the Englishman says, "he fed so many scores of highland Scotts upon the grafs of his meadows." Both phrases are doubtlefs equally absurd, and of course are alike deserving of ridicule; yet the first was only the blunder of an individual, unauthorised by any collateral support, while the last is an established phrase used by the gravest writers. Whence arises this difference? It deserves to be explained; for it will serve to bring to light one of those numerous circumstances which tend to debase a language, when no one thinks of preserving its purity by exposing the absurdity of inconsiderate innovations.

The English will say, that the phrase "highland Scott" was imported from Scotland; but that is not the case. The phrase was never heard in that country; nor would the people there know what it means. The genuine phrase from which this has been derived is highland stot. A stot is one of those numerous definite words which have been driven out of the English language by literary refiners, without substituting any other, that I know of, in its stead. It denotes "a young' ox which has not yet attained his full size," being exactly equivalent to the English word heifer, but of the imperfect gender, as I would call it, instead of the feminine. Now, it is the custom in the highlands of Scotland, in which many cattle are bred, to arrange their beasts in clafses of the same kind when they carry them to market; the young mutilated males, forming one of these classes, is called a class, or drove as they call it, of stots; and, to distinguish the highland from the lowland breed of cat

which

stots,
name conveys a clear and distinct idea
to every person in that country who hears it used;
but, when these droves of cattle come into England,
the word stot not being understood; some one, of
wondrous sapience, no doubt, in his own opinion, in-
stead of asking the meaning of it of those who could
have informed him; knowing that the highlands from
whence they came is in Scotland, profoundly con-
cluded it must be highland scots; and highland scots
he called them, and highland scots others have called
them too, in emulation of his bright example. Men
from the same district are called scots highlanders,
and cattle highland scots. A stranger, to whom this
phraseology had not been explained, would find some
difficulty in discovering which of these phrases denoted
the men, and which the beasts; or whether they did
not both denote men, or both beasts. Such is the
perspicuity obtained by these elegant refinements!

One other Anglicism of a similar kind, though it cannot claim kindred with any Scotticism that I know, is the common phrase good bye, which is pronounced so much like good boy, that when a stranger who is a little versant in the English language hears it addressed to a girl, he cannot help being struck with the seeming incongruity of the phrase. This naturally induces one to try to trace the origin of it: nor is that difficult to find. Every one knows that this phrase is only used at parting with any one, and denotes a kind valediction to the person addressed similar to that of good night, which is evidently a contraction of "I wish you a good night's rest.” Good bye is a more general valediction, and is evidently a corrupted contraction of

the Englishman says, " he fed so many scores of highland Scotts upon the grafs of his meadows." Both phrases are doubtlefs equally absurd, and of course are alike deserving of ridicule; yet the first was only the blunder of an individual, unauthorised by any collateral support, while the last is an established phrase used by the gravest writers. Whence arises this difference? It deserves to be explained; for it will serve to bring to light one of those numerous circumstances which tend to debase a language, when no one thinks of preserving its purity by exposing the absurdity of inconsiderate innovations.

"

The English will say, that the phrase "highland Scott" was imported from Scotland; but that is not the case. The phrase was never heard in that country; nor would the people there know what it means. The genuine phrase from which this has been derived is highland stot. A stot is one of those numerous definite words which have been driven out of the English language by literary refiners, without substituting any other, that I know of, in its stead. It denotes a young' ox which has not yet attained his full size," being exactly equivalent to the English word heifer, but of the imperfect gender, as I would call it, instead of the feminine. Now, it is the custom in the highlands of Scotland, in which many cattle are bred, to arrange their beasts in clafses of the same kind when they carry them to market; the young mutilated males, forming one of these classes, is called a clafs, or drove as they call it, of stots; and, to distinguish the highland from the lowland breed of cat

stots, which name conveys a clear and distinct idea to every person in that country who hears it used; but, when these droves of cattle come into England, the word stot not being understood; some one, of wondrous sapience, no doubt, in his own opinion, instead of asking the meaning of it of those who could have informed him; knowing that the highlands from whence they came is in Scotland, profoundly concluded it must be highland scots; and highland scots he called them, and highland scots others have called them too, in emulation of his bright example. Men from the same district are called scots highlanders, and cattle highland scots. A stranger, to whom this phraseology had not been explained, would find some difficulty in discovering which of these phrases denoted the men, and which the beasts; or whether they did not both denote men, or both beasts. Such is the perspicuity obtained by these elegant refinements!

One other Anglicism of a similar kind, though it cannot claim kindred with any Scotticism that I know, is the common phrase good bye, which is pronounced so much like good boy, that when a stranger who is a little versant in the English language hears it addressed to a girl, he cannot help being struck with the seeming incongruity of the phrase. This naturally induces one to try to trace the origin of it: nor is that difficult to find. Every one knows that this phrase is only used at parting with any one, and denotes a kind valediction to the person addrefsed similar to that of good night, which is evidently a contraction of "I wish you a good night's rest.” Good bye is a more general valediction, and is evidently a corrupted contraction of

God be with you, or good be to (with) you, if you please. Thus do we first lose the meaning of a phrase by false pronunciation; we then alter the spelling of it; and afterward give it another meaning to accord with the new orthography we have given to it. A fine example of this species of literary legerdemain, which has taken place in my own time, will serve as an apt illustration of this kind of mutation of language.

It happened that the art of writing was invented before the art of printing; and as printed characters are of necefsity more uniform in their figure than written characters ever can be, it necefsarily follows that many letters were once written differently from what are now used. It happened that in old times the letter y was written so like the modern z that they could not be easily distinguished from each other; in short, they were confounded with each like the j and the I, or like the v and the w. In consequence of this it happened, that printers in old times frequently printed the words your, year, &c. with a z, zour, zear, though it is well known that these words were always pronounced with the y soft, as at present. Printers at length, observing this mistake, corrected the error, and writers, imitating them in general, adopted the same mode of spelling, and wrote their y so distinctly as not to be confounded with the z, except in a few words, especially proper names, such as Menzies and M'Kenzie, in which they retained the old spelling, though they still pronounced the words as they had heretofore done zour and zear, as if they had been written your and year. These names, therefore, were