The Dutch settlers in New York introduced some words which were unknown, at least till recently, in England, as cold slaa, or slaw (kool salade), made of cabbage, and boss (bass) for master-workman, together with a number of geographical terms, which will perpetuate the history of the first settlement of Manhattan Island, or New Amsterdam, and of the Knickerbockers. ITALIAN WORDS. The beautiful Italian language has furnished us musical terms, as virtuoso, prima donna, piano forte, violin (violino), orchestra (properly from the Greek parpa and opztopat, to dance), soprano, alto, allegro; also stanza, canto, piazza, gazette (from gazetta, originally a Venetian coin for the reward of the first newspaper), umbrella (from the Latin umbra, shade), pantaloon (pantaleone, French pantalon), charlatan (from ciarlatano through the medium of the French), gondola, and bandit (bandito, outlawed). SPANISH WORDS. The Spanish has presented us with the alligator, alpaca, bigot, cambist, cannibal, cargo, cortes, don, filibuster (freebooter), gala, guano, hurricane, mosquito, negro, punctilio, stampede, potato, tobacco, tomato, tariff.1 From the same language is probably also the verb capsize (capuzar), to sink a ship by the head. ARABIC WORDS. From the time of the ascendency of the Moors in Spain and the period of the crusades we have several mathematical, astronomical, medical and chemical terms, as alchemy, alcohol, alcove, alembic, algebra, alkali, almanac, amber, assassin, azure, cipher, elixir, harem, hegira, nadir, rajah, sheik, sofa, talisman (originally from the Greek Téλeopa), vizier, zenith, zero. PERSIAN WORDS. Bazaar, dervish, lilac, pagoda, caravan, scarlet, shawl, tartar, tiara, peach, scimetar. 1 From the Spanish promontory and fortress, Tarifa, which commands the entrance to the Mediterranean, where the Moors watched all merchant ships. Hence, the proper spelling would be tarif. TURKISH WORDS. Turban, tulip, dragoman, divan, firman, effendi, and that indispensable article, coffee (which is also Arabic). SLAVONIC WORDS. These are few and mostly Russian, as drosky, knout, rouble, steppe, verst, ukase. INDIAN WORDS AND NAMES. The Indian aborigines of our country have given us terms of savage life, as wigwam, squaw, hammock, tomahawk, canoe, moccasin, hominy (parched corn), and a large number of geographical names which are generally more musical and expressive than the imported foreign names repeated ad nauseam. It is to be regretted that not more of the native and beautiful names of rivers and mountains were retained, as Mississippi (i.e., the father of waters), Missouri (muddy river,) Ohio (probably the beautiful river, la belle rivière, as the French called it), Minnehaha (laughing water, introduced in Longfellow's Hiawatha), Potomac, Susquehanna, Monongahela, Niagara, Allegheny, Massachusetts, Connecticut Iowa, Kansas, Nebraska, Dakota, Idaho, Wyoming, Alaska, etc. AMERICANISMS. Americanisms of recent native growth are mostly of a political character, as caucus, a term of uncertain origin, for a secret political meeting; doughface, a term invented by the sarcastic John Randolph to denote a pliable politician, or a nose of wax. The political party terms: Democrats, Republicans, Know-Nothings, Abolitionists, Secessionists, Federals, Confederates, have a peculiar historical meaning in the United States which is hardly warranted by the etymology, or at least is new in its application. The Democratic party received for many years before and after the civil war its chief support from the slave-holding aristocracy of the South; and the Republicans monopolized the general conception of republicanism at first in the interest of a Northern party which opposed the further extension of negro-slavery, but afterwards overleaped the sectional boundaries. In the proper sense of the word all Americans are Republicans, as distinct from Monarchists and Imperialists; and all are Democrats or advocates of popular self-government, in opposition to class-aristocracy or oligarchy. The civil war gave currency to a number of terms, as bushwhacker for guerrilla, secesh (a vulgarism for secessionist), and skedaddle for running away in a panic or fight (probably of Scandinavian origin, and possibly connected with the Greek azɛdávʊμt, to scatter), which have found their way from the newspapers into the latest editions of Webster and Worcester. "Contraband" was, during the war, employed of runaway negro slaves, and was so first used by Gen. Butler, when in Maryland, in 1861. "Mugwump" is an ugly nickname given to those Republicans who, during the Presidential campaign in 1884, partly in the interest of civil service reform, partly from opposition to a high tariff, voted the Democratic ticket and elected Cleveland. It ought to drop out of use. 