PECULIARITIES AND MANNERISMS
One finds it difficult to learn the language fluently because of a
peculiar second language called "slang," which is in use even among the
fashionable classes. I despair of conveying any clear idea of it, as we
have no exact equivalent. As near as I can judge, it is first composed
by professional actors on the stage. Some funny remark being constantly
repeated, as a part of a taking song, becomes slang, conveying a certain
meaning, and is at once adopted by the people, especially by a class who
pose as leaders in all towns, but who are not exactly the best, but
charming imitations of the best, we may say. To illustrate this
"jargon," I took a drive with a young lady at Manchester--a seaside
resort. Her father was a man of good family, an official, and she was an
attendant at a fashionable school. The following occurred in the
conversation. Her slang is italicized:
Heathen Chinee: "It is very dull this week, Miss ----."
Young lady, sententiously: "_Bum._"
Heathen Chinee: "I hope it will be less bum soon."
Young lady: "_It's all off with me all right_, if it don't change soon,
_and don't you forget it_!"
Heathen Chinee: "I wish I could do something."
Young lady: "Well, you'll have to _get a move on you_, as I go back to
school to-morrow; then there'll be _something doing_."
Heathen Chinee: "Have you seen ---- lately?"
Young lady: "Yes, and isn't he _a peach_? Ah, he's a _peacharina_, and
_don't you forget it_!"
Young lady (passing a friend): "_Ah, there_! why _so toppy_? _Nay, nay,
Pauline_," this in reply to remarks from a friend; then turning to me,
"Isn't she a _jim dandy_? _Say_, have you any girls in China that can
_top_ her?"
These are only a few of the slang expressions which occur to me. They
are countless and endless. Such a girl in meeting a friend, instead of
saying good-morning, says, "_Ah, there_," which is the slang for this
salutation. If she wished to express a difference of opinion with you
she would say, "_Oh, come off._" This girl would probably outgrow this
if she moved in the very best circle, but the shop-girl of a common type
lives in a whirl of slang; it becomes second nature, while the young men
of all classes seem to use nothing else, and we often see the jargon of
the lowest class used by some of the best people. There has been
compiled a dictionary of slang; books are written on it, and an adept,
say a "rough" or "hoodlum," it is said can carry on a conversation with
nothing else. Thus, "Hi, cully, what's on?" to which comes in answer,
"Hunki dori." All this means that a man has said, "How do you do, how
are you, and what are you doing?" and thus learned in reply that
everything is all right. A number of gentlemen were posing for a lady
before a camera. "Have you finished?" asked one. "Yes, _it's all off_,"
was the reply, "and _a peach_, I think." It is unnecessary to say that
among really refined people this slang is never heard, and would be
considered a gross solecism, which gives me an opportunity to repeat
that the really cultivated Americans, and they are many, are among the
most delightful and charming of people.
They have strange habits, these Americans. The men chew tobacco,
especially in the South, and in Virginia I have seen men spitting five
or six feet, evidently taking pride in their skill in striking a
"cuspidore." In every hotel, office, or public place are
cuspidores--which become targets for these chewers. This is a national
habit, extraordinary in so enlightened a people. So ridiculous has it
made the Americans, so much has been written about it by such visitors
as Charles Dickens, that the State governments have determined to take
up the "spitting" question, and now there is a fine of from $10 to $100
for any one spitting in a car or on a hotel floor. Nearly all the
"up-to-date" towns have passed anti-spitting laws. Up to this time, or
even during my college days in America, this habit made walking on the
sidewalk a most disagreeable function, and the interior of cars was a
horror. Is not this remarkable in a people who claim so much? In the
South certain white men and women chew snuff--a gross habit.
In the North they also have a strange custom, called chewing gum. This
gum is the exudation from certain trees, and is manufactured into plates
and sold in an attractive form, merely to chew like tobacco, and young
and old may be seen chewing with great velocity. The children forget
themselves and chew with great force, their jaws working like those of a
cow chewing her cud, only more rapidly; and to see a party of three or
four chewing frantically is one of the "sights" in America, which
astonishes the Heathen Chinee and convinces him that, in the slang of
the country, "_there are others_" who are peculiar. There are many
manufactories of this stuff, which is harmless, though such constant
chewing can but affect the size of the muscles of the jaw if the theory
of evolution is to be believed; at least there will be no atrophy of
these parts.
