Juke 1, 1888.] 



♦ KNOW^LEDGE ♦ 



183 



hyphened words counted separately or as one, and other 

 variations which !Mr. Donnelly allows himself, he can, of 

 course, find everything he wants to find. We must take 

 what he finds as what he tells us that he wanted t<i find, as 

 what he himself has conceived. Even as our " Benvolio " 

 finds in what Shakespeare wrote evidence of what Shake- 

 speare thought, though dramatically presented, so (only with 

 greater certainty) what Mr. Donnelly has evolved out of his 

 more or less moi-al consciousness about Bacoa and Shake- 

 speare tells us what manner of man Igaatius Donnelly is, 

 and with what sort of a mind he has crawled over the 

 memories of England's greatest and best. 



We will not follow him. Let any one read but one para- 

 graph of Mr. Donnelly's cypher reading — say that in which 

 he presents Bacon as painfully forcing into a noble play a 

 series of foul insults respecting the man whom (even accord- 

 ing to Jlr. Donnelly's nonsense) Bacon thought worthy to 

 be regarded as the author of the greatest dramatic works 

 ever known, and he will have read more than enough. 

 Since the time when Mrs. Stowe wrote that atrocious attack 

 on the memory of B^ron, nothing fouler has been cenceived 

 than Donnelly's picturing of Shakespeare as a decrepit 

 wretch (when little past thirt}'), eaten up with disease, 

 drunken, besotted, and imbecile. 



We decline to consider farther this loathsome work, 

 " rank without ripeness, rotten without sun," the product of 

 a coaree and abject mind. There is a passage in Shake- 

 speare which rises to our thoughts as needing but the change 

 of a word or two to express more aptly than anything 

 knou-n to us the feeling with which we have read this 

 hateful production — a disgrace to America and to literature. 

 When lachimo has pictured Posthumus Leonatus as foully 

 iis Ignatius Donnelly has pictured Shakespeare, and has then 

 !xs plainly shown the cloven hoof, Imogen says to him what 

 every clean-minded Englishman should say to Donnelly : — 



Away ! — I do comlemn mine ears, that have 



So long attended thee. — If thou wert honoarable 



Thou woiild'st have told this tale for virtue, not 



For such an end thou seek'st, — as base as strange. 



Thou wrong'st a gentleman, who is as far 



From thy report as thou from honour. 



... It [England deems] it fit 



A saucy stranger in [our land] to mart 



As in a Roman stew, and to expound 



His beastly mind to us — the has [a son] 



She little cares for, and her chief glory 



She not respects at all. 



NOTES ON AMERICANISMS. 



Harm, adjectively for "hurtful:" a Southern usage, 

 claimed by Bartlett for lleorgia. 



Hatchet. To " bury the hatchet " is to make peace ; 

 derived from the Indian custom of solemnly burying a 

 tomahawk when peace is made. 



Hauled Mealer. The Saturdat/ Review says (and the 

 .y. R. always knows i that this expression used for persons 

 carted to and from the fields for their- meals is an 

 Americanism, and one worth knowing. Striped pullers for 

 members of a London rowing club wearing striped jerseys 

 would be as reasonably included among C'ockneyisms. 



Haze, To. The most characteristically American use of 

 this word is that which associates it with the ill-treatment 

 of freshmen by the higher classes. Collegians in America 

 seem to be about as foolish in such matters as lads at our 

 public schools. Certainlv our universities now offer nothing 

 which corresponds to " hazing ; " and though 'Varsity men 

 are fond enough, and too fond, of noise and fun, the pai-- 

 ticular combination of brutality and cowardice known as 



" hazing " in Americ;i is unknown in our colleges, and 

 regarded as disgraceful (though not quite unkno^vn) in the 

 army and navy. 



Heft, for weight, though used in parts of England, is 

 oftener heard in the States, and may fairly be considered 

 an Americanism. The same may be said of " heft " used as 

 a verb, in the sense of " taking " the weight of anything. 

 Mr. Bartlett includes " heave," used for " throw," among 

 Americanisms, but there is hardly a part of England where 

 this usage is not familiar. 



Hefty. Heavy. 



Help. This word for " servant " is of English origin, but 

 it has undergone a singular change. Of old a " help " was 

 one who helped the servants, the term implying inferiority. 

 Xow the word "servant" is objected to as degrading, and 

 '• help " is used in its place. To the word " servant," 

 regarded as derived from the Latin, there are objections akin 

 to those existing against the word " subject," seeing that the 

 so-called servant is no more a slave than the so-called 

 subject is in real subjection. The word " help," however, is 

 but an unsatisfactory substitute. 



Herb. In England it is permissible to aspirate the " h " 

 in this word, though probably the word is oftener pro- 

 nounced 'erb. In America it is never aspirated. 



Hickory. Owing to the toughness and hardness of 

 hickory (a species of Cari/a), the word is often used as 

 equivalent to tough, hard, or resolute. General Andrew 

 Jackson was called " (Jld Hickory " because of his firm and 

 resolute character. Yet the word sometimes means flexible — 

 hickory being capable of bending without breaking. A 

 " hickory bend " means a bend which only some substance 

 Hke hickory can take without breaking. It is used in 

 surgery of bones which, under a severe blow, have bent yet 

 not broken. Those who would wish to prove that the 

 Indians came from the East may find an argument for the 

 theory in the rather curious circumstance that the Greek 

 name for the species to which the hickory belongs — 

 ■^ Kapva — is almost identical in sound with the Indian word 

 from which " hickory " was derived. 



High falutix. High-flown, derived by Hotten from the 

 Dutch verlooten, but by Bartlett and others from " high 

 flighting," a word which needs accounting for as much as the 

 other. 



Hired man-, or woman, or girl. One who is hired for 

 work : see " Servant." 



Hitch. To hitch together, or hitch horses, is to get along 

 well together. 



HoE oxe's Row, To. To do one's share of a job. 



HoG-w ALLOWS. Places in the western prairies which look 

 as though hogs had wallowed in them and torn them up. 

 But hogs in reality have had nothing to do with them. 

 Cracks form in the prairies during the droughts of summer 

 (usually where the prau-ie is level), forming hexagonal 

 patches eight or ten feet in diameter. During the heavy 

 rains which follow the earth gets washed into the cracks, 

 and after several yeai-s peculiarities of contour arise which 

 present the appearance attributed — unjustly — to the wallow- 

 ing of hogs. 



Home. The " old home," used for the old country, shows 

 that even to this day some Americans i-emember that 

 America was colonised by Englishmen, was rendered inde- 

 pendent through the courage and energy of Englishmen, 

 and is in point of fact of English production. If all 

 Englishmen and all Americans remembered this, we should 

 not so often hear either Englishmen or Americans speaking 

 ill of each other. 



Hominy. Coarsely ground Indian corn, boiled. 



HoMMUCK or Hummock. See " Hammock." 



Honorable. This term is applied to members of the 



