trovers. As for the western 

 dialect, it is said that three elements enter into its constitution, 

 viz., the mining, the gambling and the cowboy element, a rich vein of 

 billingsgate running through each. An effort has been made by our 

 writers of fiction to register and record the salient features of these 

 respective dialects incidentally in their stories, but the shades and 

 gradations of speech are not easy to reflect and preserve on the printed 

 page with the corresponding local color. Hence the work has been 

 but partially done, and nowhere with complete success. 



We Americans are far less trammeled by dialectal inconveniences 

 and perplexities, however, than are the English people. For in Great 



