WORDS UNDER BAN. 109 words ending in some,' the Anglo-Saxon and early English, 'sum,' the German, 'sam' ('friedsam,' 'seltsam') to fall out of use. It is true that a vast number of these survive, as 'gladsome,' 'handsome,' 'wearisome,' 'buxom' (this last spelt better 'bucksome' by our earlier writers, for its present spelling altogether disguises its true character, and the family to which it belongs; being the same word as the German 'beugsam' or 'biegsam,' bendable, compliant); but a large number of these words, more than can be ascribed to accident, more than their due proportion, are either quite or nearly extinct. Thus in Wiclif's Bible alone you might note the following, 'lovesum,' 'hatesum,' ‘lustsum,' 'heavysum,' 'lightsum,' 'delightsum;' all of which, except the last, are gone, and that, although used in our authorized Version, now only survives in poetry. So too brightsome' (Marlowe), 'wieldsome' (Golding), unlightsome' (Milton), 'ugsome' (Foxe), 'laboursome' (Shakespeare), 'longsome' (Gascoigne), 'quietsome,' mirksome' (both in Spenser), 'toothsome' (Beaumont and Fletcher), 'gleesome,' 'joysome' (both in Browne's Pastorals), meddlesome' (Barrow), 'bigsome,' 'win. some,'' dosome,' meaning prosperous, well-to-do, a word still surviving in the North, 'playsome' (employed by the historian Hume), have nearly or quite disappeared from our English speech. They seemed to have held their ground in Scotland* in considerably larger num * Jamieson's Dictionary gives a large number of words with this termination which I should suppose were always peculiar to Scotland, as 'bangsome,' i. e. quarrelsome, 'freaksome,' 'drysome,' 4 grousome' (the German' grausam'), bers than in the south of the Island. Thus Campbell employs that very graceful word' winsome,' but would scarcely have done so but for his Scotch breeding, and perhaps even then only in a Scotch ballad. Neither can I esteem it a mere accident that of a group of depreciatory and contemptuous words ending in 'ard,' at least one-half should have dropped out of use; I allude to that group of which 'dotard,' 'laggard,' 'braggard,' now spelt 'braggart,' 'sluggard,' 'wizard,' may be taken as surviving specimens; 'blinkard' (Homilies); 'dizzard' (Burton); 'dullard' (Udal); 'musard' (Chaucer); 'puggard,' 'stinkard' (Ben Jonson), as extinct. Again, there was once a whole family of words, whereof the greater number are now under ban; which seem at one time to have been formed almost at pleasure, the only condition being that the combination should be a happy one-I mean all those singularly expressive words formed by a combination of verb and substantive, the former governing the latter; as 'scarecrow,' 'telltale,' 'scapegrace,' 'turncoat,' ' turntail,' 'skinflint,' 'spendthrift,' 'lickspittle,' 'daredevil,' 'makebate' (= störenfried), 'cutpurse,' 'cutthroat,' 'marplot,' 'marprelate.' These with a certain number of others, have held their ground, and may be said to be still more or less in use; but what a number more are forgotten; and yet, though not always elegant, they constituted a very vigorous portion of our language, and preserved some of its most genuine idioms. It could not well be otherwise; they are almost all words of abuse, and the abusive words of a WORDS UNDER BAN. 111 language are always among the most picturesque and vigorous and imaginative which it affords. The whole man speaks out in them, and often the man under the influence of passion and excitement, which always lend force and fire to his speech. Let me remind you of a few of them; 'smellfeast,' if not a better is yet a more graphic, word than our foreign 'parasite;' as graphic indeed for us as tрexédeπvos to Greek ears; 'clawback' is a stronger, if not a more graceful, word than 'flatterer' or 'sycophant;' 'tosspot' (Fuller), or sometimes 'reelpot' (Middleton), is a word which tells its own tale as well as drunkard; and 'pinchpenny' (Holland) as well as or better than miser. And then what a multitude more there were in like kind; 'spintext,' 'lacklatin,' both applied to ignorant clerics; 'bitesheep' (a favourite word with Foxe) to such of these as were rather wolves tearing, than shepherds feeding, the flock; 'slip-string' (= pendard) to