THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE IN AMERICA.

THE

HE languages of the various European settlers of America, transported to that remote region, and for many years almost isolated there, might naturally be expected, in the lapse of time, to exhibit a certain amount of difference from the same tongues as continued to be spoken in their original countries. Such difference would be brought about by two opposite sets of causes-the changes which the language underwent in its new position, and those which it did not undergo. For, though the written languages of modern Europe have sustained no remarkable alterations since the settlement of America, the familiar phrases of conversation alter, not merely from century to century, but even from generation to generation. If, on the one hand, local peculiarities of custom or contact with other languages would introduce new terms in the new country, on the other hand, fashion or accident itself might work changes in the old country which would not penetrate to the new. In a word, then, we should expect to find in the colonial speech, compared with that of the mother country, archaisms as well as neologisms.

But as regards the continental languages which have permanently established themselves to a greater or less extent in America, these changes excite the smallest possible amount of curiosity. Little, for instance, is known, and as little cared about, the nature and extent of the modifications which the Spanish language may have received in the Hispano-American republics, for these countries occupy but an insignificant place in the political world, and what is more to the point here, are absolutely nowhere in the literary world. With the English language, however, the case is widely different. Contemporaneous with the astounding increase in material greatness and political rank of the United States, has been the development of their literature, both in quantity and quality, to an extent which makes a complete anachronism of Sidney Smith's once

pertinent query on the subject. Such being the case, it is impossible that any Transatlantic peculiarities of expression, any novelties, whether by way of alteration or addition, seeking to introduce themselves into the parent speech; any Americanisms, in short, should not attract some attention; and it seems to us equally clear that they not only attract passing attention, but merit serious regard. If the hypothetical modifications of dead, nay, of extinct languages, have been deemed worthy not merely of the philologist's speculations, but also of the historian's researches; if what may have happened to the Pelasgic tongue under certain possible circumstances has been considered a question deserving grave discussion, it is certainly worth while to investigate the course of a great living language, transplanted from its primitive seat, brought into contact and rivalry with other civilized tongues, and exposed to various influences, all having a prima facie tendency to modify it.

It must be observed, too, that these peculiarities are not the accidents of infancy, but the settled traits of maturer growth. They are not diminishing, but increasing. The scanty colonial and paulo-post colonial literature of America appears to contain no marked deviations from the English models which it followed, indeed, almost to servility. If any greater differences existed in the familiar language of conversation, they were generally unknown to or unheeded by Englishmen. So much so, that when Captain Morris wanted to write a song against Billy Pitt' in the Yankee dialect, he could scarcely find a peculiar Yankee' word or phrase wherewith to season it. No such difficulty now exists. On the contrary, Americanisms so abound, that some of them have flowed over, as it were, spontaneously into English popular writing.

Nevertheless, the subject has been much slighted on both sides of the Atlantic. On the eastern side it has been regarded too exclusively in a ludicrous light. Yankeeisms' in this century have taken the place occupied by bulls and other Hibernicisms in the last, as a fertile source of common-place material for cheap wit and vulgar ribaldry. The scribbler who could interlard his writings with a sufficient number of 'guesses' and 'calculates,' 'almighty smarts,' and 'tarnation cutes,' has flattered himself with the idea of having thereby, at the same time established his reputation for humour, and presented an unanswerable argument against democracy. The extent to which trash of this kind has been imposed on the public is hardly credible. Anything which was bad English has been passed off for American. Not more than fifteen years ago a book was published in London, professing to contain, under a

Misrepresentations and Mistakes.

59

feigned name, the adventures of an English traveller in America. Every page of it contained ample proof that the writer had never crossed the Atlantic. The Americans were represented speaking a jargon composed in about equal parts of Hibernicisms and Cockneyisms; while, as if to give the fullest exhibition of the author's ignorance, he had illustrated his work with impossible drawings, representing, for instance, gentlemen walking about the streets of New York in breeches and long stockings, and the members of congress seated promiscuously on benches like those of Parliament. Yet this very book received the honour of a panegyrical notice, extending through several columns of a leading London journal. After this, it is less to be wondered at that Bon Gualtier's amusing squib about the aesthetic gin-sling party at Peleg Longbody's,' was taken by some good souls for a real sketch of American literary society.

On the western side of the Atlantic more than one cause has operated to impede the investigation of the subject. In the first place, many Americans, even of the most learned class, are not altogether conscious of any national peculiarities of speech; they may have a vague suspicion of their existence, but possess no accurate knowledge of their nature. Nor is this matter of surprise when we consider that the spoken language of a country always contains expressions which do not generally find their way into writing, at least into the best description of writing, and that most usually read; so that a thorough knowledge of the written tongue by no means implies a corresponding acquaintance with the spoken, as the experience of any tourist or traveller abundantly shows. The few American writers, on this subject, therefore, have mostly erred both by default and excess: they have omitted distinctive American peculiarities, and they have set down as Americanisms expressions which are only vulgarisms, or not even that. Thus Bartlett's book, while it fails to notice some notorious Americanisms, admits a number of expressions which are perfectly good English, or, at any rate, perfectly English.

