, 1880-09-17
PUGET SOUND ARGUS.
STUDIES IN ENGLISH.
ARTICLE III.
ANALOGOUS WORD PAIRS,

ot when it appears that not only may
two distinct ideas be embodied in a
single adjustment of letters, but
that these two ideas may be antsgo
nistic, e. &, the Anglo Saxon "clev-
gan" gives 'cleave,' while the Anglo
Saxon 'cligan' gives 'cleave,' the for
mer meaning TO part asunder, whIle
the latter means to unite, hold fast.
Take now the verbal nouns from
each and we have 'cleavers,' the
butchers ns for separating bone and
meat; also .clesvers, . plant, called
catch. weed, whose characteristic is
TO cling to whateverit touches, The
two uses are fillus,rased, lst by the
Scripture: "Abhor that which is
evil, 'cleave' to that which is good"
I'd. "Or if on joyful wing, 'cleay'
ing the sky Sun, moon and stars
forgot, upward E.Ay.p The same
fact OF contrariety holds in the word
'let.' Should you trace it to one
Anglo Saxon stem the meaning is,
to permit, while another Aug. Sax.
root gives the word the.reverse idea,
TO impede by obstacles. Ex. Exc
dus s. 2S. "Pharaoh said, Il will
let you co." Exodus 5. 4. Where
fore do ye let the people from their
burdens. Another curious coinci
dence Of a,phabetic form is that class
of verbs whose past tense forms a
new verb present with entire change
of signi6cation, e. g. find, found to
lightupon, meet, while found, found.
ed to establish, institute; speak,
spoke to srticulate sounds, while
spoke, 'spoked,' to set in spokes.
A third division Of word pairs
which have a mutual identity Of let
ters and sounds, yet difference oil
Specification, consists of simple and
compounds, the latter having set
marks Of distinction which are al.
ways printed. Ex. cant jest,
can't inability. But the aposlro.
phe here 40 more denotes oompo.
nent parts, some Of which disappear
from the unity, than when the com
mon possessive case is formed from
the nominative. Hence, in this class
are such c)uple,s as visitors and
visitors, in which you cannot dis
tinguish by sound between plural
nominative and possessive singular.
This not only admits large class Of
word pairs but ii indicates the man.
nsr 10 which compounds come into
use, q. &. states man, from hich it
Is but a step to statesman, and the
meaning is not triaed with, though
The latter is broader In its scope. "A
certain class of words compound
with hyphen, 9. g. poor laws,
worthless enactments, being either
inefficient or unjust; while poor.
laws legislation concerning poor
people. Again, certain compounds
never get beyond the use of both
the apostrophe and the byphen, e. g.
'lady's slipper and 'lady's slipper
also dogs ears and dogs ears
Here the resemblance between the
word pairs is one Of resemblance or
comparison, given flower looking
80 much like iady's slipper that it
receives the same name, and ruffied
leaves Of q book worn at the corners
are iikened no the ears OF q dog.
Word pairs Of GLASS . are distin.
guishable to the heaser only by the
context, like wise also by the context
to the reader, except those under
she last division which distinguish
simple and compound by the hyphen.
CLASS III.
Here are found those dual forms
which have the same orthography
and meaning while each has differ
ent pronunciation. The difference
in pronunciation distinguishes the
parts Of speech usually.
Division lst. Accent is here
called into requisition concerning
which Sheridan said: at is The verv