The Cockney tongue, says Mr. W. Meg. Eagar in the "Contemporary Review," is not one of the "organ voices in English literature," but rather a flute or even a tin whistle. "Cockney," he says, "is a little pathetic in its high colouring and nervous energy, but always frank, plucky, and daringly alive." He gives many examples of the lesser known Cockneyisms. How many Londoners asked by a boy for "alf pint at the linen draper'? would realize that the body wished to have a glance at the 'Star'? "Alf a pint? rhymes—with "squint" and "linen draper" with "paper," and you are credited with a nimble intelligence. "Nogg's Blass" for money is a comparatively new expression, as must be "'two pennuf of dark," meaning a twopenny seat in a cinema. Mr. Eagar connects the cockney "bird," meaning girl, with the old 17th century ballad of Helen of Kil-cannel, "Burd Helen," bird being cousin germane to bride, while to "dooner," the Cockney for a shilling, he gives the distinction of direct lineal descent from the Latin "denarius." The causes of Cockney, he says, are primarily pressure, publicity. and carbon dioxide—the latter being responsible for the huskiness, and secondarily, haste, honesty, and adenoids. Bermondsey is the best place for the study of it in its purest form, but if Mr. Eagar is right the medical inspection of schools will soon imperil the simplicity of our vulgar speech. "If for all our friendliness to it," he concludes, ''we are driven cly the fact that it cannot produce
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.