22 JUNE 1907, Page 17

SLANG IN THE CLASSICS.

[To TEE EDITOR or THE "SPROTAT06.1 SID,—In your article in the issue of May 18th you say that in Greek or Latin there is no slang, except one discovers it in Aristophanes or Martial. But are there not words in both languages which, though not originally slang, are used by us as such P E.g., Sophocles makes Philoctetes, when he is cheated out of his arrows, say " I am sold " (07p.at ninpepa.), and Horace speaks of wine as a screw to the intellect: "Tn lens

tormentum ingenio admoves." Hence Barham in the " In- goldsby Legends" "Like a four-bottle baronet screwed Tight on his pins but by no means subdued?'

The Reform Club.