The Newport plain talk. (Newport, Tenn.) 1909-1939, 1914-05-13
ALL IN The ACCENT
Words on Which Common Usage
and Dictionaries Disagree.
LINCOLN AND LIEN AND LION.
An Amusing Verbal Duel In the Su.
preme Court In Which the Lean
Lawyers Wit Came Into Playa
Blind Mans Criticism of Irving.

Lawyers Wit Came Into Playa
Blind Mans Criticism of Irving.
There are many words so habitually
mispronounced that the correct accent
| d. e.. the accent favored by the die
tionaries, would appear wrong il any
body used it in current conversation
This. of course, means that common
usages have overriden the dictionary
and established new standard which
the dictionary of the future will have
to respect. just as those Of today
respect the pronunciation of ''lien"
hat they rejected in the past. Such
words are cocaine and ptomaine. which
the dictionary of the present recog-
nizes as trisyIables, thus: cocaine.
pto-ma-ne.
Anyone familiar with French-a Ian
guage that may be said to possess no
accented syllables-will understand
Taine's complaint about London res
taurants that whenever he ordered
potatoes the waiter invariably served
him with buttered toast.
And Of course 1t was another French
man who made a jest of matrimony
by pronouncing it ma-trim-ony.
Mark Lemon records story about
Lord Chancellor Eldon and Sir Arthur
Pigott The first always pronounced
the word lien in two syllabes. as ii
Il hn lnt
nounced it in one syllable, lean, just
as it would be pronounced in ordinary
conversations On this difference Jekyll
wrote an epigram
Sir Arthur, Sir Arthur. why. what do you
mean
By saying the chancellors lion is lean?
Do you think that his Kitchens SO bad as
all that
That nothing within it will ever get fat?
Lord EldOns pronunciation of this
legal term was not unknown at one
time in America. Witness an anecdote
about Lincoln He once appeared in
the supreme court in case involving
lien upon a piece of property
The presiding judge was noted alike
for obstinacy and pedantry. Lincoln.
referring to the lien, pronounced II
lean This visibly affected his
honor.
Lien. Mr.. Lincoln he gently re
monstrated
Every WE'LL" said Lincoln But
little later he forgot himself and out
came the pronunciation lean.
Once more he was corrected by The
judge.
las you please" retorted Lincoln
somewhat nettled.
"Not as | please came from thu
beneh..--s,4sThat, is the, pronunciation
favored by Webster and by Worcester
1t so obtains at Westminster hall ant
also at our own supreme court il
Washington
Lincoln had now recovered his con
stitutional good humor. Bowling t.
the court. he said: Certainly. you
honor, certainly. | only desire to say
that If my client had known there wa
a lion on his farm for so long time
| am sure he would not have stayet
there even long enough to bring thl
! suit, and should not have had tn
pleasure of appearing before this hon
orable court
OF Henry Irving we are told that t
heroic perseverance and hard study b
added almost childlike eagerness t
adopt any suggested Improvement Il
T.. e Ic1t A
once offered an Illuminating criticism
on his Shylock. The sensitive ear
the sightless auditor detected faul
in Irvings opening line:
Three thousand ducats-well!
II hear no sound of the usurer II
that" was the blind mans subse
quent comment to Irving himself II
is said with the reflective air Of maj
to whom money means very little
The justice of the criticism wa
acknowledged by Irving. He revised
his reading. not only of the first line
but of several others in which he nov
saw that he had not been enough o
rhe moneylender.
George Eliot in "Middlemarch'' sup
plies classic instance OF the valu
# tile accent When Lyndgate. sor
distressed at the failure of all his pro
fessional and financial plans. comes t.
his wife for sympathy. she meets hin
with the query:
What can | do?"
Wherein the author com ments
That little speech of four words. Xix
; so many others in all languages. is ca
pable Of expressing all states Of mine
from helpless dimness to exhaustiy
argumentat:ve perception. from tn
completeSt self devoting fellowship t
the most neutral alootness. Rosa
munds thin utterance threw into tn
words What can | do:' as niue
neutrality as they could hold. The
Tell like mortal chill on Lyndgate'
toused tenderness
One of Du Manrier's best cartoons |
Punch shows a deferential man Of il
curing mind propounding this questio
to a professional beauty:
"Ain't you tired of hearing peopl
say THAT is the beautiful Miss Be
sizeT"
"Oh. no." the professional beauty r.
plies. Il am getting tired of hearin
people say is THAT the beautiful Mis-
BelsiZe?' - William s. Walsh in Oh