one owed to the gallows (Beaumont and Fletcher). How many of these words occur in Shakespeare; the following list makes no pretence to completeness; 'martext,' 'carrytale,' 'pleaseman,' 'sneakcup,' 'mumblenews,' 'wantwit,' 'lackbrain,' 'lackbeard,' 'lacklove,' 'ticklebrain,' 'breedbate' (the old French 'attise-feu,' or 'attise-querelle'), 'swingebuckler,' 'pickpurse,' 'pickthank,' 'picklock,' 'breakvow,' 'breakpromise;' 'makepeace'-this last being the only one among them all in which reprobation or contempt does not utter itself. Nor is the list exhausted yet; there are further 'dingthrift' (= prodigal, Herrick), 'wastethrift,' (Beaumont and Fletcher), 'scape-thrift' (Holinshed), ‘shakebuck ler' (Becon), swashbuckler,' 'spitvenom,' 'killjoy,' 'lackland,' 'pickquarrel,' 'cumberworld' (Drayton), 'curryfavor,' 'clutchfist' (Middleton), with others which it will be convenient to omit. 'Rakehell,' which used to be spelt 'rakel' or 'rakle' (Chaucer), a good English word, would be only through an error included in this list, although Cowper, when he writes 'rake-hell' ("rake-hell baronet") evidently regarded it as belonging to this group.* Perhaps one of the most frequent causes which leads to the disuse of words is this: in some inexplicable way there comes to be attached something of ludicrous, or coarse, or vulgar to them, out of a feeling of which they are no longer used in earnest serious writing, and at the same time fall out of the discourse of those who desire to speak elegantly. Not indeed that this degradation which overtakes words is in all cases inexplicable. The unheroic character of most men's minds, * The mistake is far earlier: it is clear that at a very early time the sound suggested first this sense, and then this spelling. Thus Stanihurst, Description of Ireland, p. 28; "They are taken for no better than rakehels, or the devil's black guard."-Let me observe before quitting the matter that many languages have groups of words formed upon the same scheme, although, singularly enough, they are altogether absent from the Anglo-Saxon. (J. Grimm, Deutsche Grammatik, vol. ii. p. 976.) The Spaniards have a great many very expressive words of the sort Thus with allusion to the great struggle in which Christian Spain was engaged for so many centuries, a vaunting braggart is a 'matamoras,' a 'slaymoor;' he is a 'matasiete,' a 'slayseven ;' a 'perdonavidas,' a 'sparelives.' Others may be added to these, as 'azotacalles,' 'picapleytos,' 'rompe-esquinas,'' ganapan,' 'cascatreguas.' CAUSES OF DISUSE OF WORDS. 113 with their consequent intolerance of that heroic which they cannot understand, is constantly at work, and not seldom with success, in taking down words of nobleness from their high pitch; and, as the most effectual way of doing this, in casting an air of mock-heroic about them. Thus 'to dub,' a word resting on one of the noblest usages of chivalry, has now something of ludicrous about it; so too has 'doughty;' they belong to that serio-comic, mock-heroic diction, the multiplication of which, as of all parodies on greatness, is a sign of evil augury for a nation, is a present sign of evil augury for our own. เ 'Pate' in the sense of 'head' is now comic or ignoble; it was not so once; as is plain from the fact that it occurs in the Prayer Book Version of the Psalms (Ps. vii. 17.) The same may be said of 'sconce,' in this sense at least; of 'nowl' or 'noll,' which Wiclif uses; of 'slops' for trousers (Marlowe's Lucan); of 'smug,' which once meant no more than adorned (“the smug bridegroom :" Shakespeare.) To nap' in the sense of to slumber lightly is now a word without dignity; while yet in Wiclif's Bible it is said "Lo he schall not nappe, nether slepe that kepeth Israel" (Ps. cxxi. 4.) 'To punch,' 'to thump,' both which, and in serious writing, occur in Spenser, could not now obtain the same use; nor yet 'to wag.' It is not otherwise in regard of phrases. I remember in the great ballad of Chevy Chase, which Sir Philip Sydney declared he could never hear but "it stirred him like a trumpet, a noble warrior whose legs are hewn off, is described as being "in doleful dumps;" just as, in Holland's translation of Livy, the Romans are set forth as being |
