haps none but scholars of Teutonic languages are aware
that _twain_ was once of the masculine gender only, while _two_ was so
restricted that it could only be applied to things that were feminine
or neuter. As a somewhat hackneyed example of phonetic decay, we may
take the case of the Latin _mea domina_, i.e. my mistress, which
became in French _ma dame_, and in English _madam_; and the last of
these has been further shortened to _mam_, and even to _'m_, as in the
phrase "Yes, 'm." This shows how nine letters may be reduced to one.
Similarly, our monosyllable _alms_ is all that is left of the Greek
_ele{-e}mosyn{-e}_. Ten letters have here been reduced to four.

This irresistible tendency to indistinctness and loss is not,
however, wholly bad; for it has at the same time largely contributed,
especially in English, to such a simplification of grammatical
inflexions as certainly has the practical convenience of giving us
less to learn. But in addition to this decay in the forms of words, we
have also to reckon with a depreciation or weakening of the ideas they
express. Many words become so hackneyed as to be no longer impressive.
As late as in 1820, Keats could say, in stanza 6 of his poem of
_Isabella_, that "His heart beat awfully against his side"; but at
the present day the word _awfully_ is suggestive of schoolboys' slang.
It is here that we may well have the benefit of the principle of
"dialectic regeneration." We shall often do well to borrow from our
dialects many terms that are still fresh and racy, and instinct with a
full significance. Tennyson was well aware of this, and not only wrote
several poems wholly in the Lincolnshire dialect, but introduced
dialect words elsewhere. Thus in _The Voyage of Maeldune_, he has
the striking line: "Our voices were thinner and fainter than any
flittermouse-shriek." In at least sixteen dialects a _flittermouse_
means "a bat."

I have mentioned Tennyson in this connexion because he was a careful
student of English, not only in its dialectal but also in its older
forms. But, as a matter of fact, nearly all our chief writers have
recognised the value of dialectal words. Tennyson was not the first
to use the above word. Near the end of the Second Act of his _Sad
Shepherd_, Ben Jonson speaks of:

Green-bellied snakes, blue fire-drakes in the sky,
And giddy flitter-mice with leather wings.

Similarly, there are plenty of "provincialisms" in Shakespeare. In
an interesting bo