The Quizzer Series consists of about twenty-five small volumes issued by the . . . Publishing Co. Each volume is devoted to questions and answers on some particular branch of law. The system of arrangement however is somewhat different from most publications of this sort. The usual arrangement of books designed for such purposes is to give the question and, immediately following, the answer. . . . The chief value of these Quizzers is to persons pursuing a course without the assistance of an instructor. Another way in which such a work is of great benefit comes from the practice it furnishes of discriminating between a correct and an incorrect statement of the law.

55. Functionality. The word should be organic. That is to say, it should not be thrust in wantonly, but its meaning should be a vital portion of the meaning of the whole sentence. It should perform a necessary function. Conventional epithets were often used in old poetry with little concern for what we here call " functionality." Achilles is the "fleet-footed" even when he is speaking in the assembly; Odysseus is still the "crafty" when engaged in most innocent pursuits. But to-day, unless it be in literature that imitates the heroic style, such usage is not good. Even the laxity of an earlier age would probably not approve of such a sentence as "I stood on the bridge and watched the brook go murmuring by." One who writes thus does not see vividly nor think clearly. "Darkness which may be felt" (Exodus), "I heard her tears" (Rossetti), "sounds that shine" (Swinburne), are either deliberate exaggerations or poetic truth, and do not come under our stricture.

EXERCISE.

Point out words that are without function:

The ever-changing crowd begins to assemble at five in the morning, and grows steadily larger until late in the afternoon.

The tourist who spends a few of his precious years in travelling will find a camera indispensable.

We soon had our stoutly built boat successfully launched on the muddy stream.

Here was a bit of fur clinging to a bough where a wary deer had scratched the wood-ticks from his back.

Scrupp himself said that his story was not worth telling; but Scrupp was then a world-weary, hopeless, stooping, poorly fed, and unfashionably dressed old man.

And what is so rare as a day in June ?

Then, if ever, come perfect days;

Then Heaven tries earth if it be in tune,

And over it softly her warm ear lays.-LoWELL.

56. Idiomatic Usage. The word or phrase should conform to the idiom of the language. We have seen how desirable it is for general intelligibility that the meanings of words be not wrenched or confused. It is likewise desirable that all well-established usages and forms be preserved as they are. These usages are often peculiar to our own language, in which case we call them idiomatic. Some of them may be wholly indefensible on grounds of logic, but if they are well established, we have no more to say. If writers from Shakespeare to Howells write "I had rather," there is no reason why we should cling pedantically to "I would rather." Usage has established reliable for rely-onable, and laughable for laugh-at-able, though not objectable for object-to-able, nor livable for live-in-able.

How very many of our distinctions are wholly a matter of arbitrary usage we realize only when we note the difficulties that a foreigner has to contend with in mastering the language. We lead a horse; the horse, by pulling hard, draws the wagon; and together we haul the load. We scoop out earth, dig a cellar, and tunnel a mountain; we excavate all three. We shear either a sheep or its wool; we clip or crop only the wool. We carry fashions to extremes; we never take them to extremes. But a foreigner gets hopelessly confused among such apparently groundless distinctions.

Our chief difficulties in matters of this kind are likely to arise from a confusion of two idioms, and the majority of our examples and exercises, as will be seen, involve such a confusion.

Farm-life cannot help but make one ambitious. "cannot but make or "cannot help making."]

[Write either

It was a substantial-looking structure of four stories high. [Omit either "of" or "high."]

He overlooked my papers and pronounced them satisfactory. Another writer attacks this idiom from another point of view with about equal success: "She declared that she would no longer look over his conduct."

