Woman and Language.

Press, Volume LVIII, Issue 17471, 3 June 1922, Page 8

Woman and Language.

"Swear me, Kate," says Hotspur in the old play, "Swear me, Kate, like a lady, I as thou art, a good mouth-filling oath." ! But the brave days when strength of language was a test of gentlewomanhood have long since passed away, even "tho weightier and more sober sort of "swearing," to borrow a pleasing phrase from Professor Wyld, no longer living on the lips of ladies. For women, as Hotspur's singular adjuration obviously implies, are, by tihe very habit of their minds, "full measurable." It is their natural gift to see things in proportion and .avoid extremes of language, dress or conduct, except, to he sure, where the varying gale of fashion happens for a season to deflect their courses. Such at least is the burden and the implication of tho learned and weighty chapter Professor Jespersen devotes in his new book to that singular abstraction he labels ; 'The Woman.". With the alluring combination of thoroughness and earnestness which characterises tho writings of professors, ho divides "Tho Woman" under several heads, ranging from l "Women's Languages," through "Tabu," "Sanskrit Erarna," and "such branches of learning," to "Gen- " oral Characteristics." Now it is quite evident that even in these daya of large enlightenment, when woman, too often under tho harsh compulsion of necessity, competes with man in schools and colleges, law courts and pulpits, and not infrequently, it must be admitted, *hows herself far and away "the pret- " tier fellow of the two." there is still

iii her nature a certain not disagreeable element of inconsequence and caprice. Which being so, wo 6hall take the liberty to ignore the professor's minute particulars, and deal, greatly daring, with the "general characteris"tics." And the first of these is her exceeding, not to say Lirdlike, rapidity of thought. While the mere man stands deliberating, "this way and that "dividing the swift (swift!) mind" before hazarding his weighty opinion in words, 6he has already darted fair away and alighted on a fresh subject. Mark, says the professor, the lavish profusion of her "he's" and "she's," aind define, if you can, t&eir immediate reference. Or take a set of men and women of average education, and—at the risk of being voted the worst kind of bore—induce them to read a given paragraph, and immediately set down what they have gathered

of its contents. The ladies will, as a rule, read faster, and with more alert intelligence. In a test case cited, indeed, one lady read four times as fast as her deliberate spouse, and even then gave a more accurate summary of that small portion of the paragraph that he had stumbled through. There, you see, naturally says "the " woman," what a superior creature 3f am, even in the realms of mind. But her triumph is short-lived. For Mr Ellis, the philosophic and unchivalric author of "Man and Woman," called in by Jespersen as a witness for the defence, has a far from flattering word to say. "With tho quick reader "it is as though every statement were "admitted immediately and without " inspection, to fill the vacant cham- " bers of the mind, while with the slow " reader every statement undergoes an

" iustinctive process of cross-exainina-"tion; every new fact seems to stir " up the accumulated stores of facts " among which it intrudes, and so im- " pedes rapidity of mental action." Is it, and does it? We hope, but we fear, for we cannot avoid the suspicion that the professor is inadvertently playing with loaded dice. There is a hint of hardened prejudice in his too apt quotations. Passing lightly from swift leading to swift speech, he cites " Aurora Leigh's resigned 'A woman's " 'function plainly is—to talk,' " and backs it up not merely with a trivial epigram, and the familiar words of that "misuser of the sex'' Eoßalind, but with a delightfully ironic excerpt from Housmun's "John of Jingalo," where a girl is represented as confessing, "I " talk so as to find out what I "think. Don't you? Some things "one can't judge till one hears them " spoken." This alleged volubility, or proneness to speech, he links up with the fact—he has, so he hold, established "the fact" earlier in the chapter—that women's vocabulary is smaller and more central than that of men. And this he further links with "th e indubit- " able fact" that women do not reach the same extreme points as men, but are nearer the average in most respects. Now "the woman," it appears, resents this latter statement, holding that it cute her off from the shiuing tablelands of genius, as indeed perhaps it does. But is she, asks the professor, delighted at seeing her fall into the pit he has dug for her unwary feet, is she equally eager to claim equality with " the man" in his doubtful prerogative of extreme imbecility? For, "in lan- " guago we see this very clearly: the " highest linguistic genius and tho '' lowest degree of linguistic imbecility "are very rarely found among women. " The greatest orators, the most fam"ous literary artists, have been men: "but it may serve as a sort of con-

"solution to the other - sex that there " are a much greater number of men "than of women who cannot put two " words together intelligibly, who "stutter, and stammer, and hesitate, " and are unable to find suitable expression for the simplest thought. "Between these two extremes the wo- " man moves with a sure and Eiipple "tongue, which is ever ready to find "words and to pronounce them in a "clear and intelligible manner." O fortunatos ninium sua si bona norint. "It is no mean happiness to be "seated in the mean." But we very greatly doubt, in spite of the admirable reasoning of the learned professor, whether the individual woman is going to hear him gladly. And, as for following him in detail through his observations on woman's limitations in articulation, and choice of words, her too spontaneous adverbs, her incompleted periods, and the other "aggiavat- " ing" topics, the intrepid fellowhandles, wo simply daren't. After all in language as in life the final word is with the woman, and Mrs Poyser has spoken it. "Howiver, I'm not " denyin' the women are foolish: God " Almighty made 'em to match the "men."