4

BOOKS PUBLISHED BY LITTLE, BROWN & CO.

Sparks's Correspondence of the Revolution. CORRESPONDENCE OF THE REVOLUTION. Being Letters from Eminent Men to George Washington, from the Time of his taking Command of the American Army to the End of his Life. Edited by JARED SPARKS. 4 vols. 8vo, cloth, $9.00; royal 8vo, $12.00.

Sparks's Writings of Washington.

THE WRITINGS OF GEORGE WASHINGTON; being his Correspondence, Addresses, Messages, and other Papers, Official and Private. Selected and published from the Original Manuscripts; with a Life of the Author, Notes and Illustrations. By JARED SPARKS. 12 vols. 8vo, cloth, $18.00.

Sparks's Life of Washington.

THE LIFE OF GEORGE WASHINGTON. By JARED SPARKS. New Edition. Svo, cloth, $1.50.

Sparks's American Biography.

THE LIBRARY OF AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY. Conducted by JARED SPARKS. NEW SERIES; complete in Fifteen Volumes, each volume containing a Portrait, or a neatly engraved Historical Sketch. 12mo, cloth, $1 per vol.

Spectator.

THE SPECTATOR. Edited by A. CHALMERS. Fine edition.

cloth, $6.00.

Story's Life.

8 vols. 16mo,

THE LIFE OF HON. JOSEPH STORY; with Selections from his Correspondence, by his Son, W. W. STORY. 2 vols. 8vo, cloth, $5.50.

Story's Miscellaneous Works.

THE MISCELLANEOUS WRITINGS OF HON. JOSEPH STORY. Edited by his Son, W. W. Story. 8vo, cloth, $3.00.

Towle's History of the Constitution.

A HISTORY AND ANALYSIS OF THE CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES; with a Full Account of the Confederations which preceded it, &c. By NATHANIEL C. TOWLE, of the Washington Bar. 1 vol. 12mo.

Webster's Life and Works.

THE SPEECHES, FORENSIC ARGUMENTS, AND DIPLOMATIC PAPERS OF DANIEL WEBSTER; with a Notice of his Life and Works, by EDWARD EVERETT. Tenth edition. 6 vols. 8vo, cloth, $12.00.

Webster's Private Correspondence.

THE PRIVATE CORRESPONDENCE OF DANIEL WEBSTER, with the Autobiography. Edited by his Son, FLETCHER WEBSTER. Portraits. 2 vols. 8vo, cloth, $4.50.

Winthrop's Speeches and Addresses.

SPEECHES AND ADDRESSES ON VARIOUS OCCASIONS, by Hon. ROBERT C. WINTHROP. 8vo, cloth, $3.00.

Winthrop's History of New England. HISTORY OF NEW ENGLAND, from 1630 to 1649. BY JOHN WINTHROP, First Governor of the Colony of the Massachusetts Bay. From his original manuscript. With Notes, by JAMES SAVAGE. New edition. 2 vols. 8vo, cloth, $4.50.

Young's Chronicles of Massachusetts.

CHRONICLES OF THE FIRST PLANTERS OF THE COLONY OF THE MASSACHUSETTS BAY, IN NEW ENGLAND, from 1623 to 1635; now first collected from Original Manuscripts and Unpublished Records, and illustrated with Notes. By ALEXANDER YOUNG. With a Portrait of Governor Winthrop. 8vo, cloth, $2.50.

COMPAN

LITTLE, BROWN AND COMPANY.

LONDON: TRÜBNER AND COMPANY.

Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1859, by

JOHN RUSSELL BARTLETT,

In the Clerk's Office of the District Court for the District of Rhode Island.

CAMBRIDGE:

ALLEN AND FARNHAM, STEREOTYPERS AND PRINTERS.

ن

3-47-33

PREFACE

TO THE SECOND EDITION.

THE first edition of this Dictionary was published in

New York in 1848.
Aware of its many

It met with a quick sale, and soon passed out of print.
imperfections, I began my preparations for a new edition before it had fully
left the press. From that time to the day the last sheets of this edition left
my hands for the printer, now ten years, I have been more or less occupied
in its preparation. Nearly three years of this period I spent in the interior
of the country, in the service of the United States as Commissioner on the
Mexican Boundary; but even there, I failed not to note the peculiarities of
the familiar language of the frontier, and carefully recorded the words and
phrases I met with for future use. This experience enabled me to collect
the singular words occurring in prairie and frontier life as well as those com-
mon to Texas, New Mexico, and California. Most of these have come from
the Spanish, and are now fairly engrafted on our language.

The other alterations and improvements made in this edition, consist in the addition of a very large number of words and phrases peculiar to the United States; so that it now contains probably twice as many as the first edition. The examples or illustrations from authors, showing the use of words, have also been greatly multiplied. This seemed desirable, as examples convey a far more correct idea of their meaning and use than a simple definition. The histories of words and their definitions have also been corrected and improved.

In the additions to this work, I have to acknowledge valuable contribu

(iii)

tions from several friends, who took an interest in the subject. To the Rev. WM. S. MURPHY, President of the University of Missouri, I am indebted for many words and phrases peculiar to the West. To Mr. JOHN GILMARY SHEA for New York words; to Dr. A. L. ELWYN of Philadelphia, for the use of a manuscript vocabulary of Americanisms collected by him; to Mr. JAMES MITCHELL, of Nantucket, for words in use in that island; to Professor GEO. C. SCHAEFFER of Washington, for many terms of natural history, words relating to the arts, and Westernisms; and to Dr. FRANCIS LIEBER, of Columbia College, New York, for many sound remarks, of which I have availed myself in the pages of the work.

Large additions have been made to the common terms of plants, trees, and fruits of the United States, as well as of those which enter into our commerce. These, being familiar words of our language,, seem as worthy of being noted and explained as others. For valuable contributions to this class of words I am indebted to Dr. EDWARD FOREMAN, of Washington ; while Mr. ALEX. J. COTHEAL, a merchant of New York, and well known in the field of Oriental literature, has kindly furnished me the common names of the trees, fruits, nuts, etc. which enter into our commerce.

In preparing the first edition of this work, I was at a loss what to include in the collection of words; and, preferring to err on the side of copiousness, admitted many words common to the colloquial language of England and this country, which have now been rejected to make way for pure Americanisms. Of the words so rejected there are nearly eight hundred; the following are examples: above-board, Adam's ale, to advocate, afeard, afore, afterclaps, bamboozle, to bark one's shins, bobtail, bogtrotter, bolt-upright, boozy, bo-peep, to bore, born days, bran new, brown study, by-the-by, to hold a candle, to catch a Tartar, caterwaul, catspaw, to chalk out, chink, chouse, chuffy, circumbendibus, clap-trap, clincher, clout, cool, cosey, cowlick, crambo, criss-cross, cross-grained, crotchety, crowsfeet, curmudgeon, curry favor, to cut one's acquaintance, cut and run, cut a dash, dabster, dead alive, dawdle, demijohn, duds, Dick's hatband, dilly-dally, dog cheap, down in the mouth, driving at, dumpy, elbow grease, to feather one's nest, etc., etc..

A good many such words have nevertheless been retained, on the principle that a word now used only in some out-of-the-way locality in England, but quite general here, may be regarded as a peculiarity of the English