Bad cold. Inasmuch as colds are never good, why say a bad cold? We may talk about slight colds and severe colds, but not about bad colds.

Baggage. See LUGGAGE.

Balance. This word is very frequently and very erroneously used in the sense of rest, remainder. It properly means the excess of one thing over another, and in this sense and in no other should it be used. Hence it is improper to talk about the balance of the edition, of the evening, of the money, of the toasts, of the men, etc. In such cases we should say the rest or the remainder.

Barbarism. Defined as an offense against good usage, by the use of an improper word, i. e., a word that is antiquated or improperly formed. Preventative, enthuse, agriculturalist, donate, etc., are barbarisms. See also SOLECISM.

Been to. We not unfrequently hear a superfluous to tacked to a sentence; thus, "Where have you been to?"

Beg. We often see letters begin with the words, "I beg to acknowledge the receipt of your favor," etc. We should write, “I beg leave to acknowledge,” etc. No one I beg to tell you," instead of, "I beg leave to

would say,

tell you."
+ Begin- Commence.

These words have the same meaning; careful speakers, however, generally prefer to use the former. Indeed, there is rarely any good reason for giving the preference to the latter. See also COM

MENCE.

Being built. See IS BEING BUILT.

Belongings. An old idiomatic expression now coming into use again.

Beside-Besides. In the later unabridged editions of Webster's dictionary we find the following remarks concerning the use of these two words: "Beside and besides,

whether used as prepositions or adverbs, have been considered synonymous from an early period of our literature, and have been freely interchanged by our best writers. There is, however, a tendency in present usage to make the following distinction between them: 1. That beside be used only and always as a preposition, with the original meaning by the side of; as, to sit beside a fountain; or with the closely allied meaning aside from, or out of; as, this is beside our present purpose: 'Paul, thou art beside thyself.' The adverbial sense to be wholly transferred to the cognate word. 2. That besides, as a preposition, take the remaining sense, in addition to; as, besides all this; besides the consideration here offered: There was a famine in the land besides the first famine.' And that it also take the adverbial sense of moreover, beyond, etc., which had been divided between the words; as, besides, there are other considerations which belong to this case."

Best. See AT BEST.

Between. This word is often misused for among; thus, "The word fellow, however much in use it may be between men, sounds very objectionable from the lips of women.”"London Queen." Should be, "among men." Between is used in reference to two things, parties, or persons; among, in reference to a greater number. "Castor and Pollux with one soul between them." "You have among you many a purchased slave."

Blame it on. Here is a gross vulgarism which we sometimes hear from persons of considerable culture. They use it in the sense of accuse or suspect; thus, "He blames it on his brother," meaning that he accuses or suspects his brother of having done it, or of being at fault for it.

Bogus. A colloquial term incompatible with dignified diction.

Both. We sometimes hear such absurd sentences as, "They both resemble each other very much"; "They are both alike"; "They both met in the street." Both is likewise redundant in the following sentence: "It performs at the same time the offices both of the nominative and objective cases."

Bound. The use of this word in the sense of determined is not only inelegant but indefensible. "I am bound to have it," should be, "I am determined to have it."

Bravery-Courage. The careless often use these two words as though they were interchangeable. Bravery is inborn, is instinctive; courage is the product of reason, calculation. There is much merit in being courageous, little merit in being brave. Men who are simply brave are careless, while the courageous man is always cautious. Bravery often degenerates into temerity. Moral courage is that firmness of principle which enables a man to do what he deems to be his duty, although his action may subject him to adverse criticism. True moral courage is one of the rarest and most admirable of virtues.

Alfred the Great, in resisting the attacks of the Danes, displayed bravery; in entering their camp as a spy, he displayed courage.

Bring-Fetch-Carry. The indiscriminate use of these three words is very common. To bring is to convey to or toward a simple act; to fetch means to go and bring -a compound act; to carry often implies motion from the speaker, and is followed by away or off, and thus is opposed to bring and fetch. Yet one hears such expressions as, "Go to Mrs. D.'s and bring her this bundle; and here, you may fetch her this book also." We use the words correctly thus: "Fetch, or go bring, me an apple from the cellar";

"When you come home bring some lemons"; "Carry this book home with you."

British against American English. "The most important peculiarity of American English is a laxity, irregularity, and confusion in the use of particles. The same thing is, indeed, observable in England, but not to the same extent, though some gross departures from idiomatic propriety, such as different to for different from, are common in England, which none but very ignorant persons would be guilty of in America. . . . In the tenses of the verbs, I am inclined to think that well-educated Americans conform more closely to grammatical propriety than the corresponding class in England. . . . In general, I think we may say that, in point of naked syntactical accuracy, the English of America is not at all inferior to that of England; but we do not discriminate so precisely in the meaning of words, nor do we habitually, in either conversation or in writing, express ourselves so gracefully, or employ so classic a diction, as the English. Our taste in language is less fastidious, and our licenses and inaccuracies are more frequently of a character indicative of want of refinement and elegant culture than those we hear in educated society in England."-George P. Marsh.

British against American Orthoëpy. "The causes of the differences in pronunciation [between the English and the Americans] are partly physical, and therefore difficult, if not impossible, to resist; and partly owing to a difference of circumstances. Of this latter class of influences, the universality of reading in America is the most obvious and important. The most marked difference is, perhaps, in the length or prosodical quantity of the vowels; and both of the causes I have mentioned concur to produce this effect. We are said to drawl our words by protracting the

vowels and giving them a more diphthongal sound than the English. Now, an Englishman who reads will habitually utter his vowels more fully and distinctly than his countryman who does not; and, upon the same principle, a nation of readers, like the Americans, will pronounce more deliberately and clearly than a people so large a proportion of whom are unable to read, as in England. From our universal habit of reading, there results not only a greater distinctness of articulation, but a strong tendency to assimilate the spoken to the written language. Thus, Americans incline to give to every syllable of a written word a distinct enunciation; and the popular habit is to say dic-tion-ar-y, mil-it-ar-y, with a secondary accent on the penultimate, instead of sinking the third syllable, as is so common in England. There is, no doubt, something disagreeably stiff in an anxious and affected conformity to the very letter of orthography; and to those accustomed to a more hurried utterance we may seem to drawl, when we are only giving a full expression to letters which, though etymologically important, the English habitually slur over, sputtering out, as a Swedish satirist says, one half of the word, and swallowing the other. The tendency to make the long vowels diphthongal is noticed by foreigners as a peculiarity of the orthoëpy of our language; and this tendency will, of course, be strengthened by any cause which produces greater slowness and fullness of articulation. Besides the influence of the habit of reading, there is some reason to think that climate is affecting our articulation. In spite of the coldness of our winters, our flora shows that the climate of even our Northern States belongs, upon the whole, to a more southern type than that of England. In southern latitudes, at least within the temperate zone, articulation is generally much more distinct than in the northern regions. Witness