nelegantly.]

IV

Let me note a few of the Americanisms, good, bad, and indifferent, which
specially struck me, whether in talk or in books, during my recent visit
to the United States. I call them Americanisms without inquiring into
their history. Some of them may be of English origin; but for practical
purposes an Americanism may be taken to mean an expression commonly used
in America and not commonly used in England.

I had not been three hours on American soil before I heard a charming
young lady remark, "Oh, it was bully!" I gathered that this expression
is considered admissible, in the conversation of grown-up people, only
in and about New York. I often heard it there, and never anywhere else.
A very distinguished officer, who served as a volunteer in Cuba, was
asked to state his impressions of war. "War," he said, "is a terrible
thing. You can't exaggerate its horrors. When you sit in your tent the
night before the battle, and think of home and your wife and children,
you feel pretty sick and downhearted. But," he added, "next day, when
you're in it, oh, it _is_ bully!"

The general use of picturesque metaphor is of course a striking feature
of American conversation. Many of these expressions have taken firm root
in England, such as "to have no use for" a man, or "to take no stock in"
a theory. But fresh inventions crop up on every hand in America. For
instance, where an English theatrical manager would say, "We must get
this play well talked about and paragraphed in advance," an American
manager puts the whole thing much more briefly and forcibly in the
phrase, "We don't want this piece to come in on rubbers." Metaphor
apart, many Americans have a gift of fantastic extravagance of phrase
which often produces an irresistible effect. A gentleman in high
political office had one day to receive a deputation with whose objects
he had no sympathy. He listened for some time to the spokesman of the
party, and then, at a pause, broke in with the remark: "Gentlemen, you
need proceed no further. I am not an entirely dishevelled jackass!" One
would give something for a snapshot photograph of the faces of that
deputation.

Small differences of expression (other than those with which every one
is familiar--such as "elevator," "baggage," "depot," &c.)--strike one in
daily life. The American for "To let" is "For rent;" a "thing one would
wish to have expressed otherwise" is, more briefly, "a bad break;"
instead of