'Blizzard," a fierce whirlwind and blinding snow-drift, is an onomatopoetic word of North-Western origin (connected with blow, blast, bluster), dating from about 1880. The blizzard of March 12, 1888, has become historic: it broke up all communication for several days, and New York had to learn by cablegram via London that Boston was snowed up. The following words are also of American origin: accountability (for accountableness), bigbugs (people of consequence), blatherskite, bogus, bore (an unwelcome or troublesome visitor), bottom-land, bottom-facts (a word first used, I believe, by Henry Ward Beecher during his trial), breadstuff, brush up, buffalorobe, bunkum or buncombe (a speech made for the gratification of constituents, or for mere show, from Buncombe County, North Carolina), cat's-paw, Christianization, denominationalism, churchliness, dilly-dally (to loiter), lager-beer (imported from Germany), loafer, tramp, constructive mileage, dead-head, wirepullers, sockdolager, to wind up, to have a good time. HYBRID WORDS. These are made up of two different languages, often in strange conjunction. Examples: across (from the Saxon a or an, on, and the Latin crux), bailiwick (from the French baillie, govern ment, and the Saxon wic, a village), interloper (half Latin, half Dutch), Christmas (Greek and Latin), disarm (from the Latin dis and Saxon arm, French désarmer), disapprove, disappear, develop (from the Latin dis and the French veloper, déveloper), disfranchise, disregard, embark (from the prefex em or en and barque, French embarquer, Italian imbarcare), embarrass, forearm, forecast, forecastle, hobby-horse, life-guard, loggerhead, (half Danish, half Saxon), mishap (from the Saxon and German mis or miss, and the Icelandic happ), outcast, outery, outfit, refresh (from the Latin prefix re and the Saxon fresh, German frisch, Old French refraishir), regain, relish, remark, reward, seamstress, undertake (from the Saxon under and the Scandinavian taka, allied to the Latin tangere), unruly (from the Saxon negative prefix and the Latin regula, regulare, Old French reuler, Modern French régler), until (unto and Ziel, i. e. end). A curious combination of Latin and Saxon is the term nonesuch for unequaled (as in the title of William Secker's book, "The Nonesuch Professor in His Meridian Splendor," 1660). THE ORGANIC UNION OF THESE ELEMENTS. We now proceed to consider the mixture of these different elements, and the advantages resulting from it. The various elements of which the English language is composed are not outwardly and mechanically related to each other, but they have inwardly and organically coalesced by a long historical process. They are not like the primary, secondary, tertiary, and other strata and deposits in geology, but they form a living unit. All foreign elements are thoroughly anglicized, and have been so assimilated and engrafted upon the original trunk as to constitute a distinct idiom with a character of its own, like the English nation itself. The English tongue is the child of a Saxon queen and a Norman king, inheriting some of their best qualities, and endowed at the same time with an original genius, thus representing at once the flower of an old, and the promise of a new dynasty. "Wo sich das Strenge mit dem Zarten, RESULTS OF THIS MIXTURE. SPELLING. The first and most obvious result of this mixture was the confusion of the laws of spelling and sound. This is a most serious inconvenience to learners. The pronunciation of the English cannot be learned from books, but only from living intercourse and long practice. Every vowel, instead of signifying one definite sound, has several, some even four and five or more different sounds, as the a in father, fall, fat, what; the o in dove, move, wolf, note, and not; the i in bite, bit, and bird; the u in duck, tune, and bull; the ou in dough, cough, tough, tour, plough; or certain letters represent different articulations of the organs, as th in thin, and thine; and a number of words, though spelled very differently, cannot be distinguished in pronunciation, as is the case with to, too, and two, or with write, right, rite, and (wheel-)wright. The orthography and pronunciation of the English defies all laws, is most perplexing to a foreigner, and hinders the progress of the language. It becomes intolerable, at least to continental ears, if applied to other languages, as the Greek and Latin, and only tends to confusion among classical scholars. Max Müller denounces the present system of spelling as "corrupt, effete, and utterly irrational." W. D. Whitney says that every theoretical and practical consideration is in favor of reform. The English alphabet being borrowed from the Roman, is altogether insufficient both in respect to vowels and consonants. We have only twenty-six letters wherewith to write at least thirty-two sounds. It is to be hoped that sooner or later this difficulty will be removed by the substitution of a phonetic for the traditional orthography, although such a change would have the serious inconvenience of obliterating the etymological origin of words. The accent also has changed, and in words derived from the French it has receded from the last to the second last syllable. 1 Dr. Worcester has here gone beyond Dr. Webster, and unnecessarily, we think, multiplied the sounds. In his "key" he marks seven different sounds of a (three more than Webster), five sounds of e (three more than Webster), five of i (two more than Webster), six of o (one more than Webster), six of u (three more than Webster), and four of y. This seems to be more nice than |