in the United States of America. « 475 
to signify guick apprehension. It is used only in conversation, and gener- 
ally with anegative, thus: He has no docity: It is a provincial word in 
- England. I do not find it in any of the dictionaries, except Bailey’s' (fol. 
1736) and 4sh’s, in which it is said to be “ an incorrect spelling” of docility. 
In this country it is a Jocal werd, and employed only by the same class 
of speakers, that would use the low word gumption, which is also fro- 
vincial in England. See Gumption. 
DOMESTICS. It has been remarked, by Englishmen, that the people of New 
England always call servants domestics. The correlative master is also 
very seldom used in the xorthern states. -Domestic is “a term of some- 
what more extent than that of servant.” See Rees’s Cyclo. 
_ To DOOM; to tax at discretion. When a person neglects to make a return of his 
_ taxable property to the. assessors of the towns, those officers doom him, that 
js, judge upon, and fix his tax according to their own discretion. Used in 
New England. “ The estates of all marchants, shopkeepers, and factors 
shall be assessed by the rule of common estimation, according to the will 
and doom of the assessors.” Massa, Colony Laws, p. 14 ed. 1660, 
DOOMAGE. « A fine or penalty. Law of New Hampshire.” Webst. 
DUTIABLE. «Subject to duties or impost.” Webst. 
The use of tis word i in eerie s Life of eouieeston, vol. ii, p. 73. 
has been censu1 t er in the Mont MO patie, yol. 
v. p. 438. It is very little used even in conversation. 
E. 
EAGLE; a gold coin of the United States, of the value of ten dollars. 
EITHER. Dr. Witherspoon has the following remarks on one use of this word 
in America: “ The United States or either of them. This is so far from 
being a mark of ignorance, that it is used by many of the most able and 
» accurate speakers and writers, yet it is not English. The United States 
are thirteen in number, but in English either does not signify one of many, 
_ but one or the other oe two. I imagine either has become an adjective 
pronoun, by being a sort of abbreviation“of a sentence, where it is used 
adverbially, either the one or the other. It is exactly the same with sxariges 
in Greek, and alteruter in Latin,” Druid, No. 5. But Johnson says, it is 
