When a
deputation of wig-makers waited on George III. to protest against the
hair-powder-tax, the mob, seeing that one of them wore his own hair,
ducked him forthwith in Tower-Ditch,--a very Anglo-Saxon comment on his
inconsistency. We should not have noticed these passages in Mr.
Bartlett's Introduction, had he not, after eleven years' time to weigh
them in, let them remain as they stood in his former edition, of 1848.
In other respects the volume before us greatly betters its forerunner.
That contained many words which were rather vulgarisms than
provincialisms, and more properly English than American. Almost all
these Mr. Bartlett has left out in revising his book. Once or twice,
however, he has retained as Americanisms phrases which are proverbial,
such as "born in the woods to be scared of an owl," "to carry the foot
in the hand," and "hallooing before you're out of the woods." But it
will be easier to follow the alphabetical order in our short list of
_adversaria_ and comments.
ALEWIFE. We doubt if Mr. Bartlett is right in deriving this from a
supposed Indian word _aloof_. At least, Hakluyt speaks of a fish called
"old-wives"; and in some other old book of travels we have seen the
name derived from the likeness of the fish, with its good, round belly,
to the mistress of an alehouse.
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