In a case before mentioned, we spoke of the “Indian nations.”  The word Indian was chosen to specify or define what nations were alluded to.  But all may not decide alike in this case.  Some may think we meant the aborigines of America; others, that the southern nations of Asia were referred to.  This difficulty originates in a misapprehension of the definitive word chosen.  India was early known as the name of the south part of Asia, and the people there, were called Indians.  When Columbus discovered the new world, supposing he had reached the country of India, which had long been sought by a voyage round the coast of Africa, he named it India, and the people Indians.  But when the mistake was discovered, and the truth fully known, instead of effecting a change in the name already very generally understood, and in common use, another word was chosen to distinguish between countries so opposite and West India became the word to distinguish the newly discovered islands; and as India was little better known in Europe at that time, instead of retaining their old name unaltered, another word was prefixed, and they called it East India.  When, therefore, we desire to be definite, we retain these words, and say, East Indians and West Indians.  Without this distinction, we should understand the native people of our own country; but in Europe, Asia, and Africa, they would think we alluded to those in Asia.  So with all other adjectives which are not understood. Indian, as an adjective, may also be employed to describe the character and condition of the aborigines.  We talk of an indian temper, indian looks, indian blankets, furs, &c.

In writing and conversation we should employ words to explain, to define and describe, which are better understood than those things of which we speak.  The pedantry of some modern writers in this respect is ridiculous.  Not satisfied to use plain terms which every body can understand, they hunt the dictionaries from alpha to omega, and not unfrequently overleap the “king’s english,” and ransack other languages to find an unheard of word, or a list of adjectives never before arranged together, in so nice a manner, so that their ideas are lost to the common reader, if not to themselves.  This fault may be alleged against too many of our public speakers, as well as the affected gentry of the land.  They are like Shakspeare’s Gratiano, “who speaks an infinite deal of nothing, more than any man in all Venice; his reasons are as two grains of wheat hid in two bushels of chaff:  you shall seek all day ere you find them; and, when you have found them, they are not worth the search.”  Such sentences remind us of the painting of the young artist who drew the form of an animal, but apprehensive that some might mistake it, wrote under it, “This is a horse.”