in America; but that is no justification of your retaining the Transatlantic spelling which you condemn. I guess you do not mean to imply that it is with poems as with people,—¿.e., that a temporary residence abroad occasions them to acquire habits of pronunciation, &c., not easily thrown off on a return to the mother country and yet, if this be not what the preface means; pray, what does it mean? Perhaps, as mountain travellers brand certain words on their alpenstocks, to show the height that has been attained by those using them, so you have thought well to favor us with this savor of Americanisms, to show us that your poems have had the honor of being republished on the other Iside of the Atlantic. It appears to me that the preface serves only to make matters worse; for it shows that the objectionable form of orthography is retained with your knowledge and your sanction, for I have quoted from the "Third Edition." How is this? You say that the spelling in question should be confined to the cards of "the great vulgar"; and you yourself adopt that very spelling! and "bass". Before quitting the subject of the spell- "Tenor" ing of words of the above class, I beg leave to say that although there are, in our language, certain words ending in “our”, which, as we have seen, are sometimes spelt with "or" only; as honor, favor, &c., without interference with the sense, honor being still the same as honour, and favor the same as favour; there is one word of this class, the meaning of which changes with the change of spelling; namely, the word tenour, which, with the "u", means continuity of state; as in 'Gray's Elegy',— "Along the cool sequestered vale of life 66 They kept the noiseless tenour of their way:" but without the "u", signifies a certain clef in music. This distinction has been very properly noticed by Dr. Nugent in his English and French Dictionary': there the word stands thus : : 66 Tenor, alto, m. E "Open up". but you, after lecturing us upon the impropriety of leaving out the "u" in "honour", and in "favour", although the omission in these words makes no alteration in the sense, yourself leave the “u” out of "tenour", and speak, on page 429, of the "tenor" of your essay! If this be not straining at gnats and swallowing a camel, I do not know what is. What with the tenor of your essay, and the bass, or baseness, of your English, you certainly are fiddling for us a very pretty tune. It is to be hoped that if we do not dance quite correctly, to your new music, you will take into consideration the extreme difficulty we have to understand the contradictory instructions we have received. Again, you censure the editors of newspapers for using the expression “open up”, and you say, "what it means more than open would mean, I never could dis"cover". Permit me to say that, if you look at home, you will find in your own. periodical, in the identical number of it containing this remark of yours, two Doctors of Divinity using the very ex pression you condemn; a third Doctor of Divinity using an expression very similar; and a fourth, yourself, using an expression which, under the circumstances, is deserving of severe censure. To begin with the Editor; the Rev. Norman Macleod, D.D., says, on page 204, "He opens up in the "parched desert a well that refreshes us". The Rev. John Caird, D.D., says, on page 237, "Now these considerations may open "up to us one view of the expediency of "Christ's departure". The Rev. Thomas Guthrie, D.D., says, on page 163, "the "past, with its sin and folly, rose up before "his eyes". I suppose you would say, "What rose up means more than rose would "mean I cannot discover". Probably not, but just tell us what you mean by saying, on page 197, "Even so the language grew “Grew up” "up; its nerve, and vigour, and honesty, "and toil, mainly brought down to us in "native Saxon terms". If the word up be redundant in the quoted sentences of the other learned Doctors, what shall we say of it in your own? In their expressions there is sense; so, too, is there in Neglect of the study of English. your expression; but it is a kind of sense. best described by the word nonsense. The language grew up by being brought down! Sure, it must have been the Irish language that your honour was spāking of. Now for your reply to my letter. In condemnation of your wretched English, I had cited some of the highest authorities;* and you coolly say, "I must freely "acknowledge to Mr. Moon, that not one. "of the gentlemen whom he has named "has ever been my guide, in whatever study of the English language I may "have accomplished, or in what little I "may have ventured to write in that lan"guage". "I have a very strong persuasion that common sense, ordinary "observation, and the prevailing usage of "the English people, are quite as good 66 guides in the matter of the arrangement " of sentences, as [are] the rules laid down by rhetoricians and grammarians." Thus we come to the actual truth of the matter. It appears that you really have never * Dr. Campbell, Lord Kames, Hugh Blair, Lindley Murray, and others. |