Two forces are always at work in a language—one licentious, tending towards a disregard of regulation and convention; and the other conservative, tending to hold the language within bounds and to keep it neat and tidy. It is customary to think of English in America as being under the influence of the former, because our exuberant linguistic creations very readily attract attention. Yet there is a strong current in the opposite direction, and the pattern of American speech is not complete unless that is taken into account. Among the evidences of it are the recurring suggestions that an “academy” should be founded, with duties similar to those of the Académie française. Such agitation has been incessant in England since the sixteenth century, and the early suggestions in America reflected opinion in the mother country.