But a more serious reason has tended not merely to impede, but absolutely to prevent, Transatlantic investigation of this subject. The national vanity has been aroused-somewhat justly annoyed, perhaps by the shabby treatment above referred to; and Americans have taken up the line of either denying or explaining away the existence of any distinctive national peculiarities of speech. Some of the arguments employed have been handled with so much plausibility and ingenuity, that it may not be amiss to notice them briefly. They have a superficial appearance of bearing on the point,

though in reality far wide of it, and doubtless appear satisfactory to a number of sincere believers.

It is said, for example, that the great majority of reputed Americanisms can be traced to an English source, being either provincial or archaic forms, or both. Now, that many of these peculiarities can thus be traced is perfectly true; indeed, both the number and the force of producible instances are greater than most persons suppose. One of the first expressions that would probably strike an inexperienced Londoner as peculiar on his arrival in the United States, is rare for underdone meat. But this word (obviously originating in a mispronunciation of raw) is noted in Halliwell's Dictionary as common to several provincial dialects. When Captain Marryatt undertook to give a popular vocabulary of Transatlantic idioms, corned, for intoxicated, occupied a conspicuous place in the list, and the Captain thought it worth while to explain the origin of the term philosophically, because whiskey is made of Indian corn.' Yet this very expression is a Salopianism, and recorded in Halliwell as such. We can adduce a still stronger case. If there ever was a phrase deemed particularly Transatlantic in origin, it is that of Lynch Law for summary and informal justice. Yet there appear good reasons for doubting its western paternity. It is usually explained as having been derived from the emphatic practice of a certain Judge Lynch, who lived somewhere in the Far West.' But no authentic or consistent accounts of this functionary exist; no tangible grounds for supposing him to be anything more than a mythical personage, while a very probable solution of the phrase presents itself in the parent tongue. Linch, in several of the northerncounty dialects, means to beat or maltreat. Lynch Law, then, would be simply equivalent to club law; and the change of a letter may be easily accounted for by the fact that the name of Lynch is as common in some parts of America as in Ireland. It is like the introduction of an a into loafer from the analogy of loaf, or the propensity of the lower classes all over France to express a certain beverage, to them a rare exotic, by the combination of letters tait, after the model of the more familiar word lait.

But not to multiply instances, and admitting, once for all, every possible case of the kind that can be claimed, it certainly seems an odd way of proving that American speech contains no deviations from the standard of good English, to prove that it abounds in English provincialisms. What do we mean by good English but such English as is written in good books, and talked by educated and accomplished men; the standard of the best English society, and particularly the best London

society? Surely, to show that any form of speech contains provincialisms is of itself tantamount to showing that it contains deviations from the best standard. Moreover, we shall have occasion to remark, in the course of these observations, that some very decided Batavianisms and Gallicisms prevail even in the best American society; and these no power of reasoning can bring into the category of English provincialisms.

Again it is urged, and the assertion in a measure springs from the preceding one, that the number of actually new words invented in America is very small. We admit this argument to be true, so far as it goes; but it does not go so far, by any means, as its supporters imagine. They seem to forget that there is such a thing as applying a new meaning to existing words, and of this novelty the examples in America are sufficiently numerous. Thus creek is a perfectly legitimate English word, but its legitimate English meaning is a small arm of the sea,' whereas in America it is invariably used to designate a small river, except when it happens to be used to designate a large one. Draw is an old-established English verb, but the Americans have further employed it as a noun, and made it do duty for draw-bridge.

Thirdly, it has often been asserted that the deviations from standard English which occur in America are fewer and less gross than those which may be found in England herself. For instance, that there is no part of the United States where an honest citizen, unused to country ways, or a foreigner who had learned the language from classic sources, would be so little able to understand the people or make himself understood by them, as he would be in some parts of Cornwall or Yorkshire. And that, taking the average, the provincialisms of England, on the whole, exceed those of America. This is the line of argument which sometimes develops itself into the amusingly paradoxical assertion that the Americans speak better English than the English themselves. But such reasoning is on a par with that of one who should consider himself to have demonstrated that the upper classes of America were richer than those of England by showing that the lower classes of England were poorer than those of America, or that the average wealth of the American population per head was greater than that of the English. There is no inconsistency in admitting that the worst English patois may be less intelligible than the worst American, and yet maintaining that the best currently spoken American contains appreciable deviations from the true English standard. The English provincialisms keep their place; they