312 



[April 5, 



but we, in our ignorance, have retained the h in doubt, in spite of the fact 

 that we do not dare to sound it. The rackers of our orthografy, no doubt, 

 trusted, and with some reason, to the popular ignorance of the older and 

 truer spelling, and the event has justified their expectation ; for we have 

 continued to insert the h in doubt and debt (properly dout and det) to the 

 present day, and there is, doubtless, a large majority among us who 

 believe such spellings to be correct. So easy is it for writers to be mis- 

 led by paying too great a regard to Latin spelling, and so few there are 

 who are likely to take the trouble of ascertaining all the historical facts. 



" Most curious of all is the fate of the word fault. In Old French and 

 Middle English it isalways/aMie/ but the sixteenth century turned it into 

 French fauUe, English fault, by the insertion of I. For all that, the 

 I often remained mute, so that even as late as the time of Pope it was still 

 mute for him, as is shown by his riming it with ought ('Eloisa to Abe- 

 lard,' 185 ; 'Essay on Man,' i, 69), with tliought ('Essay on Criticism,* 

 422 ; 'Moral Essays,' Ep. ii, 73), and viiWitaugM ('Moral Essays,' Ep. ii, 

 312). But the persistent presentation of the letter I to the eye has prevailed 

 at last, and we now invariably sound it in English, whilst in French it has 

 become faute once more. The object, no doubt, was to inform us that the 

 French faute is ultimatelj' derived from Latin fallere ; but this does not 

 seem so far beyond the scope of human intelligence that so much pains 

 need have been taken to record the discovery. Another curious falsifica- 

 tion is that of the Middle English mtailles, Old French mtailles, from 

 Latin mctualia. The not very difficult discovery of the etymology of this 

 word was hailed with such delight that it was at once transformed into 

 French victailles and English victuals. (See Cotgrave.) For all that, the 

 Middle English mtailles was duly shortened, in the pronunciation, to 

 vittles, precisely as Middle English batailles was shortened to battles ; and 

 viitles it still remains forall practiciil purposes. Swift, in his 'Polite Con- 

 versation,' has dared to spell it so ; and our comic writers are glad to do 

 the same. 



"The form of the word advance records a ludicrous error in etymology. 

 The older form was avarice, in which the prefix a- is derived from the 

 French a which arose from the Latin ab. Unfortunately it was supposed 

 to represent the French a which arose from the Latin ad, and this Latin 

 ad was actuallj-^ introduced into the written form, after which the d came 

 to be sounded. If, then, the prefix ad- in ad-vance can be said to repre- 

 sent anything, it must be taken to represent a Latin prefix abd-f It would 

 be an endless task to make a list of all the similar vagaries of the Tudor 

 remodelers of our spelling, who were doubtless proud of their work and 

 convinced that they were displaying great erudition. Yet their method 

 was extremely incomplete, as it was wholly inconsistent with itself. After 

 reducing the word tollerate to tolerate, they ought to have altered follie to 

 folie, as the latter is the French form ; but this they never did. They 

 should likewise have altered matter to mater, since there is only one t 

 in the Latin materia; but this they never did. They had got hold of a 



