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Typo: A Monthly Newspaper and Literary Review, Volume 2

The Hyphen

page 98

The Hyphen.

No sign in typography is used with a wider latitude than the hyphen. It is difficult to lay down precise rules for its use, as the same form which is properly a compound in one connexion, will, with a different context, require to be printed either as a single word or as two words. Where the compositor adopts a hard-and-fast rule regarding any particular word—such for example as « well-known » —he will be as often wrong as right. Like the newspaper hand who « wished he knew the style of the office—whether it was 'inst.' or 'ult.'—they seemed always changing from one to the other » —the comp who is guided by arbitrary rules instead of general principles will always be perplexed by the apparent inconsistencies of the proof-reader. In most books treating of punctuation, an important consideration is overlooked—the special character of our imperfect English orthography, as affecting the use of the hyphen. To realize the impossibility of laying down hard-and-fast rules, it only necessary to remember that there are numerous compound words in English which—whatever the context—may be written with perfect propriety in three different ways. Thus:

  • Type foundry
  • Type-foundry
  • Typefoundry.

In this respect, the English differs from other languages—the third form being the only one admissible in German, for example. While there is in many cases this latitude of usage, there are others, as we shall have occasion to shew, where the misuse of the hyphen materially affects the sense.

There are two opposite tendencies at present in the usage of the hyphen. In England it is now used more freely than formerly in compound epithets. In the United States, the tendency is towards its entire suppression. This tendency is chiefly due to the preponderating Teutonic element in American printing. Anyone looking over a list of American trade houses can scarcely fail to note that in the various branches of printing, lithographing, typefounding, electrotyping, inkmaking, and all allied arts, there is scarcely a prominent firm which, if it does not bear a German name, has not at least a German in the partnership. From which it follows that the slight and almost imperceptible innovations in such matters as punctuation and orthography partake of a foreign element, being to some extent modelled upon the German rather than the English pattern. And it also follows, that in some cases these changes are ill-adapted to the language—or at all events to its cumbrous and clumsy orthography— and are very offensive to the English eye.

Most people are aware of the tendency of the Germans, Hollanders, and Scandinavians to pile up compounds of portentous length—to write as one word what in English would occupy a whole sentence. But to the English student of these languages, nothing is more remarkable than the way in which these unwieldy conglomerates resolve themselves into their component parts when the trained eye falls upon them. But it is not so in English. To omit the spaces between the words is to render the language unintelligible. The familiar puzzles of « buried birds, » « buried towns, » &c, illustrate this point. Fron a column set up without spaces, hundreds of words foreign to the subject could be picked out, and the deciphering of the whole would be a task of great labor.

For this reason the discontinuance of the hyphen as a mark of division, so noticeable in late American books, is to be deprecated. The principles so clearly laid down in that excellent American work Wilson on Punctuation, have been entirely abandoned, and words of the most uncouth form have been the result. In an American contemporary, lately, a writer, while accepting « postoffice, » and a score of similar objectionable forms, said he « drew the line » at (« proofreader. » Yet there are many American printers who adopt this latter, and even worse forms, in their anxiety to get rid of the hyphen. A little examination will shew why « proofreader » and « postoffice » offend the eye. A compound must necessarily be mentally divided before its meaning can be grasped. The « fr » and the « to » come so frequently together that the eye divides the words wrongly, and the reader sees them as « proo freader » and « pos toffice. » This fact has not escaped Wilson, who specially warns his readers against uniting compounds « whose meaning would be obscured, or whose pronunciation would be less easily known, by the consolidation of the simples, » and instances « ass-head, » « pot-herb, » « soap-house, » « first-rate. » The last of these is now commonly printed as one word in American papers. Among the compound letters which should never be allowed to come into juxtaposition when belonging to different words, are ph, th, bl, br, fr, fl, st, str, gh, and many more which will occur to the reader. Not long since we saw a singular headline « The Faceline Dispute » in a contemporary. The second word was suggestive of some new patent compound analogous to « Vaseline. » It proved to stand for « face-line, » and referred to some river protection works. Were our language phonetically written, the hyphen might be abandoned in many compounds where it is now necessary. Another point often overlooked, but which Wilson, with his usual thoroughness, has plainly dealt with, is the fact that the same word— « shoemaker » for instance, cannot always take the same form, but depends entirely upon the context. Thus, « J. Pegg, Shoemaker, » is correct; but « Lapp Stone, Boot and Shoemaker, » is wrong. Signwriters write it, and compositors set it up thus daily, without noticing that Mr Stone is described not as a bootmaker, but as a boot! The correct form is « Boot and Shoe Maker," the hyphen even not being admissible. Similarly, while « Saddler and Harnessmaker » is correct; « Saddle and Harnessmaker » is wrong. In The Queen's English, the late Dean of Canterbury made merry over a ridiculous sign, in which a tradesman figured as a « Gas-holder and Boiler-maker. »

To the Germans we are indebted for one useful application of the hyphen, the value of which was quickly recognized in scientific and technical works, and which is gradually coming into common use. We refer to the use of the hyphen to indicate an imperfect compound word, the complement of which is supplied farther on in the sentence. It represents better than any other device, that the full sense of the term is in suspense, and is a great assistance to the reader. As for example, « fascia black- or brown-margined. » Here the first hyphen makes an important difference in the sense, clearly confining the adjective « black » to the margins of the fascia. In stock reports, it is now the usual and preferable system to write « three- or four-year-old steers, » « 2-, 6-, and 8-tooth ewes. »

Last of all, beware of using the hyphen where (as in many cases) it gives to a compound a technical or special meaning which is foreign to the work in hand. Of this blunder a shocking example came under our notice in a concert programme printed during the present month, where one of the items was set down thus: « The Lord is a Man-of-War »!