RELATIONS OF COMPARATIVE GRAMMAR 41 



which the relation between present and past is that seen in love, 

 loved, as vice versa the child's think, thunk is due to the unconscious 

 association with drink, drunk, sink, sunk, etc., as dove, strove after 

 drove are not uncommon in place of dived, strived, as we all now 

 say dug for earlier digged, probably after stuck, struck, etc. The 

 historical grammar of any language is replete with examples of 

 such functional analogy or external grammatical leveling. Or, the 

 leveling may be between different inflectional forms of the same 

 word, that is internal grammatical leveling, as when we say hoofs, 

 roofs, instead of hooves, rooves (like calves, halves, shelves'), under the 

 influence of the singular hoof, roof, or as Latin honor beside earlier 

 honos owes its r to honoris, honori, etc., where the intervocalic r 

 for s is due to regular phonetic change. Other changes are due to 

 the association between congeneric words, such as words of rela- 

 tionship, of color, of sound, numerals, etc., as in Homeric mao-i after 

 Trarpao-i, etc., Sanskrit pdtyur (genitive of pdtir, when used in the 

 sense of "husband") after pitur (genitive of pitar-, "father"), etc., 

 late Latin Octember after September, November, English colloquial 

 Febuary for February after January, though in ' this last example 

 the dissimilating influence of the second r has also been a factor 

 (cf. libary for library). Associations of this kind are not only pro- 

 ductive of changes in existing words, but are influential in the 

 creation of new words, and to them is due in large part the growth 

 of significant suffixes. 



The vocabulary of every language is full of contaminations, like 

 Popocrat from Populist and Democrat, like Modern Greek Staravas 

 from Sia/3oAos, "devil," and Saravas, "Satan." Some indeed are con- 

 scious inventions of authors striving for humorous or picturesque 

 effect, like Stockton's whirlicane (whirlwind and hurricane). But 

 most of them are in their origin as naive as the child's begincement, 

 in which beginning and commencement are merged. Current slang 

 is full of examples, as hustle (hasten and bustle, rustle, etc.), swipe 

 (sweep and wipe), stunt (stint and stump). But there are plenty of 

 thoroughly respectable words which have originated in the same 

 way, as German bin, O. H. G. bim, which represents a merging of the 

 two forms seen in English be and am. 



The manifold changes of meaning which words undergo in the 

 course of their history are also mainly due to associative processes. 

 A concept represents a complexity of elements, any one of which 

 may at one time or another be the centre of associations. With the 

 shifting of the dominant element come new associations. When 

 crescent was first applied to the crescent moon, the dominant element 

 was, as the origin of the word shows, the notion of growing, but this 

 was replaced by the notion of shape, forming a new centre of asso- 



