writers. Commodity is found signifying advantage; and as proportion, or due observance of measure, time, or opportunity leads to convenience, so does a regard to convenience conduce to advantage; but advantage is only interest or profit, and profit is by commodities, the sources of gain.

Commodity as convenience.

"Travellers turn out of the highway, drawn either by the commodity of a footpath, or the delicacy or the freshness of the fields."-B. Jonson. Commodity as advantage.

"They know that howsoever men may seek their own commodity, yet if this were done with injury unto others it was not to be suffered.→→→ Hooker.

Commodity as wares.

"Of money in the commerce of mankind the principal use is that of saving the commutation of more bulky commodities.-Arbuthnot, "On Coins."

Ule, as in globule, from the Latin globulus, a small globe or ball. The termination ale (in Latin both ulus and ula) is found in particule (Lat. particula) shortened into particle. Animalcule, a little animal, is formed by analogy rather than authority, inasmuch as the only connected diminutive in Latin is animula from anima, there being no diminutive from animal.

Ure, from the Latin ura; e. g., tinctura (a colour), tincture. It is found also in verdure (Lat. viridis, green), immediately from the French; and in tenure from the word tenura, belonging to feudal or mediæval Latin.

Ute, from the Latin participial ending utus, as acutus (acu, Lat. a needle), sharpened, acute.

Ward appears in the German warts, as in vorwärts, forwards; and the Latin versus, towards. It forms many compounds, traces which of are found in the Anglo-Saxon, as thider-weard, thitherward; ham-ward, homeward. In the use of toward the to and the ward were sometimes separted by the interposition of the noun under regimen, as in 1 Thes. i. 8.

"Your faith to God-ward is spread abroad."

Wise, from the Anglo-Saxon wise, manner, is used in both Anglo-Saxon and English as a suffix; e. g., rightwis, righteous, formerly rightwise; unrightwis, unrighteous. Wise, denoting manner, is found in the Bible.

"Now the birth of Jesus Christ was on this wise." (Matt. i. 18.) "If thou afilict them in any wise." (Exod. xxii. 2.)

Webster, in his dictionary, under wise, states that wise is corrupted into ways, as in lengthways. This position may be questioned. Way, signifying manner, is good English. Why then may we not say lengthways? The s is merely a terminating consonant for the voice to rest on, as in always. Good writers use longways no less than longwise. Sideways is more common than sidewise. For always, algates; and for otherwise, othergates (which are the same as our always and otherways; gates being from the German gehen, to go;

and gasse, a street or way), are not uncommon in the north of England.

Ï, a Saxon termination, in adjectives representing ig, as myrig, merry; wässerig, watery; and in nouns representing for the Latin ia, as victoria, victory; for the Greek also ia, as geometria, geometry. See the terminations ance and ce. In such words as yclept, that is, called; yclad, that is, clothed; the y is a softened sound of the German ge, which is prefixed to the past participles as geboren, born.

"But come, thou goddess, fair and free,
In heaven yclep'd Euphrosyne,
And by men, heart-easing mirth."

ENGLISH SUFFIXES.

Milton.

It is of little consequence in general whether the suffixes ascribed to the French be ascribed to it or to the Latin, whence they originally come. If the eight French suffixes are added to the 28 Latin ones, then the Latin suffixes are nearly equal to those of Saxon origin. Adding all the foreign suffixes together we fird they amount to 43, and so out-number our native or Saxon suffixes.

UNCOMBINED SUFFIXES.

THE suffixes of which we have spoken enter into the structure of the words with which they are severally connected. Thus the ment in amendment forms an essential part of the term. If ment is sundered from amend, the word amendment ceases to exist; and instead of a noun, there arises a verb, the verb to amend.

Other words are appended to roots without entering into union with them. For instance, we say cast down and cast up. Here down and up form no part of cast. Cut off down and up, and cast remains the same. Yet down and up modify the meaning of cast, and they modify it in a very important way. And down and up come after cast. In some sort, then, they are suffixes. They perform the part of suffixes in regard to meaning, and they differ from suffixes chiefly in not combining with the root as do the suffixes already considered. Hence they appear to be uncombined suffixes. Putting the two together, I may designate suffixes, properly so called, combined suffixes, and those that do not enter into the composition of words, uncombined suffixes.

The uncombined suffixes down and up are adverbs. Adverbs form one class of uncombined suffixes. Another class consists of prepositions; for instance, we say, I speak to, and I speak of. Here to and of are prepositions. These uncombined suffixes, you see, very materially modify the meaning of the verb to speak. Consequently; the right employment of prepositions as suffixes is a matter of great consequence.

If you carefully follow me in what immediately ensues, you will see reason to believe that the English is a very flexible and a very rich language, and that it owes these qualities largely to the existence in a free and uncompounded state of many of its words. Let me explain what I mean by "a free and uncompounded state." Suppose that fall and down had coalesced into one word: thus, to falldown; then falldown would be a compound, and neither fall nor down would be free, being absorbed in the new term. Indeed we have in the shape of a noun this very compound, only the terms are inverted as in downfall. Now down and fall, thus combining, you cannot modify fall by using other prefixes; you cannot, for instance, say outfall. But with down, as an uncombined prefix, you can say fall out equally well with fall down; and as you can say fall out, so can you also say fall in. Indeed the power of expression thus acquired is almost endless. The greater is the pity that some writers, ignorant of the treasures of the Saxon element of our language, and misled by false views of elegance, should have given preference to Latinisms, and frowned on the idiomatic diction h ensues from the employment of our uncombined suffixes.

He went

"Away there! lower the mizen yard on deck,"
He calls, and "brace the foremost yards aback.

Abaft, on the aft or hind part.
"Let all hands go abaft.-Anon.

Aboard, on board ship.

Falconer, "Shipwreck,"

"Resolv'd, he said; and rigg'd with speedy care,
A vessel strong, and well equipp'd for war;
The secret ship with chosen men he stor'd,
And bent to die or conquer went aboard."

The facility of combination afforded by those uncombined suffixes may be exemplified in this verb went."

Here are forty-one different acceptations of the word went. In no other language known to me is this multiplying power exceeded, if, indeed, it is equalled, even in the German; while in most languages, as in Latin, in French, and in Spanish, the facility of combination is very much less.

So familiar, however, are Englishmen with the import and the application of the uncombined adverbs, that I have no need to go through them in detail. It may be more useful to give two or three instances of the way in which they modify the verb to which they are subjoined.