Word: curtness
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...public libraries. Although we realize that the position must be a trying one, and that many foolish and useless questions are asked, nevertheless the attendants are paid to help find and distributed the books, and long service and thorough knowledge of the shelves is no excuse for curt answers and halfhearted assistance...
...Courant, which dubbed me, short and curt...
NOTHING astonishes a German or a Frenchman, when beginning the study of English, more than our vowel-sounds, unless perhaps our consonant-sounds. The English language abounds in vowels which are little better than grunts. We have hosts of curt little vowels that seem to be the remnants of some full sounds which a continual press of business prevents us from ever completing. One of the most hybrid and unsatisfactory of these - to take an instance - is our short o, as in hot. It is quite interesting to speculate as to what the full sound can be which is swallowed...