an the United States of America. 457 
did not obey his parents. This word, however, is never used but in very 
familiar conversation, and is far from being so common as it was some 
years ago. A late English traveller has the following remarks upon it. 
“ I found in several instances that the country-feople of Vermont and oth- 
er New England states make use of many curious phrases and quaint ex- 
pressions in their conversation, which are rendered more remarkable by a 
Sort. of nasal twang which they have in speaking. Every thing that cre- 
ates surprise is awfu! with them ; ‘ what an awful wind! awful hole ! aw- 
Jul hill! awful mouth ! awful nose!” ke. Travels through Canada and 
the U. States, by John Lambert, London, 1814. 
B, 
— ayy FORTH; backwaras and forwards. He was walking back and 
“forth. New England. Used only in familiar conversation. — 
BACKWOODSMEN ; ; a name given by the people of the commercial towns in 
the United States, to those who iphabit the territory westward of the Al- 
legany mountains. “ The project of transmuting the classes of American 
citizens and converting sailors into dackwoodsmen, is not too monstrous for 
speculatists to conceive and desire.” wisiress 8 Ble p- 144. This word is 
"commonly used as a term of reproach (and that, oly in the familiar style) 
te designate those people, who, beng" ‘ata Aiiance Tone the sea, and en- 
tirely agricultural, are supposed to be hostile, or indifferent, to the commer- 
Cial interests of the United States. 
BANDITTI. The use of this word, in Marshail’s Life of Washington, as a 
noun of the singular number, is censured in the Annual Review, vol. vii. p. 
241, The passage alluded to by the reviewers is this :—“ The expulsion 
3 ; or suppression of a danditti of tories collecting on Long Island.” Life of 
_. Washington, vol. ii. p. 285. I donot recollect seeing it thus used in any 
. other American work ; and Judge Marshall hitnself, in other places, uses 
jt as a plural noun. “ The perpetrators of the late murders were danditti 
composed chiefly of Creeks and Cherokees.” Vol. ep set. Pee 
BANK-BILL; a bank-note. It is remarkable that neither Dr. Jofinson tor the 
other Lexicographers have the term 6ank-note in their dictionaries, though 
79. 
