parts must necefsarily occasion the defendants to disderse if they prove successful, these afsailors come to be called scalers, and the operation by which they mounted to the afsault scaling. Thus it happens, that by preserving the original meaning of a word we frequently are enabled to trace the progrefs of ideas, and to point out a natural connexion between things, that when the primary idea is once lost can never be discovered. I am aware of the commonly received etymology of the verb to scale, from the Latin scala; nor shall I enter into an argument with any one who holds that opinion. All that I shall say on that head at present is, that there is no doubt that our learned lexicographer was so fond of Latin, that he has derived many pure Saxon words from the Latin without a cause; and that there is some reason to think this may be among the number. We, no doubt, along with the French and Italians, have borrowed many words from the Latin; but our word ladder is not of that number, though theirs be so. That the French word escalade is evidently derived from their word eschelle will not be denied; and as it coincides in sound with our word scaling, we believe it has the same origin, though it is very evident, that if it be derived from the Latin, it must have been by a very different procefs from that adopted in the French. I am the rather inclined to think, that the English verb to scale is only incidentally connected in sound with the French escalade, and not derived from it; but that the true etymology is as above set forth, from this consideration, that the word would have been undoubtedly applied to Cromwell when he dispersed the parliament; for they would have said he scaled the parliament, though the French phrase of similar import, had we derived that word from the same source, could not be used; for no one would ever think of saying that he dispersed them par escalade. If then English writers, instead of that senseless abhorrence which they discover against every peculiarity in the Scottish dialect (which, in fact, is only old English with a somewhat peculiar pronunciation), would carefully examine its peculiarities, and, while they rejected every word that was unnecessary or superfluous, would adopt and naturalise such words only as were evidently useful and necessary, they would very soon effect a great improvement: and if, together with that, our philologists would study, with much more attention than has been the fashion of late years, the language of the English version of the Bible, they would do still more service to the cause for which I at present contend; for then they would be compelled to avoid that inaccurate use of words so common in our day, which tends to confound all language, and to introduce a chaos of confusion, which must end, if not speedily restrained, in babbling, nonsense, and eternal wrangling. But this is the natural consequence of the general use of a dictionary, in which there are not, perhaps, ten words of the language accurately and properly defined, where they have not been copied from other dictionaries; and this, we have reason to regret, that the vanity of the compiler has so often prevented. "the privation of life by suspending the body of an animal by the neck," to the too numerous list of Anglicisms which owe their existence to that species of refinement whose efsence consists in a retrograde progrefsion. In old times the word hung was only employed to denote hung beef, or other inanimate objects suspended in the air for the purpose of being dried; but when such suspension was for the purpose of" extinguishing life," hanged was universally adopted. Thus the traitors who had conspired against Ahasuerus were "both hanged (not hung) on a tree" (Esther ii. 22); and, again, Ahasuerus tells Esther (ibid. viii. 7), speaking of Haman," and him they have hanged (not hung) upon the gallows." Ahithophel also, when he faw that his counsel was not followed, saddled his afs, and arose, and gat him home to his house, to his city, and put his house in order, and hanged himself." (2 Sam. xvii. 23.) Those persons, therefore, who have been accustomed from their infancy to read the Bible, which chances to be more frequently the case with the natives of the northern than those of the southern parts of this kingdom, are much shocked at the indelicate idea conveyed by this modish transposition of terms. And what good reason, may I ask, can be afsigned for this innovation? When a language has once got two appropriate terms to denote with precision two distinct ideas, is it not a degradation of that language to banish one of them, or use it in a different sense? Thus, if I say, "Jeffrey was hanged, and afterwards hung in chains," can any one object to the propriety of the exprefsion? Do not the words convey two very distinct ideas? the one," the privation of life by means of a well known operation;" the other, "the suspension of a lifeless carcase for a particular purpose:" why then shall we confound these ideas by the more faulty expression, "he was hung, and then hung in chains ?" I should be inclined also to think that the verb to hing (now nearly obsolete), with its preterite hung or hinged, declined through all its tenses, after the same manner as to swing, swung, or swinged, had originally a distinct meaning from the verb to hang, with its preterite hanged, though these two words, from their near similarity of sound as well as sense, have been long confounded, in consequence of that inaccuracy which inattention so often introduces into language; but of this I speak only by conjecture, not having any classical authorities prepared to quote in support of this opinion. But whether this was ever the case in former times, or not, it would certainly be an improvement in our language, both in point of energy and elegance, were we in future to employ the verb to hang in all its tenses in no other sense than that of the privation of life by suspension as above said; employing the verb to hing, with its derivatives, invariably to denote the suspension of inanimate bodies only for any purpose whatever. This would not occasion the introduction of any new word, but merely the replacing of a word that is beginning to grow obsolete to its original rights and legitimate prerogatives. It is in this way that I would wish to see the jus et norma loquendi vigorously supported, and not, by allowing every silly boy to encroach upon these rights, by abandoning or transposing words at one time as ever because they had been once so inconsiderately dropped, though their want was deeply felt. The Linden (Lime) Tree. By the late Sir James Foulis, Bart. The following little poem has been handed' to me as the composition of the late Sir James Foulis, of Colington near Edinburgh, whose virtues were much less known than they deserved to have been. The lines themselves, from the soothing plaintive strain they breathe, exhibit evident proofs of their being his genuine production. It affords me a sensible pleasure to have been accidentally employed as the means of preserving this small memorandum of one to whom, in my younger days, I lay under many obligations, and for whose memory I shall ever entertain the sincerest. respect. ARISE, fair Linden, haste, arise, and spread You grew and flourish'd by my guardian care: J. A. |