Words derived from foreign languages are numerous, and one philologist (W. \V. Crane) asserts that, though few are intelligible to Eng lish people, they are more extensively used by Englishmen than is generally supposed, and "form the really distinctive features of what may be termed the American language." •hus, front the Spanish we have in corrupted or contracted form, creole (erio//o), garrote (garro(a), jerked beef (charqui), key, a small island (cayo), lasso /azo ) • mustang ( mesteno), pickaninny, con tracted to piekney in S. C. (pcqueiio ?lino), Sam bo (Za»ibo, a person of negro and Indian blood) ; stampede (estampcdo) ; and such literally appro priated words as adobe, bonanza, canon, and mesa. From the French have been obtained among many, bayou (boyau, a trench), cache or cash (cached, chowder (ehaudi&e), shivaree (Mari rari), metif, an Indian half-breed (mail or metis), and the identical butte, levee, portage, prairie, and voyageur. From the Dutch have come boss, an overseer or superior (boas) ; cold slaw-, cabbage salad (kool slaa); cruller (kru/ kr, to twist) ; hook, a point of land (hock, a corner) ; noodles, an imitation of macaroni (noodlcjes); overslongh, to supersede or defeat (orcrslaan. to skip or pretermit) ; stoop or stoup, the step or steps of a house (stoop). Kill, a small stream, retains both its old sound and spelling, and Santa Claus (Klaus) receives as much respect as before the slight change in his name. The Germans have contributed bummer (hammier, a braggart, a, wanderer), pretzel, and dude.
From the Indian we have chinquapin, a kind of oak (Va. Algonquian che-ehicnamin); hominy (Va. Algonquian, enstathominy); moccasin (Mass. Algonquian, inockisin) ; opossum (appas sum) ; pow-wow (powan, a prophet or conjurer) ; raccoon (Algonquian, arougheun) ; sachem (sak o ) ; skunk ( Abnakis, secancu); succotash (Nanaheganset. mesicmotash) ; toboggan (oda bogan) ; tomahawk (Algonquian, tamahagan, a war-club) ; wigwam (Natie, wceewahm). Among words introduced or invented by the Southern negroes are: brottus, a small gift (Ga.) ; buccra, a white man; corn (harvest.) songs (Md.) ; cracklings or goody-bread, bread containing roasled pork-rinds; enty? is that so? (Sea Is lands) ; goober, a peanut (W'. African guja, or Guinea gobbe-gobbe, Va. and N. C.) • lagniappe, a tradesman's gratuity (Sp. La.) ; moon ack, a mythical animal ; pickaninny, and pinder, a peanut (Fla.) : while the Chinese word kowtow or kotow, salutation by prostration, has (or had) a limited use in the sense of obsequious polite ness.
In the matter of pronunciation, slight differ ences exist. The word trait, for instance, is pro nounced tray by the English. the i in slicer is lengthened by them, and schedule is commonly pronounced shedule. We may mention here that cheerful retains in some parts of the South its old pronunciation, ch-crful. In the pronunciation of proper names, English and American usages frequently disagree. In England Ralph is pro nounced Rafe; Brownell, Parnell, etc.. are ac cented on the first syllable; the last syllable of Gladstone is sounded short. With English sur names and geographical names cultivated Ameri cans should seek to follow English usage. In Christian names Englishmen generally use only the first, while Americans always give the full form. In England we read of Ralph Emerson, Edgar Poe, etc. What have been termed by Grant Allen "Americanisms in spelling," exam ples of which are tabor, offenses, and theater, are undoubtedly the result of the extensive use of Webster's spelling-books and dictionary.
Amerieanisms are classified by Reeves as fol lows: (l) Eastern dialects ; 2 ) Southern; ( 3 ) Western ; (4) Pacific or mining; and lie adds as a possible (5) English-Dutch (German) of Pennsyl vania. This convenient arrangement enables us to separate such words and phrases as are lim ited to particular sections or localities (provin cialisms) from those that may be called national. Beginning with New England, we have: to ad mire, for to like, e.g., "1 should admire to go;" to allot, or 'lot, for intend; barns, for yeast; be, for am or are: bettermost ; blob, a blossom; b/omth, blossoming time; bungtown copper, a counterfeit: to calculate, for to infer or sup pose: empti'n's, any dregs; to fail tip; to fay, for to fit; fore-chamber, a front bedroom (Me.) ; gawnicus, a dolt; grayslick, a glassy stretch of water (Me.) ; Hessian, as a term of reproach ; like, without a specified object, as, "How did you like?" (a place, person) ; long-faror«l, tall; mush-muddle, a potpie (Cape Cod) ; pew-curt, a box-like carriage (Nantucket) ; pleasant, for pleasing; pokcloken, a marsh (Me.) ; priest, for a minister of any denomination; piing, a kind of sleigh; rifle, a whetstone for scythes; sconce, for discretion; to seep, to pour through a sieve or hole; slip, for pew; spero, a commonplace enter tainment, "small doings" (Vt.) ; staddle, a sap ling; secant or scent, level, uniform; to sugar off, to boil maple syrup down until it grains; tack ling, for harness; timbers, for skeleton of a whale; torsh, the youngest child (Cape Cod) ; to train, to move briskly (like the militia on "training day"), to frolic; vestry, the chapel or lecture-room of a non-liturgical church; r'y'ge, for voyage; ?copper (or whopper) jawed; wicket, a hut or shelter of boughs (Me.) ; ?vinegar, for vinegar (Essex Co., Mass.) ; York shilling, nine pence. In New York State, among localisms de rived from the Dutch, are hockey, a gourd-dip per; tyke, a bow-net; hoop/c, a child's hoop; pile, an arrow, and scup, a swing, a name still used by children of foreign parentage on the "east side" of New York City. Slip, an opening between wharves, is apparently an indigenous English word; the provincial English duff, dough or paste, signifies, in the Adirondacks, fallen and matted hemlock needles; and dimpy (probably from the English dimpsy, a kind of preserve) is the name given in some places to a tea-party, or a small social gathering at which refreshments are served. New Jersey, settled, like New York, both by English and Dutch, preserves in remote localities some Oh] World words, or perversions of the same: for example, bliekie. a tin pail: to heir to, to inherit: jag, a small load; inn.r, dis order, and piece, a cold meal hastily prepared, or one for farm hands. Examples of the pro vincialisms of Pennsylvania, which were intro duced by the English, Scotch-Irish, and Germans, and in many instances have been carried beyond her borders by emigration, are: after-night, for after candle-light; .1prile, for April (Cumber land Valley) ; barrick, a hill ; beating, suppurat ing; briekle, brittle; dipsey, the sinker of a fish line; dozy, timber brittle from decay; forty, trifling; to get shot, to get rid; gams, for over shoes (eastern Pa.) ; horsebeast; to lift, a col lection in church, to take up; once, immedi ately; outcry, public auction; riffles, ripples: scrapple, an article of food: slave, a fierce dog, i.e., needing to be chained (western Pa.) ; to smooch, to kiss; sots, common yeast; to top (a candle), to snuff; to areal), to argue; yammer, a whine or whimper.