340 



American Euglish. 



In respect to at least one American spelling, that oiplow, and prob- 

 ably others, it sliould not be lorgotten that the prevalent practice in 

 this country, though an indisputable innovation so far as modern 

 usage is concerned, is really a return to the long abandoned custom 

 of an earlier time, from which divergence without good reason has 

 gradually grown np in England. And this brings us to another 

 strongly marked characteristic of our American speech — its greater 

 permanence and steadiness, so to speak, as compared with that of the 

 mother country. Such a change of fashion as has occurred in London 

 in respect to a lady's robe, which was universally called a "dress" a 

 dozen years ago, afterwards a *'gown," and now a "frock" — the 

 words "dress" and "gown" being accounted alike vulgar at present 

 — such a change as that would be well-nigh impossible in New York. 

 The same peculiarity will appear very clearly, where it might least 

 be expected, on close examination of any list of words supposed to 

 have been greatly distorted in their meaning, or even manufactured 

 out of whole cloth, by erring Yankees, a A'ery largo proportion of 

 which will almost always be found to be good old English, grown 

 obsolescent or obsolete at home, but preserved in the New World in 

 their pristine vitality and force ; and conversely, on examining such 

 a book as Halliwell's Dictionary of Archaisms and Provincialisms, 

 which contains, presumably, no word now in good use in Great Brit- 

 ain in the meaning given, the American reader Avill discover a great 

 number of terms — nearly three hundred, I should say — with which he 

 is perfectly familiar. I give a few examples, not including any that 

 are marked as provincial, the direct inference being that all these 

 words were once good English, but are no longer in common use in 

 the mother country: 



Adze (a carpenter's tool) ; affectation (-'^a curious desire for a thing 

 which nature hath not given"); afterdap; agape; age as a verb; air 

 in the sense of appearance ; amerce; andirons; angry, said of a wound ; 

 appellant (one who appeals); apple-pie order; laker's dozen; bamboozle; 

 bay m a barn; bay window ; /^e^rers at a funeral; berate; between 

 whiles; bicher; blanch (to whiten); brain as a verb ; burly; cast (to tie 

 and throw down, as a horse); catcall; cesspool; chafe (to grow angry); 

 clodhopper; clutch (to seize); clutter; cockerel; coddle; copious; cosey; 

 counterfeit money ; crazy in the sense of dilapidated, as applied to a 

 building; croc^• (an earthen vessel) ; crone (an old woman); crook {\\ 

 bend); croon; cross-grained in the sense of obstinate or peevish ; cross- 

 patch; cross purposes; cuddle; cuff' (to beat); deft; din; dormer win- 

 dow ; earnest money given to bind a bargain ; egg on; greenhorn; hasp; 

 jack of all trades; jamb of a door; lintel; list (selvage of cloth) ; loop 

 hole; nettled (out of temper); neiuel; ornate; perforce; piping hot; 2Jit 



