Evening star., 1931-12-19
THIS AND THAT
BY CHARLES E. TRACEWELL.

willingly do without this famous pair:
Mitto, nlissum?
Think Of all the fine words which
come from mitto and missum.
You cannot miss 'em.
Admit, commit, permit, submit, remit,
intermit, surmise, premise, promise, re-
mission, intermission, emission, permis-
sion, commission, admission, missive,
missile, missionary.
Pono, positum-there one has another
great duo. A few of their words are
compose, depose, interpose, oppose, dis
pose, expose, repose, transpose, propose,
| suppose, component, deponent, oppon-
ent, exponent, imposition, composition,
juxtaposition, disposition, proposition,
proposition, postpone, compoSure.
Pono means to lay, put or place. Post
pone, for instance, word which every
one uses almost every day, means to
put after, or off, to delay.
One instance Of the debt we owe to
Greece in the matter of our English"
words will suffice. Every one Of us knows
thermometer, chronometer, diameter,
photometer, hydrometer. The root Is
meter" from the Greek metron, a
measure.
So we get the measure of heat, the
measure of time, the measure Of through
(dia), the measure of light and the
measure Of water.
These instances, for which We are
indebted to Prof. William Swinton's
Word Analysis" published by the Amer
lean Book Co., are sufficient to show
the tremendous debt which we owe to
Latin and Greek. They might be null
tiplied thousands of times.
The interesting thing, it seems to us,
|
selves, although they are extremely so,
but rather the fact that all English
speaking peoples use these words
naturally, without thinking a thing
about them.
One may not know that they come
from Latin. for instance. and yet be
able to use them perfectly, and with
proper understanding OF their con-
notationS. 1t would be sorry thing
indeed, in the use Of a language, if
every speaker and writer were halted
at every word by some professor who
demanded to know the derivation and
the precise meaning of the word used
There is no man who speaks Eng
liSh who does not use the word sin
cere" many times week. If be is given
to writing letters. Sincerely yours"
he signs himsee,; but does he know
just WIlaL Lne WCfQ means!
According to SWinton, 1t comes from
sine. without, and cera, wax, and liter
ally means without wax, as applied to
pure honey. hence its derivative mean
ing Of pure. unadulterated, true.
Try signing your next letter:
Yours without wax" etc.
Every one knows that the word
salary comes from the Latin sal, or
, salt. The salary was the Roman SOL
| dlers allowance of salt. A soldier who
was mot worth his salt" was a poor
fellow, indeed
The derivation which always pleased
us the most is that Of the word
.capricious, meaning tickle, uncertain
IL comes from the Latin capra, a goat
And there you have it, literally spring
ing from one thing to another like the
leaps OF goat. Once you get that
idea into your head, the word capri
clous" will always have bit Of extra
meaning for you, wherever YOU see it
or whenever you hear it.
We have gone a good way from the
plan for basic English of 800 words,
put not as far as it seems. A little
Language OF a few words may meet
special needs, but the old large tongue
OF 100000 words is still glorious Let
us be proud Of our Latin and Greek
heritage, as well as OF our Anglo
I Saxon.