250 



♦ KNONA^LEDGE 



[June 1, 1886. 



Dlvort. Bartlett finds this word distinct tVoiii (livide in 

 implying elevation as the cause of the division of waters. 



Dixie. The name of a very kindly slave-owner on Man- 

 hattan Island, whose slaves, increasing faster than the land, 

 had to emigrate. After his death his virtues as a master 

 assumed a semi-mythological aspect, and Dixie's Land became 

 an equivalent for a sort of nigger paradise. 



Dodyer. Hardbaked cake or biscuit. Thomson says this 

 word is a corruption of Deadgarred, thoroughly done. Let 

 us hope so. 



Do don't. Nigger English for don't — showing the taste 

 of lower races for reduplication. 



Dad rot it. Americans claim this as a pleasing relief- 

 expression. But it is tolerably good old English mock 

 profanity, like " 'Od rot it " (or " him " or " them " as the 

 case may be). 



What are they fear'd on, fools, 'od rot em ' 

 Were the last words of Higginbottom. 



And Higginbottom was not a Yankee. 



Dog-goned. This, however, may be American. In the 

 " Farm Ballads"— 



But when that choir got up to sing, 



I couldn't catch a word ; 

 They sang the most doy-goiidest thing 



A body ever heard. 



Doc/ged. For con" demned " theologically. I'll be dogged 

 if I do. 



DoliKjs (pronounced doitis). Food provided for a guest or 

 company. See Vidcken-Ji.niKjs. 



Do, used instead of •' do for," seems peculiarly American. 

 " That will do me," i.e. suit me. 



Donate. Americans try to persuade us that the word 

 " donation " is American. But of course donation for a 

 gift of considerable value is found in English writings of a 

 time long preceding the Day of Independence. " Donate," 

 however, as a verb formed from " donation," as " collide " 

 from '• collision," is unquestionably an American word, and a 

 very unpleasing word it is. 



Donation Partji. A party collected to make presents to a 

 clergyman, where the parishioners are not generous enough 

 to give him a suitable salary. 



Done, used instead of did. Bartlett makes the odd 

 remark that this vulgarism is common in the State of New 

 York, and also heard in the province of J^einster, Ireland. 

 (This reminds one of the example in the " Art of Sinking," 

 which tells us how a person whose name I " disremember" 



was not only 



The great god of war, 



but also, and moreover, was 



Lieutenant-Colonel to the Eavl of Mar.) 

 Done for did is a common vulgarism wherever the English 

 language is spoken. It is only an Americanism in being 

 heard oftener in America than in the old country, and 

 especially in being heard among classes who might be 

 expected to know better. 



Done used in an adverbial way i.s a negro vulgarism. 

 " Done gone " means " gone quite away," as Mrs. Nickleby's 

 admirer i>ut it. " He's done gone and done it " is a 

 singularly emphatic bit of nigger phraseology. " Done 

 dead " means rather more dead tlian mere death unqualitied 

 would imply : the expressiju is known to be of negro origin, 

 or one might attiibute it to " Leinster, Ireland," and also 

 to LTlster, Munsler, and Connaught, where one may not. 

 uufrequently hear the expression " murdhered inthoiiely." 



Don't (uiiount to much. Mr. Bartlett i.s kind enough to 

 explain that this corresponds with what we mean in Eng- 

 land when we speak of any one as " no great shakes." But 

 " don't amount to much " has been used in England a good 



deal longer than Mr. Bartlett imagines, and " no great 

 shakes " is sheer- slang — in England (and in America too, 

 where this expression, probably derived from apple-growing 

 regions, is often heard). 



Doted. Changed, or half-rotten. Prolmhly equivalent to 

 our old English doited. 



[To be continued,.) 



AMATEUR PHOTOGRAPHY. 



By T. C. Hepwokth. 



HERE was recently shown in one of the 

 Bond Street galleries a collection of more 

 than two thousand photographs, the whole 

 of which were the work of amateurs. The 

 idea of holding such an exhibition originated 

 with the London Stereoscopic Company, by 

 whom valuable prizes were offered to com- 

 petitors in several different classes of subjects. Thus one 

 class was reserved for marine subjects, another for land- 

 scapes, another for the work of beginners, and so on. With- 

 out entering into any detailed examination of the various 

 pictures exhibited, we may usefully call attention to several 

 points in connection with them which seem to us worthy 

 of remark. 



Not alone did this exhibition show an advance in 

 general acquaintance with photographic manipulations on 

 the part of amateurs, but it illustrated in a remarkal)le 

 manner several important steps in the recent history of 

 photography itself. In the first place, every picture 

 here without exception owed its creation to that system 

 of dry-plate photography which came upon us like 

 a revelation only six short years ago, a .system which 

 has rendered possible the " delineation " of so-called 

 instantaneous effects. Nor was this collection of pictures 

 devoid of several excellent examples of this most startling 

 application of the camera. Here, for example, was a mar- 

 vellous rendering of a flash of lightning which at once 

 called to mind the br'anched, crackling dischar-ge from a 

 large indirction coil. How different this from the stereo- 

 typed zigzag line which artists for centuries have been con- 

 tent to accept as a typical representation of the thunderbolts 

 of heaven ! Passing from things sirblime to those of a 

 very mundane charvacter we saw in Dr. Alabone's instan- 

 taneous studies a boy [ilaying leapfrog, and actually for- the 

 moment poised with his finger-tips on the Ijowed back of his 

 companion in sport. In the same frame wer-e a couple of 

 swimmers in the act of entering the water- fr-om the top of 

 that unpicturesque object, a bathing-machine. Both were 

 in mid air, one taking a fair " header," and the other turning 

 a summersault. 



Another recent advance in photography was illustrated 

 by the large number of pictures which were printed by the 

 platinotype process, and which, apart from their engraving- 

 like, artistic appearance, have the merit of undoubted per- 

 manence. The discoverer of this process is able to boast 

 that no chemical agent .short of warm aqua rei/ia can 

 destrov the platinum image. In other words, the picture 

 is far less destructible than the paper which supports it. 

 Then, again, in the many representations of mountain 

 scenery we had an exemplification of the very latest 

 advance in photographic art, wher-eby the tourist is 

 relieved of the weight of glass, and can take his pictures, 

 jianorama fashiorr, on a roll of prejrared paper-, otirerwise 

 known as the " Eastman film." By this new system the 

 weight of apparatus is reduced to such an extent that an 

 Alpine climber is able to carry his camera to altitudes 



