The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1886-12-19
WORDS THAT AMERICANS USE
What are Called Yankesisms are Of
ten Good Anglo-Saxon IdiOms.

ten Good Anglo-Saxon Idioms
We laugh at the 81 guess" OF the
Yankee, and seem 10 look upon it as a
phrase of his own nvention-forsetful
or unaware Of Tie fact that early in the
seventeenth century it was in common
use, as, indeed. IL had been as early as
the fourteenth. l. it not emplo, ed a
the Americans employ it ia Chaucer's
| line?
"of twenty years Of age he was, I gesse,'
and in Shakespeare's
Better far. guess,
] That We 10 make our entrance several ways.
/ Henry W. ii d"
When our cousins puzzle us by speak
/ ing # the Fall instead of the "Au-
tumn," they are again using good seven
tenth century English. Dryden has:
What crowds Of patients the town doctor
or how last Fall he raised the weekly bills"
The word sick" which the Ameri-
cans use where most of US use the word
ill, had the meaning they assign TO
il in the days of Chaucer, of Shakes
pvare and Of Pope. Where we speak Of
person being plain. the Americans
would describe him as homely-once
more retaining a perfectly classical
usage. In MiltOn's COmus We have
Tits for h6inely features to keep home,
They had their name thence"
The verb Ito white" most people.
probably, would pronounce to be a
newly coined word; but it Is not so.
Johnson gives an example Of its use
| from "Hakewith on Providence, 8
book which was published in -627. It
is good word, having no equivalent in
the language, and those who have
| preserved it have done wisely. The
substantive white" signifying a
knife, IS found in Shakespeare (TImon
of Athens. verse p. but seems 10 have
died out not long after.
slick" again. we should at first sight
imagine to be undoubtedly of Yankee
manufacture, but we should be quite
wrong. Chapman 1GO3) describes the
god Apollo as both slicke and dain-
| tie, and later on in the century Se find
the word used by Thomas Browne and
Fuller. The former speaks of slick
stones. G., smooth stones.
A familiar form Of salutation which
one hears sometimes in the United
States, How d ye," Is not of native
CROWN, but has the sanction of no less
writer than Pope. Years mske men
NOR talkative," he saws. but less
writative; so that l write no letters but
of plain business, or plain how DYES,
TO those few l am forced TO correspond
with"
In the case Of "cute" we have in one
and the same word an instance Of the
legitimate preservati of bygOne usage
and the unwarranted induction of
novelty. When Americans use it in the
sense OF clever" sharp" they can
show that it was so EMPLOYED in the
past but when in the sense Of pretty"
they can do no such thing. Many OF
the fair sex use the word with its latter
meaning to an exasperating extent.
Amt he cute2" you will hear a whole
chorus exclaim as they gaze in raptures
on some baby; or, again. What cute
little dreSses!" Other examples Of old
words that would have died out and
been lost 10 the language had they not
been well cared for IN their new trans
Atlantic home, might easily be cited. |
"Freshet." truly described by Arch |
bishop Trench as an exquisite word, is 4
one OF them; it is used by Milton:
"All fish from sea or shore,
AANaASL " FulAAA5 u4V0A-
Another is bluff" formerly. how
ever. used as an adjective (e. e, "a |
bluff peninsular prominence, !" whereas |
the Americans followed by our own |
TennysOn. round the hills from bluff |
10 bluff employ it as substantive;
others are "snsg,' a word which We /
meet with in Spenser and in Dryden
rifle" the same as roll, an old verb |
signifying to disturb, to yex, and found
in Chauc T.
The use of the formal Sir" when ad-
dressing a stranger or person with /
whom one has only q slight acqUaint-
ance, is another instance of The reten-
ton oy the Americans Of past modes of
speech. Good illustrations Of this pSr-
ticular custom, as 1t existed at the time
that the New World was being colon
lied, are found in the Complete Ang-
Ter" whose author died in the year in
which Pennsylvania was founded by
Penn. Such sentences as the following
are constantly occurring: Sir, l shall
by your favor bear you company as far
as Theobald's;" "Sir. my fortune has
answered my desires" Il am, sir,
brother of the angler, and so on.
IL is evident, then, that many So
called American'sms so far from being
arbitrary novelties. have the clearest
- I I