A Dictionary of Cont..

while is grammatically comparable to wait a
minute, but when used in this way, as an adverb
of extent, custom allows the two words to be
written together, as if they were a simple adverb,
as in wait awhile. But when the same form is
used after a preposition, as in wait for awhile,
it is generally considered a mark of il!iteracy.
There is no justification for this distinction, since
true adverbs sometimes follow a preposition, as
in away from here, but many people feel very
strongly about it.
When it is used as a conjunction, while may
mean “at the same time,” as in it ruined while
Bill was ut the theater. Or it may be used to
introduce a contrast. Used in this way while
may have the force of although, as in while
Dave is good in mathematics, he is not good in
English; or it may have the force of but, as in
Mr. Chapman likes classical music while Jim
likes modern jazz. These three uses of while are
all literary English and have been for centuries.
Sometimes while is used where no contrast and
no reference to time is intended, as in Charlie
comes from Michigan, Sandy comes from New
Jersey, while Bill comes from New York. Here
it has only the force of and. This use of while
is about a hundred years old and is usually condemned
as “journalese.”
whip. The past tense is whipped or whipt. The
participle is also whipped or whipt.
whip hand. As a way of saying that one has a
decided advantage over another, so decided that
resistance would be useless, to have the whip
hand over (formerly of) him, or just to have
the whip hand, is a clicht.
whipped cream. Although the form skim milk is
preferred to skimmed milk, the form whipped
cream is preferred to whip cream. This may be
because of the sound. Or it may be because
thirty years ago a study of English usage chose
whip cream to represent words of this kind and
found that it was “illiterate.” This may have
kept students of domestic science from using
the word. But nothing had been said about skim
milk and so there they may have felt at liberty
to do as they pleased. (This same study found
that it was perfectly all right to speak of
“driving” a car.)
whipsaw, literally, is a saw used for cutting curved
kerfs, consisting essentially of a narrow blade
stretched in a frame. Americans use the word
figuratively in colloquial contexts to mean to
win two bets from a person at one turn or play
or, more loosely, to defeat or worst in two ways
at once, or, even more loosely, simply to get
the better of (They were just hoodwinked and
whipsawed by Michigan’s slickers). Whipsaw
may be used figuratively as a noun to describe
a double defeat, and as an adjective to mean
violently opposing (The Santa Vittoria reached
Georges Bunks with its whipsaw currents and
dangerous shoal waters).
whtrl; whorl. Though their meanings are related,
these words are not interchangeable. Whirl is
both a verb and a noun; whorl is a noun only.
As an intransitive verb, whirl means to turn
round, spin, or rotate rapidly (In the ballroom
the dancers wheeled and whirled); to turn
about or aside quickly; to move, travel, or be
carried rapidly along on wheels or otherwise
(The stagecoach whirled merrily along). As a
transitive verb, whirl means to send, drive, or
carry in a circular or curving course (We whirled
his hat across the room. Whirling a light malacca
cane, he strolled along the avenue). As a
noun, whirl means the act of whirling, a rapid
rotation or gyration, a whirling movement, a
quick turn or swing (The eddy and whirl of the
whispering flood waters. He could see the whirl
of the carousel in the distance). In the United
States whirl is also used in the slang expression
give it a whirl meaning “have a try” (I still
think it won’t hurt to give ‘em a whirl and see).
This figurative use would seem to be drawn
from the roulette wheel. To give a girl a whirl
means to press attentions upon her, to hurry
her from one pleasure to another, until she is,
supposedly, giddy with delight.
Whorl is used only in special connections. In
botany it means a circular arrangement of
like parts, as leaves, flowers, round a point on
an axis; a verticil. In zoology it describes one
of the turns or volutions of a spiral shell. In
anatomy it describes one of the turns in the
cochlea of the ear. In general, it may describe
anything shaped like a coil.
whiskers; moustache. Whiskers is not so inclusive
a term as it once was. If used to describe the
full beard now, the use is intended to be humorous
and is confined to Santa Claus, hoboes,
Russians, and other quaint folk. It is now used
only dialectally to describe the hair growing on
the upper lip; the more acceptable alternative
is moustache. Yet the bristly hairs growing
about the mouth of certain animals, such as cats
and rats, are always whiskers. The slang expression
of admiration, It’s the cat’s whiskers!,
may simply be an elaboration of “outstanding.”
Sometimes whiskers describes the beard generally
(Admiral Blake was very fond of combing
his whiskers) but usually today the term
describes the hair growing on the side of a
man’s face, especially when worn long and with
the chin clean-shaven.
When people had more occasion to speak
about whiskers than they have today, the hair
on a man’s face might be referred to generally
as whiskers, or it might be called a pair of
whiskers, or it might be treated as a singular,
like the word beard, and called a whisker, as
in a tall gentleman with a carefully brushed
whisker.
white; whitened; whited. That is white which has
the color of white, whether it has always had
it or has acquired it some way. That is whitened
which has become or been made white (His
hair whitened over night when he used up the
lust of his dye). Whited has become fixed in
a specialized pejorative sense by its use in
Matthew 23~27: Woe unto you, scribes and