To trace language through all its varieties of declination, conjugation, &c., would far exceed our fitting limits. Some two or three questions of leading moment can alone be considered, and we may justly give a precedence to the doctrine of diminutives on various grounds. They play an important part in the formation of verbs, subatantives, and adjectives alike; once formed, they are apt to usurp the place of the primitive, and so cause the utter disappearance of that primitive ; and by a natural consequence, when thus acting the part of primitives, they suggest occasion for the formation of new diminutives. Nay, this process is sometimes repeated again and again ; and wo mnay even venture to say that a large per-contage of language is made up of ditninutival elements. As examples, of diminutives wholly supplanting primitives we many quote the Italian fratello and awe/lo, the only terms in that language for brother and sister ; the French so/r/ and ALI/lean ; the English. teeas-cl (Scotch ware), stocking (Shakapero stock, an "With a linen stock on ono leg, and a kersey boot-hose on the other." ' Paining of the Shrew,' iii. 2), wander, and learn ; the German ad, ferket, and schenkel ; the Latin °cubs and spargere ; the Greek barreaos and KetpaAn—in all which cases we must pass over into cognate languages, or starch for obsolete forms, before wo find evidence of the simple words from which they have been deduced. Another inconvenience arises from the variety of form which even the same suffix takes, variety the less surprising, because the affix being often of no practical value is for that reason more carelessly pronounced. Iu our Lido European stock the diminutival suffixes may perhaps be reduced to two original elements, cl, and something like tech or orb. But the ti, as regards its consonant, easily slips into cr on the one hand, in or eat on the other ; and by an easy change of the vowel the Latin employs id, and in or im, rather than et or en ; while the Greek seems often to give a preference to an a, as in torraxe, KIJCI1207. The element est, or ach is, however, the more fertile suffix, and its varieties are all but endless. In the Gaelic (and wo purposely quote from one of the lan guages which have preserved more readily the guttural varieties we find an abundance of forms, such as curer h, "a wicker-boat," or " coracle ;" beach, bee ; " camag, curl; " while the English, especially if we include in our view Lowland Scotch, supply a list far exceeding the meagre limits of those quoted by Grimm. We have room only for hillock, bullock, charlock, fistock, haddock, hassock, hillock, larerock, peacock or polloek, tussock. The Scotch again gives us the clearest evidence of the tendency in this suffix to modify alike its consonant and vowel Thus, the word haddock has in some localities given way to haddow, and elsewhere to both Icaddick and haddie ; anu the last of these suffixes, happening to have met with a general pre ference in the parts about Edinburgh, that is, in the domain of letters, has, as might have been expected, secured a great preponderance to such forma as lassie, laddie, or, as we now write them in the south, lassy, teddy. The Slavic and Gaelic itself may also be called, to show how readily a final guttural vanishes. Thus, batach, little boat," pocach," a little pocket," have batach-an, pkach-an, in the plural, but only bate, pace, in the singular. The old Slavic, again, has a number of words ending like wpax, " dust," /Aux, " leathern-bag," soCvx, " skin ; " but in the later languages, Servian for example, the guttural has been rubbed off, and left us ,r pa, issue, noce (where we employ the Greek character as more readily intelligible to English readers); so also we our selves have done well to prefer way, hay, honey, to weg , tag, hold g , of the German. The classical languages have also the same suffix, as, for example, PoaaE, " a dwarf rose," xu9c4, " a small stone," anaAal, " a mole, walaat, " a youth," apat, "a shrew-mouse" (over 60 might be given); in Latin, I imax, but commonly with a variety of vowel, as pode.r, silex, eulex, puler, cimex, apex, carex,sorex (35); radix, salix, jinx, fulix, larix, varix, streix (25). In or r.
s,/, crux, and f ugea;the to has been preferred ; and compression has destroyed all trace of the vowel in arx, cube, falx, lame, merx, as it has also done in our own lark (lavcrock), park (Anglo Saxon parrue). The list is already tolerably large, but over and above the quotations just given from the third declension, we must also claim the great mass of the other or vowel declensions. We have already seen how a final guttural was lost in some northern languages, so in Latin, the adjectives rosac-eus, viola c-eus, tcslaceus (24), compared with lapid-ects, tell us that rosa, viola, and testa, have suffered a similar curtailment ; aprug-nua tells us the same for apero (nom. aper), murtac-eus, hordeac-cus, sebac-eus (21). I-epic-hat,
tribunic-ius, &c., for murtus, hordeum, sebum, repent, tribunals. Ensic taus, can ic-ula, retic-cclum,- genue-ulum (aft. genic-idum), tnetfic-ul-osus (aft. meticulosus), corn ic-ulum ; dice-ul a, rec-ula, severally claim a final guttural for the nouns whose nominatives are ensi-s, can i-s, ?We, gene, Mete-8, corn's, die-s, re-s.
