tion.' Probably he would have extended to him "the same polite invitation that Samson did to "Harapha, namely, just to come within reach of his "fists. Bacon also does not scruple to spell after the same fashion when it pleases him; as is seen "here: In sutes of favor the first comming ought "to take little place'; 'hee doth not raine wealth, nor shine honors and vertues upon men equally'; "where honors is the word given in the manuscript. "It is a little singular that Sidney always addresses "his letters to the Right Honorable,' but com"monly prefers to say 'your honour.'

"Every writer seems to follow his own notions "about the spelling of words in our, and those

abominations' in the eyes of Archdeacon Hare "and Dean Alford have been freely used by the "best authors through all periods of English "literature."

You justly 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 discover". But 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 expression which you condemn; a third

Doctor of Divinity using an expression very similar; and a fourth, yourself, using an expression which, in 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 up; its nerve, and

vigour, and honesty, and toil, mainly brought "down to us in native Saxon terms". If the word

up" is 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 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 condem

nation 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 "language". "I have a very strong persuasion "that common sense, ordinary observation, and the prevailing usage of the English people, are quite as good 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 made the English language your study! All that you know about it is what you have picked up by "ordinary observation"; † and the result is, that you tell us it is correct to say, "He is wiser than me;‡ and that you speak * Dr. Campbell, Lord Kames, Hugh Blair, Lindley Murray, and others.

+"It is notorious that at our public schools, every boy has "been left to pick up his English where and how he could.”— Harrison' On the English Language', preface, p. v.

This subject was ably commented on by a writer in the 'English Churchman'. See Appendix.

of "a decided weak point" in a man's character! You must have a decidedly weak point in your own character, to set up yourself as a teacher of the English language, when the only credentials of qualification that you can produce are such sentences as these.

You sneer at " Americanisms", but you would never find an educated American who would venture to say, "It is me", for "It is 1"; or, "It "is him", for "It is he"; or, "different to", for "different from"; and nowhere are the use and the omission of the "h", as an aspirate, so clearly distinguished as in the United States. In confirmation of this statement turn over the pages of that humorous American work, "Artemus Ward, "His Book", and among all the vulgarisms and misspellings there, you will scarcely ever find that the aspirate "h" is omitted.

With regard to the purport of your second essay on the Queen's English, it is, as I expected it would be, chiefly a condemnation of my former letter; but you very carefully avoid those particular errors which I exposed; such as, "Sometimes "the editors of our papers fall, from their igno"rance, into absurd mistakes"; and, "A man does "not lose his mother now in the papers". There

are, however, in your second essay, some very strange specimens of Queen's English. You say, "The one rule, of all others, which he cites". Now as, in defence of your particular views, you appeal largely to common sense, let me ask, in the name of that common sense, How can one thing be an other thing? How can one rule be of all other rules the one which I cite? If this is Queen's English, you may well say of the authorities which I quoted, "There are more things in the English language than seem to have been dreamt "of in their philosophy"; for I am sure that they never dreamt of any such absurdities.

In my former letter I drew attention to your misplacing of adverbs; and now you appear to be trying, in some instances, to get over the difficulty by altogether omitting the adverbs, and supplying their places by adjectives; and this is not a new error with you. You had previously said, "If "with your inferiors, speak no coarser than usual; "if with your superiors, no finer." We may correctly say, "a certain person speaks coarsely"; but it is absurdly ungrammatical to say, "he speaks "coarse"! In your second essay, you say, "the "words nearest connected", instead of "the words "most nearly connected"; but this will never do ;

E