to
quarter the <i>Dictionary of National Biography</i> continues
its stately progress. But the noblest monument of English
scholarship is <i>The New English Dictionary on Historical
Principles</i>, 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
<i>New</i> will, however, be unsuitable long before the
Dictionary is out of date. Its right name is the <i>Oxford
English Dictionary</i> (`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. In answer to his call I began to collect; but
instances of words must be noted as one comes across them, and
of course they do not occur in alphabetical order. The work
took time, and when my parcel of quotations had grown into a
considerable heap, it occurred to me that the collection, if a
little further trouble were expended upon it, might first enjoy
an independent existence. Various friends kindly contributed
more quotations: and this Book is the result.

In January 1892, having the honour to be President of the
Section of "Literature and the Fine Arts" at the Hobart Meeting
of the Australasian Association for the Advancement of Science,
I alluded to Dr. Murray's request:

A body like this Section, composed of men from different parts
of scattered colonies, might render valuable help in organising
the work of collecting authorities for our various peculiar
words and usages. Twenty or thirty men and women, each
undertaking to read certain books with the new dictionary in
mind, and to note in a prescribed fashion what is peculiar,
could accomplish all that is needed. Something has been done
in Melbourne, but the Colonies have different words and uses of
words, and this work is of a kind which might well extend
beyond the bounds of a single city. At first it may seem as if
our words were few, as if in the hundred years of Australian
life few special usages have arisen; but a man with a
philological turn of mind, who notes what he hears, will soon
find the list grow. Some philologers speak, not perhaps very
satisfactorily, of being "at the fountains of language": we can
all of us testify to the birth of some words within our own