the only guide to authoritative usefulness, as even the publishers of Webster's Dictionary have at last been obliged in practice to admit.

In pronunciation the usage of the most cultivated people of English blood and speech is absolute, as far as their usage itself is fixed. But the least valuable part of a dictionary is that which is given to orthoepy. Pronunciation is the most arbitrary, varying, and evanescent trait of language; and it is so exceedingly difficult to express sound by written characters, that to convey it upon paper with certainty in one neighborhood for ten years, and to the world at large for one year, is practically impossible.

Upon the plan thus lightly sketched, an English dictionary might be made which would give a vocabulary of the language from its formation, with full and exact definitions, etymology, and pronunciation, and which yet would be a convenient handbook, in clear typography, and which could be sold at half the price now paid for "the best," whichever that may be.

* With the request that I should give some attention to the subject of elocution—a request made chiefly by readers who seem to suffer under the stated preaching of the gospel -I cannot comply. According to my observation, elocution cannot be taught; and systems of elocution are as much in vain as the physicians immortalized on the gravestone that fascinated the young eyes of David Copperfield. The ability to speak with grace and force is a gift of nature that may be improved by exercise and observation, but very little, if at all, by instruction. What can be profitably said upon this subject has been well said by Mr. Gould in his book "Good English."

CHAPTER XIII.

"JUS ET NORMA LOQUENDI."

WALKING down the Bowery one morning of

last spring, I met a lad who took a paper from a package that he carried and thrust it into my unwilling hand. I suspected him of having lain in wait for the purpose; for on looking at the paper I found on it a printed announcement in these words:

Being about to inaugurate my Sample Room at No. Bowery on the 16th instant, I invite my friends to be present at a Free Lunch on that occasion.

N. B-Liquors and everything first class.

It is probable that neither this young gentleman nor his employer had given his days and nights to the perusal of the first edition of a certain book, which need not be named upon this page, or they would not have singled out its author for the unexpected honor of an invitation to the inauguration of a "sample-room." And yet possibly, even in that case, they, knowing the proverbial impecuniosity of literary men, might have supposed that, considering the tempting terms on which entertainment was proffered, I might be induced to be present on that occasion. However that might be, I did not scorn the invitation, but, for purposes of my own which have taken me to places even less to my liking than

a "sample-room," on the appointed day I was present at the inaugural ceremonies, which I observed. were of a very interesting nature to those who took part in them. I will confess, too, as Doctor Johnson once did, that at the early hour at which I made my visit I was impransus; but how much I ate and drank, I shall never tell; and as to how many brethren of my craft were also present, I shall ever preserve a discreet silence. Far be it from me to reveal to a curious and unsympathizing world how the priests of literature eke out their scanty means, and supply the wants of nature from the deodands of such inaugural sacrifices.

I remained long enough to discover that, whether the liquors were first-class or not, the language was. Among the choice morsels with which I was regaled was the remark of a gentleman with a pallid face, and a heavy mustache very black in the mass and very red just at the roots, who wore a dirty shirt confined by a brilliant pin worth at least five thousand dollars. Evidently disgusted with either the quality or the quantity of his entertainment, he said as he swaggered out, "Blessid is them wot don't expect nawthin'; for them's the ones wot won't git disappointed." Another gentleman, who as plainly was better pleased with his luncheon, replying for himself and a companion to an inquiry as to how he had fared, said, "Other fellers goes in for the fried liver, but me and him comes down orful on the corn beef." I was not surprised to hear another free-luncher as sert with emphasis that his host was a perfect gentle. man, and that he wished he would inaugurate every day. Soon after which I departed, no less pleased with my entertainment than he with his! I had

gotten all I came for; and at how many receptions, at which luncheon is also free (although that, of course, is never thought of), can a man say as much as he goes away, leaving "society" behind him?

I

Now, if the first mentioned of my convives had uttered his apophthegm in the form, Blessed are they who expect nothing, for they will not be disappointed, and if the other had said, He and I come down awfully on the corned beef, and the remainder of the company had discoursed in like manner, I confess that the entertainment would have lacked for me the seasoning that gave it all its savor. Their talk afforded me the enjoyment of an inward laugh. But why was it so ridiculous? Merely because it was at variance with cultivated usage? think not. It seems to me that the amusing element in such a use of language is absurdity—the absurdity which is the consequence of incongruity. Their meaning was as unmistakable as if their sentences had been constructed by a pedagogue; but with this intelligibility there was a confusion due to the heterogeneous incongruity of the words with their position and their real significance. The combination of singular verbs with plural nouns, the use of words expressing an object in the place of those which express a subject, of those which express the quality of a thing to tell the manner of an act—this incongruity was the cause of the laughable absurdity. To a certain extent, indeed, the violation of usage was at the bottom of this absurdity; for if usage had not made the verb is singular, and the pronoun them objective, the word awful expressive of quality, and corn a substantive, and so forth, there would have

been no incongruity. But here the point to be observed is, that usage does not act arbitrarily. It is guided, almost governed, by a union of the forces of precedent and reason.

Within certain limits usage has absolute authority in language. To assert this is not to lay down a law, or to set up a standard, but merely to recognize a fact. For as the only use of language, outside of Talleyrandic diplomacy, is to express, and not tʊ conceal, our ideas, and as language which does not conform to the general usage of those to whom it is addressed cannot convey to them the meaning of the speaker or of the writer, such language fails to fulfil the first, if not the only, condition of its being. It has been said that the usage which controls language is that of great writers and cultivated speakers. To a certain extent this is true; but it is not true without important qualification. For the very necessity which controls communication by words, that is, the making of a thought common to the speaker and the hearer by means of a medium which has a common value to both, is binding upon the great writers and the cultivated speakers themselves. A man who uses words that are unknown, or familiar words in senses that are strange, or who, using familiar words in accepted senses, puts them together in an incoherent succession, which jars and interrupts rather than easily leads the train of thought, will fail to convey his meaning, whatever may be his mental gifts or his culture.

Ideas and facts may be new or

strange; but the language in which they are uttered must be old in fact or familiar in form, or they cannot be imparted.