Stories That Words Tell Us

added to a language; for just as grown-up people use more words than children, and educated people use more words than uneducated or less educated people, so, too, nations use more words as time

it up, and it passes into general use, w

have made new words which their readers have seen to be very good, and have then begun to use themselves. Sometimes these great writ

now enough of the language which was in use at that time to say so. One famous phrase of Chaucer is often quoted now: "after the schole of Stratford-atte-Bowe," which he used in describing the French spoken by one of the Canterbury Pilgrims i

ally French words; while Wyclif, the first great English prose writer, who translated part of the Bible from Latin into English, must also have given

er used. The word elfin, which became quite a common word, seems to have been invented by Spenser. He called a boasting knight by the name Braggadocio, and we still use the word braggadocio for vain boasting. A common expression which we often find used in romantic tales, and especially in the novels of Sir Walter Scott, derring-do, mea

eariment, drowsihead, are hardly seen outside his poetry. One reason for this is that Spenser was telling stories of

others more elaborate, but all of them so suitable that they have become a part of the language. Such a common word as bump, which it would be difficult to imagine ourselves without, is first found in Shakespeare's writings. Hurry, which

, of course, by people who do not know where they first came from. We can only mention a few of these phrases, such as "a Daniel come to judgment," which Shylock says to Portia in the "Merchant of Venice," and which is often used now sarcastically. From the same play comes the expression "pound of flesh," which is now often used to mean what a person knows to be due to him and is determined to have

hich he turned his phrases is often imitated. It was Shakespeare who used the phrase to "out-Herod Herod," and n

ide one's diminished head," "a dim religious light," "the light fantastic toe." It was Milton who invented the name pandemonium for the home of the devils, and now people regularly speak of a state of horrible noise and disorder as "a pandemonium." Many of those who use the expression have not the slightest idea of where it cam

writer, but his works are only read by a few, not like the great works of Shakespeare and Milton. Yet Sir Thomas Browne has given many new words to the English language. This is partly bec

ery few people liked them. These words never really became part of the English language. They are "one-man" words, to be found only in the

medical, literary, and electricity were first used by him. He made many others too, n

f words. Most of his new words were made from foreign words, and as he was much interested in art and music, many of his words relate to these things. It was Evel

w scientific words to the English language. The words pendulum and intens

and Pope gave us

Johnson was a man who always said just what he thought, and had no patience with anything like stupidity. The expression fiddlededee, another way of telling a person that he i

ur commonest words relating to politics. Colonial, colonization, electioneering, dipl

egan to have an enthusiasm for all sorts of old and adventurous things, and a new love for nature and beauty. Sir Walter Scott was the great novelist of the movement, and also wrote some fine, stirring ballads

s now always the meaning of courtesy and gentleness towards the weak, but before Sir Walter Scott used it it had not this meaning at all. Scott also revived words like raid and foray,

re critical of almost everything and everybody, and he seemed to love rather ugly words, which made the faults he described seem contemptible or ridiculous. It was he who made the words croakery, dry-as-dust,

day are the people who talk a new slang (and of these we shall see something in another chapter), and the

hn Masefield used the word waps and the phrase bee-loud, which is very expressive, but which we cannot imagine passing into ordinary speech. Two poets of the Rom

them that some of them have become quite common. This writer generally made these curious words out of two others. The word galumph (which is now put as an ordinary word in English dictionaries) he made out of gallop and triumph. It means "to go gallopin

he time of Henry VIII. wrote his famous book, "Utopia," to describe a country in which everything was done as it should be. Utopia (which means "Nowhere," More making the word out of

ity Fair was, of course, one of the places of temptation through which Christian had to pass on his way to the Heavenly City in John Bunyan's famous book, the "Pilgrim's Progress." Another of these places was the Slough of Despond, which is now quite

e's Man Friday, meaning a right-hand man or general helper; but the original Man Friday was, of cours

rather foolish things, and the adjective quixotic now describes this sort of action. A quite different character, the Jew in Shakespeare's play, "The Merchant of Venice," has given us th

e one who is very quick at finding out things. Sherlock Holm

ter when the names of persons or places in his boo