AMERICAN SLANG.
Why was it necessary for Mr. L. V. Upward to select an American for his horrible example of stupidity, ill temper and bad English in his "Thumb Nail Short Story " ? As usual, just about the time when I feel convinced the English are the most lovable people on earth someone on your side upsets the ,apple cart. I can let everything else pass, but the idiotic dialect which, in the absence of any qualifying adjective must stand as Mr. Upward's idea of English as Americans speak it. In forty-two years' residence in America I never even in burlesque heard the word " misremember." " Ain't " is not uncommon here, nor is it in Great Britain. Dickens used it generally and we received it from abroad. As for " pronto " it seems to be a localism used rarely in certain remote parts along the Mexican border. I have never heard the word used except once by an American who had travelled in Mexico and he made facetious mention of it. —EDGAR R. MCGREGOR, Fourteenth and Chapline Streets, Wheeling, W. Va.
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