The Newberry herald and news. (Newberry, S.C.) 1884-1903, 1888-05-03
THE WORDS WE USE.
Does an Average Man Use 700 Words Of
1000:
TGeorge Fleming in Literature.


At an educational meeting held in
this State few years ago, the conduc-
tor, a noted professor, made the follow
idg statement: "The best educated per-
son in this room will not use more than
600 or 100 words" He also assigned
smaller number to persons oflimited ed
ucation, stating that an ignorant man
would not use more than 200 or 800
words. I had before seen statements
ofsimilar import in public print, and to
test their correctness I began an inves-
rigation of the matter.
The subject was brought anew to my
mind by observing an article in the
Chautauquan some months ago, in
which Professor Bancroft remarked:
"It has been estimated that an English
farm hand has a vocabulary limited to
800 words. An American workingman
who reads the newspapers may COM
rnand from 100 to 1000 words. Five
thousand is large number, even for an
educated reader or speaker" This as
sertion is much nearer the truth. than
that Of the institute conductor men
toned. For the benefit of those who
may be interested. offer the results of
my study on the subject. An intelli-
gent person can make the same exami-
nation, and will arrive at substantially
the same results.
I took Webster's high school diction-
ary, edition 1878, containing 4S4 pages
of vocabulary, and examined each word
in the book. I made note Of those
words which supposed had used at
some time either in speaking or writing.
l counted the primitive words and
those derivatives whose meaning is
most at variances with the primitive.
Thus, count fright and fruit, but not
frighten, fruitful, frightfully nor fruit
age, fruiterer, fruitful, fruitfulness, fru-
ition and fruit-tree. I omitted most of
the compound words, especially when
the component parts directly indicated
the meaning, as milk-pail, meeting
house, rag-man, but counted those
whose significance was not directly
indicated, as crowbar, quicksand, tin
foil. AS the result of this examination,
l had 1928 words, which, think, l
myself have used.
There We're 419 in \, 52S in B, 75G in
c, 455 in D, 235 in E, 369 in F, 279 in &,
2S6 in H, $50 in l, 81 in J, 49 in K, 290
in L, 476 in NJ, IN in n, PIT in o, 7l5
in P, 50 i'll @, 397 in r, 954 in T, Il in
L, AS in V, POP in W, q in X and Y,
and 10 in Il.
Had l counted the various deriva-
tives in common use, it is probable the
number would be nearly double.
To make further test of words at
my command, spent about two hours
in writing from memory words in A.
I was able to note down 537 words that
I could use if occasion required. This
is thirty-tive per cent. more than I had
counted from the dictionary. Should
the same proportion hold good i'll all
the letters, it would follow that I can
recall from memory 10, 700 words, all of
which are familiar.
I made another count, and came to
the conclusion that could give fair
definition of at least $4,000 words in
that book, and would understand their
signification in a printed article or
spoken address.
The above estimates are based upon
my own experience and knowledge be-
cause it was convenient to make the
experiment with myself. Every we'll
Informed man will be as competent, if
not more so. Either professor men
toned will have more extended vo-
cabulary than have.
then took at random, in the same
dictionary, a page i'll each letter, aud
counted the words in very common use.
On twenty-four pages there were 25
such words. This would give $500
words in use by persons of the most
ordinary intelligence. None Of these
lists include any proper names.
At the time Of making this study,
one OF my children was three years and
two months Of age. noted down (and
still have the lists 2l3 words used by
her in one day. They were words that
any intelligent child would Use, chiefly
names Of household articles and com
mon things, with the most ordinary
verbs and participles. l did not hear
al! she said during the day, nor do l
think she used all the words she knew.
| estimated her vocabulary ut 400
words. and she did not know enough
to carry on any except childish conver-
SatioE.
From all ofthe foregoing observations
| drew the following conclusions:
Every we'll read man of fair ability
will be able to define or understand 20,-
900 or $1,000 primitives and principal
derivative words.
The same man in his conversation and
writing, will use not less than 5000 or
or 1000 words If he be literary man