A Dictionary of Cont..

airship 2:4
airship, when used at all, designates what is now
more generally called a dirigible, a lighterthan-air
craft which, in contradistinction to a
free-floating balloon, may be navigated.
aisle. The English, for the most part, restrict aisle
to the lateral division of a church separated
from the nave by piers or columns or to the
passageway between the seats in a church. In
America both of these meanings are known
and used, but the word is extended to denote
any kind of passageway between seats, as in
theaters and public conveyances. Two on rhe
aisle, which would be incomprehensible to the
English, or suggest a marooned couple, means
to an American two especially desirable seats
in a theater.
alas, poor Yorick! It is sad that “a fellow of
infinite jest, of most excellent fancy” should
be known to us only through such a threadbare
quotation. Alas, indeed, poor Yorick!
There is another line from Hamlet that should
always be uttered after this one: “What, has
this thing appear’d again tonight?” Or, if one
perceives that it is about to be spoken, appeal
to the speaker’s better nature: “Refrain tonight,
and that shall lend a kind of easiness to the
next abstinence.” And if he does forbear: “For
this relief, much thanks.”
albino. The plural is albinos, not albinoes. A
female albino used to be called an albiness,
but the word has fallen into disuse. Sex distinctions
have nothing to do with albinism.
albumen; albumin. Albumen is the white of an
egg. Albumin is a biochemical term for any
of a class of water-soluble proteins. The chemical
term is sometimes spelled albumen, but the
white of an egg is never spelled albumin.
alcoholic. See drunkard.
alga. The plural is algae.
alias means another. The legal term alias dictus,
of which the common term is an abbreviation,
means called at another time or place. Thus
Smith alias Jones indicates that a man who
now calls himself Smith had at some other
time or place called himself or had been called
Jones.
alibi in law means the defense of having been
somewhere else when a crime of which one
stands accused was committed (The fact f/rat
he was speaking before a large audience in
Boston, three hundred miles away from the
scene of the crime, at the time the murder
was committed proved a perfect alibi). By a
natural extension it has come to be used in
common speech as a synonym for excuse and,
as a verb, to offer an excuse. Ring Lardner’s
Alibi Ike was a baseball player who always
had a self-exculpating excuse for anything
wrong that he did. When Life referred to a
certain prizefighter (July 26, 1954) as un
inveterate alibier, it meant that he could always
explain away his failures. When, however,
George Orwell (in “England Your England”)
says that the wealthy ship-owner or cottonmiller
set up for himself an alibi as a country
Rentleman, he may mean that the businessman
wished to prove that he could not have been
responsible for the crimes of his business, since
he was tending his acres, an innocent bucolic,
at the time they were committed. Or he may
have meant alias, that is that the ship-owner
or cotton operative wished to go under the
then more respectable name of a country
gentleman.
Cynicism and the common man’s distrust of
the law have tinged alibi with a suggestion of
improbability and even of dishonesty. Purists
insist that it should be restricted to its legal
meaning, and those who wish to be formally
correct will so restrict it. In so doing, however,
they will lose the connotation of cunning and
dishonesty which distinguishes it from excrdse.
alight. The past tense is alighted or alit. The
participle is also alighted or alit. Alighted is
the preferred form for the past tense and the
participle. Alit is archaic.
Alight means to come down deliberately, or
with dignity, and we may say he alighted from
the plane. Things which are not under their
own control, such as stones and snow flakes,
are said to light, and not to alight, and we
therefore say he lighted (or lit) on his head.
Alight was once also used in the sense of
kindle. This usage has completely disappeared
except for the adjective alight, as in my candle
is alight.
alike. Thirty or forty years ago some textbooks
on English claimed that alike could not be
used to mean similarly, as in he treats everyone
alike. There is no justification for this
cIaim. Alike has been used in this way at Ieast
as long as we have had printed books.
alit. See alight.
alJ may be used with a singular noun, as in all
flesh is mortal, or with a plural noun, as in
all men are brothers. When used with a singular,
all means “the whole of it.” With a plural,
all was originally used collectively to mean the
entire number taken as a whole or unit, as in
all the angles in a triangle are equal to 180
degrees. Later, it was also used distributively
to mean every one of the individuals referred
to, as in all the angles in a triangle are less
than 180 degrees. Today, all with a plural noun
usually means “every” but it may-also mean
“the total.” Conceivably, _ this could create a
misunderstanding in some situations.
All is primarily an adjective and qualifies a
noun, as in all things to all men. It usually
precedes its noun, as in all children believe,
but may also follow it, as in children all
believe. When it precedes the noun it also
precedes all other qualifiers, as in all these dear
little children.
All is sometimes used as a noun, as in one
who gave all. It may be used after an objective
pronoun, as in us all, which is grammatically
comparable to us men; and either before or
after a subjective pronoun. Formerly it frequently
came before a subjective pronoun, as
in all we like sheep have gone astray. This
order is still acceptable, but in current English