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The excerpt represents the core issue or deciding factor on which you must meditate, and is drawn from A Straight Deal by Owen Wister: now current in English and American usage: molasses and treacle will
suffice for an example; you will be able easily to think of others, and
there are many such that occur in everyday speech. Almost more tricky are
those words which both peoples use alike, but with different meanings. I
shall spin no list of these either; one example there is which I cannot
name, of two words constantly used in both countries, each word quite
proper in one country, while in the other it is more than improper.
Thirty years ago I explained this one evening to a young Englishman who
was here for a while. Two or three days later, he thanked me fervently
for the warning: it had saved him, during a game of tennis, from a
frightful shock, when his partner, a charming girl, meaning to tell him
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