The Salt Lake tribune. [volume] (Salt Lake City, Utah) 1890-current, 1910-01-16

tionary and Gazetteer Of the World
have been enlarged and corrected in
accordance with tho latest authorities.
In spelling and pronunciation. the
treatment of the various speclal dc
parGmcnts, the principles applied TO
ploycd in the work, the detailed in the
preface. Suffice il TO say that all ls
excellent and the authorities relied on
| are the best. As 10 pronunciation,
special caro- has been taken TO asccr-
tain and record the hest English usage,
thus freshly emphasizing the ''1ntc--
national'' character Of the work.
The treatment applied 10 the general
vocabulary may be illustrated from one
| class of words The common speech OF
the people is sweled largely from
homely and everyday sources. Its lower
stratum, the debatablc ground between
the admissible and the inadmlssiblc for
is known rs slang Tho word itself is
defined in the present book (in the
synonyms under "cant'' as the
popular but unauthorized (and usually
ephemeraD usage of odd, Grotesqnc; or
strained words or terms of speech. -
Johnson defined the dignity Of lltera
ture by highly exclusive attitude to-
ward all such interlopcrs Webster shut
the door still tighter. But the Una
bridgcd OF 1864 opened tho gate little,
and the old international opened II
wider. The Oxford Dictionary is cx
tremelv hospitable, admitting almost
everything of this coinage which is
found in reputable print. The purist
who would fain run n rigid line OF OK
clusion along this frontier is confronted
by the fact that historically slang has
been one Of the experiment stations IN
which verbal candidates were tried out
it has been one stage IN the contest
for the survival of the fittcst. Thus, |
bluff" as a metaphor derived from
best periodicals about quarter of n
century ago. .'Stand pat, - from the |
same game, seems 10 have been first
employed in political sense by Scna-
tor Hanna in 1902 and now the ''stand-
patier" figures in all current discus
sions of the American tariff. Such
sla4s a3ssft terms PSmgh PS SonsSs SSadsS G'Gaa make
good. ". i.), whatever their merits or
are so common IN the news
papers and light literature Of the day
that their meaning is likely to be oc-
casionally sought for, perhaps by some
crudite scholar who has stumbled on
them in unfamiliar fields. As to all
such terms. the editors of the New In
have aimed at the practic-
able maximum of utility. Their test
question has been: Is this word likely
to be looked up by enough readers,
within the next few years, To ontitle ii
to a place. This has led TO the inclusion
Of such slang terms as appear To have
pretty general vogue and seem likely
10 hold their ground for some longer
Or shorter term Of years
This seems to us TO be the true prin
,iple of dictionary making.
There is contained also in this great
work full representation of the an.
,ient usage of English authors, New
,ses of old words are well pointed out,
md, in short, it is difficult TO think of
anything appertaining to the collection,
definition. and treatment Of words that
s left out of this book. Everything is {
lere: nothing is omitted. And the sur +;
,rising fullness Of il all is for the benc
il of the users Of this comprehensive, I
lighly practical, magnificent volume