b; but I hold fast my integrity. Once, indeed, I took
it into my head not to split compound tenses, and carried this fad
somewhat remorselessly through a series of republished articles; but
the result has not pleased me. Boswell tells us that Johnson would
have none of "former" and "latter;" that he would rather repeat the
noun than resort to this subterfuge. I see no good reason for
rejecting these convenient alternatives; but nevertheless I have
obsequiously bowed to the autocrat and taken a skunner to the
words--the only literary snobbishness of which I am conscious. I can
stand out against Macaulay's proscription of prepositions ending
sentences. Although I generally twist them round, they often please my
ear there. It is not exactly in point, but I have always rejoiced over
"Silver was nothing accounted of" in the days of King Solomon; indeed,
I was brought to book by a proofreader for concluding a sentence with
"accounted of." I let it stand, so taking was it to me.

The question doubtless occurs to most authors how far they are under
bonds to the King's English. As to grammar, I submit; the consequences
of anarchy dismay me; but I question whether in words coinage is an
attribute of sovereignty. There is, of course, plenty of false money
going around, current because accepted; but I think a man is at
liberty to pass a new word, a word without authority in dictionaries,
if it be congruous to standard etymology. I once wrote "eventless;"
but, on looking, found it not. Yet why not? "Homeless," "heartless,"
"shoeless," etc.; why merely "uneventful," a form only one letter
longer, it is true, but built up to "eventful" to be pulled down to
"uneventful"? Besides, "uneventful" does not mean the same as
"eventless." "Doubtless" and "undoubtedly" differ by more than a shade
in sense, and we have both. So we have "anywhere," "nowhere,"
"somewhere," "everywhere;" why not "manywhere," if you need it? Again,
if "hitherto" be good--and it is--why not "thitherto"? In the case of
"eccentric" as a military term, I felt forced to frame "ex-centric;"
the former--I ask Dr. Johnson's pardon--has, in America at least,
become so exclusively associated with the secondary though cognate
idea of singularity that it would not convey its restricted military
significance to a lay reader.

I had been assigned to the War College in October, 1885, Admiral Luce
being still its president, but I did not go into residence until the
end of the fol