English-speaking readers. Others e. g., diplomatiste, pharmacie - are so ridiculously like English words that it is an affectation to use them. None of the other words in italics, from affaire du cœur to trouble-fête, are in any respect preferable to their English equivalents.

At noon she was still en désha- At noon she was still en déshabillé (or, half-dressed).

bille.

En déshabille is often used by English-speaking people; but it is neither good French nor good English.

I.

They carried off the honors in the presence of a company as select as ever gathered on the Beverly polo grounds.

The Senator is suffering from a violent attack of influenza.

Mrs. Parnell, formerly Mrs. O'Shea, is still confined to the house.

II.

They carried off the honors in the presence of as élite a crowd as Beverly ever mustered on the polo grounds.

The Senator is suffering from a violent attack of the la grippe. Mrs. Parnell, née Mrs. O'Shea, is still confined to the house.

These sentences as originally printed in American journals illustrate the danger of using a language which one does not understand.

I.

Her nom de guerre (or, pseudonym) is Ouida.

They arrived at the station after the train had gone.

"Homestead" was attacked by

a band of mercenaries.

II.

Her nom de plume is Ouida.

They arrived at the dépôt after the train had gone. "Homestead" was attacked by an American condottieri.

In France, nom de plume in this sense is unknown; nom de guerre is sometimes seen, but pseudonyme, the exact equivalent of the English "pseudonym," is the usual word.

The French word for the place where passengers take or leave a train is gare or station, and the English use "station" exclusively. Condottieri is the plural of the Italian condottiere, the name of a class of military leaders who sold their services during the Middle Ages.

Foreign words and phrases are sometimes only half translated.

I.

To know that the most deadly danger may come to you at any innocent opening naturally tells on the nerves.

Mr. and Mrs. Page were present at the wedding.

The door at the other end

opens on the outer air.

II.

To know that the most deadly danger may arrive to you at any innocent opening is a risk which naturally tells upon the nerves.

Mr. and Mrs. Page assisted at the ceremony.

The door at the other end gives upon the outer air.

Arrive to, assisted at, and gives upon, as used in the sentences under II., are in accordance with the French idiom, but are not good English.

I.

The lines of her dress were sharply defined.

The country was undulating. That is a matter of course. He had a prominent nose. He sat in the chimney-corner. He asks why his sister has been excluded from certain social festivities.

II.

The lines of her dress were sharply accentuated.

The country was accidented.
That goes without saying.
He had a pronounced nose.
He sat in the corner of the fire.

He asks why his sister has been excluded from certain social functions.

Function in this sense is a translation of the Italian funzione. It has been current in the fashionable world of London for years, and has now made its way to New York and Boston.

Deo volente and the other italicized words may be good Latin; but they are not good English, and there are good English equivalents for them.

As Latin words appear much less frequently than French in English books, instances of their misuse are not common; but when such instances do occur, they are, as in the foregoing example, very bad.

Chapter V.

GENERAL OR SPECIFIC WORDS

A GENERAL Word is a word of wide but indefinite appli. cation; it names a large class of objects, actions, or qualities, real or imagined, but does not point to any one member or part of the class rather than to another. A specific word covers less ground but is more definite.

Uses of General Words. If there were no general words, the progress of mankind would be exceedingly slow; for general words serve to classify and sum up knowledge, and thus to store it, as it were, for future use. Without general words, it would often be difficult to put wit or wisdom into portable form. They are the life of many proverbs: e. g., "Haste makes waste;" "Pride goeth before destruction." Without general words, natural science would be a heap of detached observations, law a pile of unclassified cases, history no longer philosophy teaching by example, but a mere chronicle of events. If we were unable to arrange books under general heads, e. g., History, Travels, Literature, a library would be chaos. If general orders could not be issued, an army would be a mob.

General words are of service in writings intended to popularize science. In such writings, technical words, specific though they are, must as a rule be avoided, for the general public cannot understand them. A writer has to content himself with giving an approximate idea of his meaning. Now and then he may define a technical term, but when he does, he must keep his definition before the reader until it becomes familiar.

General expressions are sometimes more striking than specific ones. Thus, Tennyson says that Enid

"daily fronted him [her husband]

In some fresh splendor; "

and that Guinevere called King Arthur "that passionate perfection." In the poet's hands, the abstractions "splendor" and "perfection " become concrete. Enid wears, not a splendid dress, but "splendor" as a dress. King Arthur is not a perfect man; he is "perfection" in the flesh. So, too, Scott, in his account of a battle in "Marmion," writes,

"The war that for a space did fail

Now trebly thundering swells the gale."

Steele calls an impudent fellow "my grave Impudence;" and Byron says that a "solemn antique gentleman of rhyme" is a "sublime mediocrity," that a "budding miss" is "half Pertness and half Pout," and that

"The stars

Shone through the rents of ruin."

General words are a resource for those who seek to disarm opposition, to veil unpleasant facts, to hide poverty of thought in richness of language, to give obscurity an air of cleverness and shallowness the dignity of an oracle, to cover the intention to say nothing with the appearance of having said much, or to "front South by North," as Lowell's "Birdofredum Sawin" did. They abound in resolutions of political parties, "appeals" of popular orators, "tributes to departed worth," second-rate sermons, and school compositions.

Uses of Specific Words. - If a writer wishes to communicate his meaning exactly, and still more if he wishes to