Seldom or ever comes from a confusion of seldom or never

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and seldom if ever. Rarely ever is simple tautology. So, usually, is at about (compare from whence, where at ?). A half an hour is not good. Sort of a, kind of a, are often criticised, but here a distinction must be made. It is true, the article belongs with the individual, not with the species or class. "He is a new type of teacher," we say, or "He lives in a kind of tent," or "She is a quiet sort of girl." But the species or class is not always in mind, perhaps not often. And so we say She is a quiet sort of a girl," meaning by girl herself, not thinking of the class girl at all, and so not meaning anything different from "She is a girl of a quiet sort." We have merely turned our phrase about. Or perhaps we use "sort" in an absolute sense, as when we say, "He is a queer sort." In this case, the rest of the phrase is to be construed as appositive, and is to be compared with such idiomatic phrases as "a perfect gem of a poem," "a great barn of a building," "a little slip of an Irish lad." Compare this phrase from R. L. Stevenson: "To think o' that!' said he. 'A strange nature of a man!""

EXERCISES.

1. Define the following idioms: to make out, to make up, to make for, to make of, to make off, to make way, to make away, to make away with, to do away with, to away with.

2. Make the following sentences idiomatically correct:

He was not capable to commit such a crime.

I do not doubt but that you are right.

There was the solution out of her difficulty.

Much more must be done in order for one to succeed. He pondered for some time upon such thoughts as these. The buds are purple, while the flowers are a pure white. There he stood, looking over the valley laid to waste. The woodsman will find a compass of indispensable value. He looked for help from the father, upon whom he had created an agreeable impression.

One should give a broad-minded view to this subject.

Only the ticking of a clock broke the still air.

Many Englishmen live there and carry on the principal business interests.

Somewhat apart from the huddled group I noticed a comely mulatto woman of about twenty-five years old.

Why is it that in Neptune's realm we are so impressionable to tender emotions?

In the same way many other of his novels have been written with an eye for the public good.

I asked him plainly what sort of a man was Mr. Balfour of the Shaws. "Hoot, hoot, hoot," said the barber, nae kind of a man, nae kind of a man at all.” . . . What kind of a great house

...

stare to be asked

that his ill-fame The house itself ap

was this, that all the parish should start and the way to it? or what sort of a gentleman, should be thus current on the wayside?.. peared to be a kind of ruin; no road led up to it; no smoke arose from any of the chimneys; nor was there any semblance of a garden. STEVENSON: Kidnapped.

3. The following sentences are literal translations from

the Greek, Latin, French, and German languages. Point out wherein they fail to conform to the idiom of our language, and convert them into natural English.

Having learned of this plot, having collected the army of himself, the sun being risen, he spoke these things. [See 34.]

Sophocles up to the greatest old age made tragedies; on account of which zeal, since he seemed to neglect family matters, by his sons he was called to judgment, that, just as after our fashion it is customary to interdict fathers managing things ill from their goods, so him as growing foolish the judges might remove from his family matters.

This battle having been made and the race and name of the Nervii reduced almost to extinction, the elders by birth, who, we had said, were sent, together with the children and women, into the estuaries and marshes, this fight having been announced, since they thought nothing obstructive to the victors, nothing safe for the vanquished, by the consent of all who survived sent ambassadors to Cæsar and gave themselves up to him.

Edith became over and over red, and saw herself quick by stealth about, whether no one had heard this address. That had to her still not yet passed, that one had addressed her with "Madam."

At the hotel Beauveau, Miss Lydia had a bitter disappointment. It was perhaps the first time that a desire manifested by the Colonel had obtained the approbation of his daughter.

Now the silence began to reestablish itself, and the molecatcher had just made bring a second bottle, when some low growls made themselves heard under the table; immediately we looked and we saw the great brown dog of M. Richter which turned around Scipio. This dog was called Max; he had the hide short-haired, the nose slit, the ribs projecting, the eyes yellowish, the ears long, and the tail elevated like a sabre; he was tall, lean, and wiry. M. Richter had the habit of hunting with him some entire days without giving him anything to eat, under pretext that the good dogs of chase ought to have hunger for scenting the game and following it in the track. He wished to pass behind Scipio, who turned himself around always, the head high and the lips quivering.