Rensselaer Republican, Volume 18, Number 47, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 29 July 1886 — Notes on Language. [ARTICLE]

Notes on Language.

The expression “in good form” or “good form” is taken bodily from French law (see Littre’S Dictionnaire), and means that all technicalities have been duly observed. The opposite is expressed by the English phrase “bad form,” which has degenerated into a cant term and is applied rather indiscriminately. The question why t is silent in often, hasten, soften, castle, and kindred words, lias been explained by Johns Hopkins investigators on the ground of physiology and environment. This explanation ' is entirely correct, the tin the words named being placed between consonants which are pronounced more easily .thamthe hard and sharp t is. As a matter of convenience or laziness, therefore, the t was dropped, and the less pedantic pronunciation has become the standard.