dazzling jewels; and it stands there the acme, the climax, the supremest
possibility in art or nature, of bewildering, intoxicating, intolerable
magnificence. One cannot make the words too strong.
CONCERNING THE AMERICAN LANGUAGE
–[Being part of a chapter which was crowded out of “A Tramp Abroad.”–
M.T.]
There was as Englishman in our compartment, and he complimented me on–
on what? But you would never guess. He complimented me on my English.
He said Americans in general did not speak the English language as
correctly as I did. I said I was obliged to him for his compliment,
since I knew he meant it for one, but that I was not fairly entitled to
it, for I did not speak English at all–I only spoke American.
He laughed, and said it was a distinction without a difference. I said
no, the difference was not prodigious, but still it was considerable.
We fell into a friendly dispute over the matter. I put my case as well
as I could, and said:
“The languages were identical several generations ago, but our changed
conditions and the spread of our people far to the south and far to the
west have made many alterations in our pronunciation, and have introduced
new words among us and changed the meanings of many old ones. English
people talk through their noses; we do not. We say know, English people
say nao; we say cow, the Briton says kaow; we–”
“Oh, come! that is pure Yankee; everybody knows that.”
“Yes, it is pure Yankee; that is true. One cannot hear it in America
outside of the little corner called New England, which is Yankee land.
The English themselves planted it there, two hundred and fifty years ago,
and there it remains; it has never spread. But England talks through her
nose yet; the Londoner and the backwoods New-Englander pronounce ‘know’
and ‘cow’ alike, and then the Briton unconsciously satirizes himself by
making fun of the Yankee’s pronunciation.”
We argued this point at some length; nobody won; but no matter, the fact
remains Englishmen say nao and kaow for “know” and “cow,” and that is
what the rustic inhabitant of a very small section of America does.
“You conferred your ‘a’ upon New England, too, and there it remains; it
has not traveled out of the narrow limits of those six little states in
all these two hundred and fifty years. All England uses it, New
England’s small population-say four millions-use it, but we have forty-
five millions who do not use it. You say ‘glahs of wawtah,’ so does New
England; at least, New England says ‘glahs.’ America at large flattens
the ‘a’, and says ‘glass of water.’ These sounds are pleasanter than
yours; you may think they are not right–well, in English they are not
right, but ‘American’ they are. You say ‘flahsk’ and ‘bahsket,’ and
‘jackahss’; we say ‘flask,’ ‘basket,’ ‘jackass’–sounding the ‘a’ as it
is in ‘tallow,’ ‘fallow,’ and so on. ‘Up to as late as 1847 Mr.
Webster’s Dictionary had the impudence to still pronounce ‘basket’
bahsket, when he knew that outside of his little New England all America
shortened the ‘a’ and paid no attention to his English broadening of it.
However, it called itself an English Dictionary, so it was proper enough
that it should stick to English forms, perhaps. It still calls itself an
English Dictionary today, but it has quietly ceased to pronounce ‘basket’
as if it were spelt ‘bahsket.’ In the American language the ‘h’ is
respected; the ‘h’ is not dropped or added improperly.”
“The same is the case in England–I mean among the educated classes, of
course.”
“Yes, that is true; but a nation’s language is a very large matter.
It is not simply a manner of speech obtaining among the educated handful;
the manner obtaining among the vast uneducated multitude must be
considered also. Your uneducated masses speak English, you will not deny
that; our uneducated masses speak American it won’t be fair for you to
deny that, for you can see, yourself, that when your stable-boy says,
‘It isn’t the ‘unting that ‘urts the ‘orse, but the ‘ammer, ‘ammer,
‘ammer on the ‘ard ‘ighway,’ and our stable-boy makes the same remark