ORIGIN OF THE WORK

About a generation ago Mr. Matthew Arnold twitted our nation with the fact that “the journeyman work of literature” was much better done in France—the books of reference, the biographical dictionaries, and the translations from the classics. He did not especially mention dictionaries of the language, because he was speaking in praise of academies, and, as far as France is concerned, the great achievement in that line is Littré and not the Academy's Dictionary. But the reproach has now been rolled away—nous avons changé tout cela—and in every branch to which Arnold alluded our journeyman work is quite equal to anything in France.

It is generally allowed that a vast improvement has taken place in translations, whether prose or verse. From quarter to quarter the Dictionary of National Biography continues its stately progress. But the noblest monument of English scholarship is The New English Dictionary on Historical Principles, founded mainly on the materials collected by the Philological Society, edited by Dr. James Murray, and published at the cost of the University of Oxford. The name New will, however, be unsuitable long before the Dictionary is out of date. Its right name is the Oxford English Dictionary (‘O.E.D.’). That great dictionary is built up out of quotations specially gathered for it from English books of all kinds and all periods; and Dr. Murray several years ago invited assistance from this end of the world for words and uses of words peculiar to Australasia, or to parts of it.