Sometimes a word will keep or even
improve its place in one language, while at the same time it declines
from it in another. Thus 'demoiselle' (dominicella) cannot be said to
have lost ground in French, however 'donzelle' may; while 'damhele,'
being the same word, designates in Walloon the farm-girl who minds the
cows. [Footnote: See Littre, _Etudes et Glanures_, p. 16; compare p. 30.
Elsewhere he says: Les mots ont leurs decheances comme les families.]
'Pope' is the highest ecclesiastical dignitary in the Latin Church;
every parish priest is a 'pope' in the Greek. 'Queen' (gunae) has had a
double fortune. Spelt as above it has more than kept the dignity with
which it started, being the title given to the lady of the kingdom;
while spelt as 'quean' it is a designation not untinged with
contempt. [Footnote: [_Queen_ and _quean_ are not merely different
spellings of the same Old English word; for _queen_ represents Anglo-
Saxon _cwe:n_, Gothic _qens_, whereas _quean_ is the phonetic
equivalent of Anglo-Saxon _cwene_ Gothic _qino_]] 'Squatter' remains for
us in England very much where it always was; in Australia it is now the
name by which the landed aristocracy are willing to be known. [Footnote:
Dilke, _Greater Britain_, vol. ii. p. 40]
After all which has thus been adduced, you will scarcely deny that we
have a right to speak of a history in words. Now suppose that the
pieces of money which in the intercourse and traffic of daily life are
passing through our hands continually, had each one something of its
own that made it more or less worthy of note; if on one was stamped
some striking maxim, on another some important fact, on the third a
memorable date; if others were works of finest art, graven with rare
and beautiful devices, or bearing the head of some ancient sage or hero
king; while others, again, were the sole surviving monuments of mighty
nations that once filled the world with their fame; what a careless
indifference to our own improvement--to all which men hitherto had felt
or wrought--would it argue in us, if we were content that these should
come and go, should stay by us or pass from us, without our vouchsafing
to them so much as one serious regard.
Pages:
158
159
160
161
162
163
164
165
166
167
168
169
170
171
172
173
174
175
176
177
178
179
180
181
182