Corvallis gazette. [volume] (Corvallis, Benton County, Or.) 1900-1909, 1901-06-14
THE SLANG FOUNDRY.
THE UNITED STATES ORIGINATES
THE BEST EXPRESSIONS.
After a Probationary Term in the vo-
cabuIary of the Uneducated and Care
less, the Really Expressive Phrases
Are Adopted Into the Language.


The London Society of Amateur Phil
ologists, the members of which are de-
voted to the study Of language, has
gravely decided that IL it were not for
the additions made from time to time
by Americans, English would have to
be classed as dead or at least as
rapidly dying language.
From this country. however, says
the Chicago Tribune, come so many
apt and novel phrases which are incor-
porated into the body Of the English
tongue that it Is still alive and growing.
And both In the United States and
abroad students are beginning to rec
ognize the importance and the value Of
words and phrases which start as
slang and, because they yividly de
scribe some prevailing condition, grad
ually find their way into the standard
dictionaries. Both the philologists Of
London and American authorities
agree in the opinion that comparatively
little slang of the sort which endures
and becomes part Of the language orig
mates in large cities. Nor is it used
first by educated and refined people.
The so-called educated classes" add
little to a language except some stilted
words which are borrowed from the
classics or scientific terms which are
also likely to be derived from one of
the dead languages. 1t is the men on
the farm, on Western ranches, In gold
and silver mines, and in other similar
occupations, who give the language its
vitality and growth.
Thus the men who pack mules and
horses for the trail over the mountains
and plains of the great West put
tight "cinch'' on many a "critter" be-
fore the general public began to talk
familiarly of .'getting cinch" on any
proposition in which it was interested.
The lumbermen in the great woods of
Wisconsin and the Northwest piled up
many millions of logs In booms and
watched the logs go tearing down the
swift little rivers after the 'boom was
busted for many years before the
stock brokers and real estate agents
adopted their phraseology. Now there
are few people indeed who do not
know what boom" Is and what Is
likely to happen when a ''boom is
busted"
Speaking broadly, there are two
kinds of slang. One depends for its
popularity on the mere fact that the
phrase is mouth filling and pleases the
popular fancy. Such slang is likely to
have only a temporary popularity. The
slang which lives and which sooner or
later becomes permanent part of the
language is that which really means
something, which describes some fact
or condition in a new and vivid way.
The only class of highly educated
people who contribute to any extent to
the growth of the language is the col
lege students. College slang is so vivid
and has been so generally adopted that
a dictionary has been issued which is
entirely devoted to@the subject.
1t was at college boarding club, for
instance, that student who wanted
the small milk pitcher asked COM
panion to ssdrive the heffers this way
From terms originally used 5in college
games the language has adopted many
useful phrases. 1t is not many years
since the first curved ball was pitched
/ in a baseball game, and yet the cur
! rent phrase, Il am onto his curves, "
has meaning entirely without connec-
/ ton with the baseball diamond. From
| the field sports of collegians have come
the phrases to Jump on man and to
/ Jump on him with both feet" Even
the great American game of draw
poker, which will not be claimed as a
college game exclusively. has added
several common phrases to the Ian.
i guage Many a man who has never
tried to Fill two pair" has called a
bluff" or declared that he would .go 1t
blind"
/ 1t was a farmers boy who had touch
ed his tongue to the iron pump handle
on below-zero morning who discov-
cred that .to freeze to- a person ex-
pressed strong degree of attachment.
The expressions ito get load on" and
'sto carry load" are plainly of coun-
Try eXCrdcti0H anu ueeu uO eApldudllOn.
"a jag" is a provincialism which
means a little. load, SO that to say q
man has "a big jag on" is contradic.
ton in terms. jag" is one of the
American expressions which has hard
" reached England as yet, If one may
Judge from the expression Of a recent
author, who defined a Jag as an um.
brella and quoted as authority para.
graph from st. Louis paper which
announced that "Mr. Brown was seen
on the street last Sunday morning in
the rain, carrying fine large Jag" II
;. was Chicago humorist' who declared
{ that man of his acquaintance was
sometimes entirely sober. though he
did Jump from jag to jag like an alco
holic chamois."
Almost every business and profes
sion has given the most picturesque
! words in its particular vocabulary t.
enrich the language. From the stocl
exchange, for instance, come ebulls'
; and "bears," corner" and .'mar
gins" though these words were orig
inally borrowed and given new mean