In New England, the northeastern portion of the country, this habit
appeared to be more prevalent, and I asked several scientific persons if
they had made any attempt to trace the history of the habit or to find
anything to attribute it to. One learned man told me that he had made a
special study of the habit, and believed that it was merely the modern
expression in human beings of the cud chewing of ruminating mammals, as
cows, goats, etc. In a word, the gum-chewing Americans are trying to
chew their cud as did their ancestors. Any habit like this is seized
upon by manufacturers for their personal profit, and every expedient is
employed to induce people to chew. The gum is mixed with perfumes, and
sold as a breath purifier; others mix it with pepsin, to aid the
digestion; some with something else, which is sold on ships and
excursion-boats as a cure or preventive for seasickness, all of which
finds a large sale among the credulous Americans, who by a clever leader
can be made to take up any fad or habit.
The Americans have a peculiar habit of "treating"; that is, one of a
party will "treat" or buy a certain article and distribute it
gratuitously to one or ten people. A young lady may treat her friends to
gum, ice-cream, soda-water, or to a theater party. A matron may treat
her friends to "high-balls" or cocktails at the club. The man confines
his "treats" to drinks and cigars. Thus five or six Americans may meet
in a club or barroom for the sale of liquors. One says, "Come up and
have something;" or "What will you have, gentlemen; this is on me;" or
in some places the treater says, "Let's liquor," and all step up, the
drinks are dispensed, and the treater pays. You might suppose that he
was deserving of some encomium, but not at all; he expects that the
others will take their turn in treating, or at least this is the
assumption; and if the party is engaged in social conversation each in
turn will "treat," the others taking what they wish to drink or smoke.
There is a code of etiquette regarding the treat. Thus, unless you are
invited, it would be bad form among gentlemen to order wine when invited
to drink unless the "treater" asks you to have wine; he means a drink of
whisky, brandy, or a mixed drink, or you may take soda or a cigar, or
you may refuse. It is a gross solecism to accept a cigar and put it in
your pocket; you should not take it unless you smoke it on the spot.
Drinking to excess is frowned upon by all classes, and a drunkard is
avoided and despised; but the amount an American will drink in a day is
astonishing. A really delightful man told me that he did not drink much,
and this was his daily experience: before breakfast a champagne
cocktail; two or three drinks during the forenoon; a pint of white or
red wine at lunch; two or three cocktails in the afternoon; a cocktail
at dinner, with two glasses of wine; and in the evening at the club
several drinks before bedtime! This man was never drunk, and never
_appeared_ to be under the influence of liquor, yet he was in reality
never actually sober; and he is a type of a large number in the great
cities who constitute what is termed the "man about town."
The Americans are not a wine-drinking people. Whisky, and of a very
excellent quality, is the national drink, while vast quantities of beer
are consumed, though they make the finest red and white wines. All the
grog-shops are licensed by the Government and State--that is, made to
pay a tax; but in the country there is a political party, the
Prohibitionists, who would drive out all wine and liquor. These, working
with the conservative people, often succeed in preventing saloons from
opening in certain towns; but in large cities there are from one to two
saloons to the block in the districts where they are allowed.
Taking everything into consideration, I think the Americans a temperate
people. They organize in a thousand directions to fight drinking and
other vices, and millions of dollars are expended yearly in this
direction. A peculiar quality about the American humor is that they joke
about the most serious things. In fact, drink and drinking afford
thousands of stories, the point of which is often very obscure to an
alien. Here is one, told to illustrate the cleverness of a drinker. He
walked into a bar and ordered a "tin-roof cocktail." The barkeeper was
nonplussed, and asked what a tin-roof cocktail was. "Why, it's on the
house." I leave you to figure it out, but the barkeeper paid the bill.
The ingenuity of the Americans is shown in their mixed drinks. They have
cocktails, high-balls, ponies, straights, fizzes, and many other drinks.
Books are written on the subject. I have seen a book devoted entirely to
cocktails. Certain papers offer prizes for the invention of new drinks.
I have told you that, all in all, America is a temperate country,
especially when its composite character is considered; yet if the nation
has a curse, a great moral drawback, it is the habit of drinking at the
public bar.