But as the aspirated guttural among ourselves has often passed into a labial, as witness, laugh, rough, cough, so we find our diminutive in fl-isfi; and with loss of the vowel, call, half, turf (Scotch, toor or tare), ultar-f (Fr. gore), wolf (from gul," yellow") ; and a lip letter once let in, slips into other labials as scallop (shell), and with loss of vowel sharp (shear), war-p, whel-p. Again, bes-om, boa-ore, bottom, and with loss of vowel, (fell), cal-rn (coal), (Germ. qua). Nay, by a step further in advance, the 74 slips into an n, and so brings us to diminutives, which might well have been claimed for our pre ceding suffix el (corrupted to en), but that the historical examination decides against the claim. Thus the German bus-en, bes-en,bod-eu have in the n a substitute for an m, which grew out of a final aspirated guttural; and the m of the Latin second declension of neuters has a like origin. Hence apium, Ilium, lead to apiac-us, Iliac-us. So again, a primeval var-afsh may he assumed as the origin of our brake, " fern," and of the old German var-am, which has since passed into farren and fern, the last all but identical with our own fern ; and this assumed var-agh stands well beside the Latin fit-k- (nom. Nix). The assumption of a primeval pod-ugh, in like manner would explain the existing forms weva-as-, pod-cc-, pot-am (old bodes, and our own bott-em, as well as the Latin fund-a- (nom. fundas). W is another form of the final consonant, as proved by skrog, skruff, shrew, or shrew, all existing varieties of what the Greeks called Oat, the Romans sore.
But at times, a t also supplants the guttural of our suffix ; but this change was probably brought about at first by special causes. When tho base to which the suffix is added, already possessed a guttural, the pronunciation became not only unpleasant to the ear, but somewhat difficult to the producing organs. Under these circumstances, the guttural is apt to give way, at one time to a p, and at another to a 1. We have already seen examples of the supplanting labial in scallop. So the Greeks from csaA- " dig," formed a name atraA-ace-, not cruaA-ax-, or ." the mole," and the Latin from a base ac, " sharp," and a secondary form fore (fuses), gives ua not ac-cx, but ap-ex, not fore-ex, but forceps, forpex, or forfex. In this way, what were once in actual use, as em mock, or immock, gemliek, gabbock, „u+n nsock-, are now found only in the forms, cm met, gimlet, gobbet, mammet. We cannot then hesitate, even though the historical proof be wanting, to claim as deduced from a suffix ock, the words apig-ot, clot-, crick-et, lock-et, pock-et (poke, Shaksp.), smick-et (smock); and a suffix et once established, the condition of its origin is forgotten, and we have cyot, blot, mallet, fillet, tippet, mart (verruca), silt.
But as was above said, one diminutival suffix was not enough, and not only are they added one after the other, but often, at any rate in later days, two at a time. Thus from the verb /cam, "leap," the Gad forms leum-ach-an, or kunt-n-ach, frog." The German Own, and our own kin, are justly regarded as corruptions of ich-en. and ik-in„ and therefdre twofold in origin. Thus the German nainnclon, stands for miinn-ich-cn„ our mani-ki-n. The Latin again has the very same double suffix in ferul-agon- ole-a yin-eua, im-agon-, vor-agon- ; and the Greek in The auffix ling is in like manner made up of el and ing (the last. being a variety of an or en), and let, of c/ and et ; but in both cases, the two elements have coalesced so completely, that for the creation of a new usminutive, they must be bodily attached as one suffix. The word wostixv-n, just quoted, has, when strictly examined, no less than three suffixes of diminutival power ; but even this is not enough to content the passion. A Scotehman will talk of "sic a bonnie, 1-ilt-le wee bit lass-ick-ie," where the notion is expressed eight times ; and a German amasses five diminutival suffixes in a single word, when from the monosyllabic ass he deduces es-el-in-ch-il-in.