Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 1.djvu/98

Rh 82 ACCENT recurrence of the accents, they are always on the root- syllables. The Norman Conquest, however, introduced a different system, which gradually modified the rigid uniformity of the native English accentuation. The change is visible as early as the end of the 12th century. By the middle of the 14th, that is to say, in the age of Chaucer, it is in full operation. Its origin is thus explained by Mr Marsh, in his Origin and History of the English Language (Lond., 1862) : &quot; The vocabulary of the French language is de rived, to a great extent, from Latin words deprived of their terminal inflections. The French adjectives mortal and fatal are formed from the Latin mortalis and fatalis, by dropping the inflected syllable; the French nouns nation and condition from the Latin accusatives nationem, condi- tionem, by rejecting the em final. In most cases, the last syllable retained in the French derivatives was prosodically long in the Latin original ; and either because it was also accented, or because the slight accent which is perceivable in the French articulation represents temporal length, the stress of the voice was laid on the final syllable of all these words. When we borrowed such words fronl the French we took them with their native accentuation ; and as ac cent is much stronger in English than in French, the final syllable was doubtless more forcibly enunciated in the former than in the latter language.&quot; The new mode of ac centuation soon began to affect even words of pure English origin e.g., in Robert of Gloucester we find falshede instead of falshede, tidinge instead of tidinge, trewehede instead of t? ewehede, gladdore instead of gladdore, fisliche instead of wisliche, &amp;gt;egynnyng instead of ~begynnyng, endyng in stead of endyng. In the Proverbs of Hendyng we have no- tliyng for nothing, liabben for habben, iomon for/onion ; in Robert of Bnmne, halycfom for halydom, clothyng for cloth ing, gretand for yretsnid. Chaucer furnishes numerous in stances of the same foreign influence revolutionising the native accent; fredom for fredom, hethenesse f or he thenesse, worthinesse for worthiness, lowly for lowly, vrynnynge for wynnyngc, weddynge for weddynge, comynge for comynge ; and it is traceable even in Spenser. On the other hand, a contrary tendency must not be overlooked. We see an effort, probably unconscious, to compel words of French origin to submit to the rule of English accentuation. It is noticeable in the century before Chaucer : in Chaucer him self it begins to work strongly ; mortal becomes mortal ; tempest, te?npest; substance, sw&stance ; amyable, amyable; morsel, mo?-sel ; servise, servise ; duchesse, duchesse ; cosyn, cosyn, &c. ; while a multitude of words oscillate between the rival modes of accentuation, now following the French and now the English. Before and during the Elizabethan period, the latter began to prove the stronger, and for the last 300 years it may be said to have, for the most part, Anglicised the accent and the nature of the foreign additions to our vocabulary. Nevertheless, many French words still retain their own accent. Morris (Historical Outlines of English Accidence, p. 75) thus classifies these : &quot;(1.) Nouns in -ade, -icr(-eer), -e, -ee, or -oon, -ine, (-in), as cas cade, crusade , &c. ; cavalier, chandelier, &c. ; gazetteer, pioneer , &c. (in conformity with these we say harpooneer, mountaineer , ) ; legatee, payee , &c. ; balloon, cartoon , &c. ; chagrin, violin , &c. ; routine, marine , &c. &quot;Also the following words: cadet, brunette , gazette , cravat , canal, control , gazelle , amateur , fatigue , antique , police , &c. &quot;(2.) Adjectives (a) from Lat. adj. in us, as august, benign, ro bust, &c. ; (b) in -ose, as morose, verbose , &c. ; (c) -esque, as bur lesque, grotesque, &c. &quot; (3.) Some verbs, as baptize, cajole , caress 1 , carouse , chastise , escape, esteem , &c.&quot; To these may be added the Greek and Latin words which have been introduced into English for scientific and other learned purposes, and which, not having been altered in form, retain their original accentuation as aurora, corona, colossus, idea, hypothesis, caesura, diuresis, diag nosis, diluvium, diploma, efflu vium, dys ium, &amp;lt;fcc. ; besides the still larger number that have suffered a slight modifi cation of form, but no change of accent, as dialectic, diag nostic, efflorescent, elliptic, emer sion, emollient, &c. The Italian contributions to our tongue retain their original accent when the form is untouched, as mulatto, sonata, vol cano, but lose it when the form is shortened, as bandit (It. bandi to). A change in the position of the accent serves a variety of purposes in English. It distinguishes (1.) a noun from a verb, as ac cent, accent ; aug ment, augment ; tor ment, torment ; com ment, comment ; cou sort, consort ; con test, contest ; con trast, contrast ; di gest, digest ; dis count, dis count ; in sult, insult, &c. ; (2.) an adjective from a verb, as ab sent, absent ; fre quent, frequent ; pre sent, present ; com pound, compound, &c. ; (3.) an adjective from a noun, as ex pert, expert ; com pact, compact. It also denotes a difference of meaning, e.g., conjure, conjure ; in cense, incense ; au gust, august ; su piue, supine. Accent has exercised a powerful influence in changing the forms of words. The unaccented syllables in the course of time frequently dropped off. This process was necessarily more rapid and thorough in English than in many other languages which were not subjected to equal strain. The Norman Conquest made havoc of the English tongue for a time. It was expelled from the court, the schools, the church, and the tribunals of justice ; it ceased to be spoken by priests, lawyers, and nobles ; its only guardians were churls, ignorant, illiterate, indifferent to grammar, and careless of diction. Who can wonder if, in circumstances like these, it suffered disastrous eclipse ] The latter part of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle furnishes melancholy evidence of the chaos into which it had fallen, yet out of this chaos it rose again into newness of life, reforming and re-accenting its half-ruined vocabulary, and drawing from the very agent of its destruction the elements of a richer and more plastic expression. For it cannot be doubted that the irregularities now existing in English accent, though perplexing to a foreigner, copiously vary the modulation, and so increase the flexibility and power of the language. The older forms of English, those in use before the Conquest, and down to the period of Chaucer, are stiff, monotonous, and unmusical. A hard strength is in the verse, but no liquid sweetness or nimble grace. Now, it is possible, in spite of our deficiency in vowel endings, to produce the noblest melody in accent words known to the modern world. Almost every kind of metre, swift or slow, airy or majestic, has been successfully attempted since the age of the Canterbury Tales. When we compare the drone of Caeclmou with the aerial melody of the Skylark, the Cloud, and the Arethusa of Shelley, we see what an infinite progress has been made by the development of accent in the rhythm of our native tongue. See Lectures on the English Language, by G. P. Marsli (Lond. 1861) ; the Origin and History of the English Language, &c., by G. P. Marsh (Lond. 1862); Historische Grammatik der Englische Sprache, von. C. Friedrich Koch (1863-69); The English Language, by E. G. Latham (1855); Philological Essays, by the Rev. Richard Garnett (Lond. 1859); On Early English Pronunciation, with especial reference to Shakspere and Chaucer, by A. J. Ellis Lond. 186771) ; Historical Outlines of English Accidence, by Dr R. Morris (Lond. 1872). (j. M. R.) ACCEPTANCE is the act by which a person binds himself to comply with the request contained in a bill of exchange addressed to him by the drawer. In all cases it is understood to be a promise to pay the bill in money, the law not recognising an acceptance in which the promise is