The orthography and etymology, though imperfect, are not imperfect
for want of care, but because care will not always be successful,
and recollection or information come too late for use.

That many terms of art and manufacture are omitted, must be frankly
acknowledged; but for this defect I may boldly allege that it
was unavoidable: I could not visit caverns to learn the miner's
language, nor take a voyage to perfect my skill in the dialect of
navigation, nor visit the warehouses of merchants, and shops of
artificers, to gain the names of wares, tools and operations, of
which no mention is found in books; what favourable accident, or
easy enquiry brought within my reach, has not been neglected; but
it had been a hopeless labour to glean up words, by courting living
information, and contesting with the sullenness of one, and the
roughness of another.

To furnish the academicians della Crusca with words of this kind,
a series of comedies called la Fiera, or the Fair, was professedly
written by Buonaroti; but I had no such assistant, and therefore
was content to want what they must have wanted likewise, had they
not luckily been so supplied.

Nor are all words which are not found in the vocabulary, to be
lamented as omissions. Of the laborious and mercantile part of the
people, the diction is in a great measure casual and mutable; many
of their terms are formed for some temporary or local convenience,
and though current at certain times and places, are in others
utterly unknown. This fugitive cant, which is always in a state of
increase or decay, cannot be regarded as any part of the durable
materials of a language, and therefore must be suffered to perish