diff --git a/hledger/hledger.m4.md b/hledger/hledger.m4.md
index 9f1383c61..29665919e 100644
--- a/hledger/hledger.m4.md
+++ b/hledger/hledger.m4.md
@@ -834,9 +834,9 @@ If they're not doing what you expect, it's important to know exactly what they s
 #. they are infix matching (they do not need to match the entire thing being matched)
 #. they are [POSIX ERE][] (extended regular expressions)
 #. they also support [GNU word boundaries][] (`\b`, `\B`, `\<`, `\>`)
-#. they do not support [backreferences][] - if you write `\1`, it will match the digit `1`.
+#. they do not support [backreferences][]; if you write `\1`, it will match the digit `1`.
    Except when doing text replacement, eg in [account aliases](journal.html#regex-aliases),
-   where [backreferences][] can be used the replacement string to reference [capturing groups][] in the search string.
+   where [backreferences][] can be used in the replacement string to reference [capturing groups][] in the search regexp.
 #. they do not support [mode modifiers][] (`(?s)`), character classes (`\w`, `\d`), or anything else.
 
 [POSIX ERE]: http://www.regular-expressions.info/posix.html#ere