Democratic Sentinel, Volume 14, Number 47, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 12 December 1890 — “It’s a Shop, Sir!” [ARTICLE]

“It’s a Shop, Sir!”

I had an experience all my own in Lock & Co.’s hat store, in St. James street. The aged proprietor displays ancient helmets and caps in his window, which is kept scrupulously dusty. Noting this I said, “ This must fep a very old store, indeed?” “ Store ? ” said the man. “ It’s no store at all; it’s a shop, sir. I call a store a place for the sale of a miscellaneous lot of goods, but this is a shop, sir. You ought to be more careful in your use of terms.” If that was rudeness—and I do not know how great he considered his provocation—it was the only rudeness I experienced from any shopkeeper. But I learned from that incident not to say store. And before I left London I had swelled my index expurgatorius to the extent that I seldom used the following words: Guess, yes, sir, glass (for tumbler), railroad, horse car, cents, fix, store, or pad of paper. “Block of paper,” they said, when I at last got them to understand that I wanted a pad. “Guess” and “fix” are pure Americanisms, and are to be used or not as you want to attract curious attention or to avoid it. But the most difficult thing for many Americans in England was to avoid saying “ sir ” to a stranger who addressed them or to an old gentleman. “Yes, sir,” and “No, sir,” over there are the verbal insignia of a servant.— Julian Ralph, in Harper's Weekly. Were Not Full. A negro woman borrowed a dozen eggs from a neighbor, and instead of returning a dozen, brought back only eleven. “How’s dis ?” the lender asked. ““How’s whut, lady?” “W’y you borrid er dozen aigs from me, but dar ain't but erleben yere. How does you’count fur dat?” “I ’counts fur it might easy. Dem aigs I got frum you wa’n’t right full.” “Wa’n’t right full! Whut you means by dat?” “I means dat da wan’t fall—dat de hens whut laid ’em wa’n’t right honest. Deze aigs dat I have fotched you is full up ter de brim; an’ yo’ kaint ’spect me ter fetch you er dozen full aigs fur er dozen dat wa’n’t right full. Oh, I’s squar’, I is.”— Arkansaw Traveler. By far the oldest newspaper in the world is the Pekin Gazette, which was established in the year 911 of the Christian era, has been regularly published since 1351 A. D., and is at the present time edited by a committee of six members of the Academy of Han Lin