III. Syntactical Remarks.
Constructions with To be and the Present Participle are used colloquially, with the intention of vividness, in many cases where there is no particular reason to stress the fact that a thought is just a going on, a tendency especially characteristic of the Celtic-speaking Englishman. The uneducated vulgus have a strong predilection for these constructions and overdo them, as in the following examples, where there is not any reason at all for using them:
I’d ’ave ’ad to wait a long time, I’m thinking, if I ’adn’t come across this one ’ere. (T. T. T. 148. 18.)
Uncultivated Londoner.
You don’t see many fish that size about here now, I’m thinking. (Three Men In A Boat 221. 24.)
A farmer.
I am hoping it will be some sensible, pleasant woman. (Tommy And Co. 164. 12.)
A London gentleman with a strong liking for vulgarism.
Adjectives, adverbs, and other words are often accompanied by a pleonastic -like.
(Such-like is quite normal. In fact, when the word is not attributive, »such» would now be colloquial, e.g. »thieves and such» for »such-like», »the like».)
Adverbs are often substituted for adjectives.
It was awful gloomy before. (Three Men In A Boat 63. 30.)
Not a particular nice class as you meet there. (Tommy And Co. 17. 1.)
Uncultivated Londoner.
She’d come in regular with her young man. (T. T. T. 130. 3.)
A waiter.
I snapped him up shortish. (T. T. T. 196. 2.)
The same.
I’m fair sick of ’er. (Novel Notes 212. 12.)
Uncultivated young man.
He fair settled ’im. (Sketches 201. 2.)
Uncultivated old woman.
They met accidental-like. (T. T. T. 144. 4.)
A waiter.
This tendency extends, however, to the colloquial language of the cultivated. »Precious», for instance, is almost regularly substituted for very by many persons of some education.
(The inverse construction—adverb instead of adjective—may be heard now and then: the child looked very nicely, etc.)
Adjectives turned into a Plural Noun to express a State of Mind.
I used to get the fair dismals watching it. (T. T. T. 129. 21.)
A Waiter.
It gave me the blues for a day or two—that bit of news. (T. T. T. 146. 20.)
The same.
As stands very often for Relative Pronouns without a preceding such.
It’s the world as I’m complaining of. (T. T. T. 157. 12.)
The sort as likes it and the sort as don’t. (T. T. T. 205. 5.)
’E don’t cotton much to them as ain’t found grace. (Sketches 199. 28.) Etc. Etc.
Nearly as often, as or as how is substituted for subordinate that.
I don’t think as I can. (T. T. T. 127. 2.)
They shan’t say as I have disgraced them. (T. T. T. 145. 8.)
They told him as ’ow it was folks’s own fault that they was poor. (Sketches 201. 8.)
The papers always said as how she was charming. (T. T. T. 137. 14.)
It was evidently his turn to think as how I was mad. (T. T. T. 188. 25.)
Constructions with so ... that are contracted in the following manner.
She was that clean you might have eaten your dinner out of her hand. (T. T. T. 133. 16.)
A waiter.
I wur that taken aback I couldn’t tell ’ee what it wur. (Woodb. Farm 56. 35.)
A farmer.
Double Negative Particle is rather common—as in German and other languages also.
She don’t get no better. (Sketches 194. 10.)
’E ain’t never been his old self since then. (Sketches 201. 3.)
I ain’t no bloomin’ Smythe. (Novel Notes 203. 7.) Etc.
The ordinary confusion of on and of occurs in one instance, admirably illustrating the difficulties the uneducated meet with as often as they try to disguise the fatal dropping of the h’s:
The lean girl said she had »erd on me». The fat girl, seizing the chance afforded her, remarked genteelly that she too had »heard hof me», with emphasis upon the »hof». (P. Kelver 68. 6.)
The following sequence of words—with stress upon the pronoun—is in high favour with the uncultivated Englishman (Cf. Swed. sa han, sa jag. etc.):
»What’s the good of Africa?» replies he. (T. T. T. 159. 18.)
»Australia!» retorts he; »what would I do there?» (T. T. T. 159. 10.)
»A man like that deserves what he gets,» answers he. (T. T. T. 169. 9.)
»She was a bit of a fool herself,» adds she. (T. T. T. 258. 7.)
»There’s no wages attached», continues she. (T. T. T. 228. 14.)
»Go for a soldier», says I. (T. T. T. 160. 12.)