The Birmingham age-herald. [volume] (Birmingham, Ala.) 1902-1950, 1902-07-08
way in which Our I'm,
happy Language" is Abused

cause It Is so apt to pass unnoticed even
in proof And which, has more excuse
for It than the split inhnitive. because
It arises out of genuine mental eonfu-
haps for many people. because it is used
by not few of our great writer's. We
have met with it n Sir Walter Scott and
have found 1t in George Borrows books,
with disconcerting frequence. Neyerthe-
less, 1t Is an error IN the common man,
unless he can write like Scott and Bor-
row In other respects. which we doubt
Now at the risk of incur ing a charge Of
literary snobbishr ess. we will say frank
iy that, while we can forgive this pecu-
harity In Borrow IL we found this error
In any writings of the common man Of
which We had the editing, we would de-
stroy them without compunction. It is
not SO very long ago. By The way that
we say little pamphlet written by some
German professor Whose name we regret
to have forgotten). partly for the purpose
of condemning the German equivalent Of
and which used IN the same way. He
was quite comminatory. We are look
Ing anxiously for something Of the sauna
sort in French. for "et our is much IA
vored in that tongue. The word same
as used by our friend. the author of THE
Madness OF Nabuchodonosor" condemns
itself so utterly that we need not waste
time over it. lis knack of ending HIS SEN
fences with unimportant propositions is
an offense against almost every principle
OF euphony emphasis, appearanee-in
short, Of language. His other peculiar
tiles arise out of his native genius and.
save as examples of carelessness and
bad grammar, they call for no particular
censure.
Not long ago we read an article In ons
Of the quarterly reviews in which the
writer seemed particularly fond of an
redundant "of them" On every possible
occasion, so it seemed to us. instead of
beginning a sentence with the natural
they ALL he used "all of them" and
ended 1t In the same way instead of with
the natural them ALL 1t is a slight mat
ter, no doubt and only noticeable as
mannerism when very frequent repeated.
but 1t Jared on us as an unnecessary
and unbeautiful use of words. A SOME
what similar mannerism is the use of
what we may call an enclitic lone" or
"ones, The pens of my aunt are good"
says ollendorf; but the healthy bodied
Englshman (and more particularly wo-
mani In making the same brilliant re-
Election says. The pens of my aunt are
good ones" 1t may be fastidious in us to
object to ones here, but 1t is certain
ly unnecessary to the sentence, and pos
sibly even harmful to It; we would be
more convinced of the merit of the pens
If good We're allowed to have its prop
er emphasis and value, while "ones''
just seems to give them benefit of the
doubt. A weekly journal lately discussed
the use of ''averse to- and one or two
correspondents attacked it with vio-
lence. We admit that its use is not JUS
titled by its derivation, but on the other
hand, 1t appears to us to be more euph-
onious than "averse from, which is a
good deal in its favor. Besides we have
already treated the venerable Latin lam
guage so Ill that we see no reason to be
pedantic in this one instance We are
deeply indebted to the dead let us follow
the custom of heirs, and forget out obli-
cations so soon as may be.
.