On 3/16/06, Chris Rowse <chris(a)forth.co.za&gt; wrote: Hi Chris, I think TFM is actually fairly clear. C-h f replace-regexp says: ... Third arg DELIMITED (prefix arg if interactive), if non-nil, means replace only matches surrounded by word boundaries. In TO-STRING, `\&' stands for whatever matched the whole of REGEXP, and `\N' (where N is a digit) stands for whatever what matched the Nth `\(...\)' in REGEXP. Now granted you have to read through a couple of paragraphs to get there, but I find the explanation clear enough. If you can think of how to improve it, a patch would be considered. Regards, Vin -- Whoever you are, no matter how lonely, the world offers itself to your imagination, calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting-- over and over announcing your place in the family of things. Mary Oliver