Barbour County index. [volume] (Medicine Lodge, Kan.) 1880-current, 1889-09-18
DICINE LODGE KANSAS WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 18 1889.

paper SAID the movement was like boom
across swollen stream, taking in all that
was worth having. This gave new mean
ing to the word. Since then it has been in
common use as such.
''You are a daisy is considered very
slangy by those who use it tindiscriminately;
and, oftentimes, it is. But if used in the
sense in which its inventor, if may so
speak of word, Charles Dickens, intended
1t, IL is good and forcible word. In ssDavid
Copperfeld" it is first used in the sense Of
calling person a daisy in a way to express
admiration, and, at the same time, to laugh
at ones credulity. Steerforth says to young
Copperheld: ''David, my daisy, you are so
innocent of the world. Let me call you my
daisy, as it is SO refreshing to find one In
these corrupt days so innocent and unso-
phisticated. My dear Copperfeld, the daisies
Of the field are not fresher than you"
Hence, when conveying the idea that q per-
SON Is artless and innocent amid a skeptical
and scheming condition OF society, to say:
You are daisy'' is not slang. 1t is forci-
bic and elegant. The same passage gave US
the other word, meaning the same thing,
though sounding little harsher, ''fresh"
We often hear the expression, you're too
fresh" This, too, was originally meant by
Dickens to mean an innocent ignorance of
the ways OF the world. 1t was so used by
Steerforth in reference to David Copper
field. But when used to mean that a per-
son is impudent or forward, as is too fre.
quently the case I ow, it becomes. slang, as
such meaning is in reality senseless.
I ''Too thin' is two-worded phrase heard
In all classes of society. By some it is used
in avulgar sense, and is Objectionable slang;
by others it is used IN the manner which
gave it to US as a good word. To say, when
speaking Of an action, so, that is too thin,"
is vulgar slang, because an action can not
be thin. But to say, when person makes
astatement which is calculated to mislead,
90, that is too thin,n is not slang. 1t was
given currency by Hon. Alexander II.
Stephens, of Georgia, in the United States
! Congress in 1870. Some member had made
areply to Mr.. Stephens, and the latter had
his chair wheeled out in the aisle and said
in that shrill, piping voice which always
commanded silence: ''Mr. Speaker, the
gentleman's arguments are gratuitous as
sertions made up Of whole cloth. And cloth,
sir. so gauzy and thin that it will not hold
water. 1t is entirely too thin, SIR"
Brother Jon athan,' as name for the
United States, is much older than this, and
was given by Washington himself, though
that individual had no idea of making a
slang phrase for name to his country at
the time. Jonathan Trumbull, Governor of
| Connecticut, furnished the struggling
colonial army with funds and supplies on
many an occasion. One time the army was
in sore distress, and a consultation was
| held. In the midst of it some one wondered
what would be done. Washington an
swered: "Well, We'll have to put it of till
we can see Brother Jonathan" as Governor
Trumbun was called; ''he will help us out,
| l guess.n And he did, and gave his name
to the country his zeal and patriotism
! helped to save.
! Thus it is that words are made and
| phrases take on a new meaning. In this
manner the language progresses by accre-
| ton, as it were. Such words as take new
meanings from custom are usually from
the common people; that is, from those who
| are not scholarly. 1t is in this way that old
| words drop out or take new meanings and
lose their old ones and new words take their
| place. At first most of them are slang.
One of the best words we have is ''agnos-
ticism," yet it's inventor-Prof. John Tyn-
| dali, the great scientist-says that when he
used it he had no idea it would be used
again, or that he would be understood in
using it. He could find no other, he says, to
convey an idea of his religious belief in an
swer to some churchman that he tell what
he did believe Hence heinvented 'Agnos-
ticism," meaning ''the unknowable." 1t is
only about fifteen years old.