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What he has in common with Irving is chiefly the attitude of spectatorship, and the careful refinement of the style, so different from the loud, brassy manner of modern writing. Hawthorne never uses slang, dialect, oaths, or colloquial idioms. The talk of his characters is book talk. Why is it that many of us find this old-fashioned elegance of Irving and Hawthorne irritating?
"There is Madeira near you, my Lord," says my Lady, pointing to a tall thin decanter of the fashion of the year. "Madeira! Marsala, by Jove, your Ladyship means!" shouts Mr. Slang. "No, no, old birds are not caught with chaff. Thrum, old boy, let's have some of your Comet hock." "My Lady Thrum, I believe that IS Marsala," says the knight, blushing a little, in reply to a question from his Sophia.
Whilst Lady Diana, he observed, simpered so prettily, and took herself so quietly for Fairly Fair, not perceiving that the colonel was admiring his own nails all the while. Next to Colonel Epaulette, Frederick, at Marianne's particular desire, came into the room like Sir Charles Slang.
He did not smoke or chew tobacco or take snuff; he did not swear, or use slang or rude, or coarse, or indelicate language, or make puns, or tell anecdotes, or laugh intemperately, or raise his voice above the moderate pitch enjoined by the canons of good form. When he gave an order, his manner modified it into a request.
You see, you are supposed to have lived in a girl's school for the last three years and to have all the slang vocabulary at your fingers' ends, so that if you go asking what every common or garden slang expression means you will give us both away with a pound of tea." "I understand," said Margaret meekly, "and I will not ask."
From under the edge of the hood his eyes look upon Crainquebille, who has just uttered in an uncertain voice the sacramental, insulting phrase of the popular slang Mort aux vaches! They look upon him shining in the deep shadow of the hood with an expression of sadness, vigilance, and contempt. He does not move. Crainquebille, in a feeble and hesitating voice, repeats once more the insulting words.
Huxter very probably had been also partaking of supper, for he was even more excited now than at the time when he had previously claimed Pen's acquaintance; and, having run against Arthur and his partner, and nearly knocked them down, this amiable gentleman of course began to abuse the people whom he had injured, and broke out into a volley of slang against the unoffending couple.
Colonel Ryder's indignation was curbed, however, by the bookmaker, who, having no views, but seeing an opportunity for fun, brought up reinforcements of chaff and slang, easily construable into profanity, and impregnated with terse humour. Many of the ladies had spoken of the bookmaker as one of the best-mannered men on board. So he was to all appearance.
But, like other electric flashes, they are not usually of long duration. If quickly started, they are as quickly forgotten. Each generation or decade or year manufactures its own supply of slang words, and seldom bequeaths any of them as a permanent inheritance.
But they were so glad to have me have a good chance to learn the American language, that they would not quite forbid me. I thought I never would learn. Sometimes I thought I knew it well; and there would appear in your speech some strange words that you could not seem to translate to us, and you called it all with one word, 'Slang! You said you could not get along without it.
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