Page:The American Language.djvu/133

Rh means tolerably rich, richer than most; quite so, in English, is identical in meaning with exactly so. In American just is al- most equivalent to the English quite, as in just lovely. Thornton shows that this use of just goes back to 1794. The word is also used in place of exactly in other ways, as in just in time, just how many and just what do you mean? §3 Honorifics—Among the honorifics and euphemisms in everyday use one finds many notable divergences between the two lan- guages. On the one hand the English are almost as diligent as the Germans in bestowing titles of honor upon their men of mark, and on the other hand they are very careful to withhold such titles from men who do not legally bear them. In Amer- ica every practitioner of any branch of the healing art, even a chiropodist or an osteopath, is a doctor ipso facto, but in Eng- land, as we have seen, a good many surgeons lack the title and it is not common in the lesser ranks. Even graduate physicians may not have it, but here there is a yielding of the usual meticu- lous exactness, and it is customary to address a physician in the second person as Doctor, though his card may show that he is only Medicinae Baccalaureus, a degree quite unknown in Amer- ica. Thus an Englishman, when he is ill, always sends for the doctor, as we do. But a surgeon is usually plain Mr. An English veterinarian or dentist or druggist or masseur is never Dr.

Nor Professor. In all save a few large cities of America every male pedagogue is a professor, and so is every band leader, dancing master and medical consultant. But in England the title is very rigidly restricted to men who hold chairs in the uni- versities, a necessarily small body. Even here a superior title