es, to men also.

When a man is tipsy (spirits being made from grain), they generally say
he is _corned_.

In the West, where steam-navigation is so abundant, when they ask you to
drink they say, "Stranger, will you take in wood?"--the vessels taking
in wood as fuel to keep the steam up, and the person taking in spirits
to keep _his_ steam up.

The roads in the country being cut through woods, and the stumps of the
trees left standing, the carriages are often brought up by them. Hence
the expression of, "Well, I am _stumped_ this time."

I heard a young man, a farmer in Vermont, say, when talking about
another having gained the heart of a pretty girl, "Well, how he
contrived to _fork_ into her young affections, I can't tell; but I've a
mind to _put my whole team on_, and see if I can't run him off the
road."

The old phrase of "straining at a gnat, and swallowing a camel," is, in
the Eastern states, rendered "straining at a _gate_, and swallowing a
_saw-mill_."

To strike means to attack. "The Indians have struck on the
frontier,"--"A rattle-snake _struck_ at me."

To make tracks--to walk away. "Well, now, I shall make tracks;"--from
foot-tracks in the snow.

Clear out, quit, and put--all mean "be off." "Captain, now, you _hush_
or _put_"--that is, "Either hold your tongue, or be off." Also, "Will
you shut, mister?"--i.e. will you shut your mouth? i.e. hold your
tongue?

"Curl up"--to be angry--from the panther and other animals when angry
raising their hair. "Rise my dandee up," from the human hair; and a
nasty idea. "Wrathy" is another common expression. Also, "Savage as a
meat-axe."

Here are two real American words:--

"Sloping"--for slinking away.

"Splunging," like a porpoise.

The word "enthusiasm," in the south, is changed to "entuzzy-muzzy."

In the Western states, where the racoon is plentiful, they use the
abbreviation 'coon when speaking of people. When at New York, I went
into a hair-dresser's shop to have my hair cut; there were two young men
front the west--one under the barber's hands, the other standing by him.

"I say," said the one who was having his hair cut, "I hear Captain is in
the country."

"Yes;" replied the other, "so they say; I should like to see the 'coon."

"I'm a _gone 'coon_" implies "I am distressed--_or_ ruined--_or_ lost."
I once asked the origin of this expression, and was very gravely told as
follows:--

"There is a Captain Martin Scott (already men