Page:Stories from Tagore (IA storiesfromtagor00tago).pdf/213

Rh number of words are coming into use in English now from the East. One of the most curious recent ones is Blighty which is a corruption of wilayati, bilaiti. For words introduced into English compare karma, sanyasi, fakir, brahmin, ghat, puggaree, pyjama, pucca, curry, chutney, chintz, cummerbund, khaki, rupee, durrie, turban, sepoy.

doll. This is a shortened form of the English girl’s name Dorothy, Dolly, Doll. Compare poll-parrot from Polly or Poll.

soup. This word still retains its French form, without the final “e” (French soupe), but the English words sup, supper have dropped their French spelling altogether.

ticket. From the Old French “ estiquette,” meaning something fixed like a bill on the wall. (Compare the English word to “stick” which comes from the same root.) We have here a case of a French word branching off into two quite distinct English words, — "etiquette" and “ticket,” each having its own meaning.

jersey. One of the islands in the English Channel called Jersey first made this special form of woollen vest. Many English words are thus taken from the names of places. Compare currant (Corinth), argosy (Ragusa), calico (Calicut), bronze (Brundusium), gipsy (Egyptian), cashmere (Kashmir).

'impertinence. Originally this word means that which is not “pertinent,” and so something “out-of-place.” Later on it got the present meaning of something insolent.

mosquito. From the Spanish. The word is the diminutive of the Latin “musca,” a fly.

scruple. From the Latin “ scrupulus,” a small sharp stone. This word meant first in English a very small weight of twenty grains; then it came to mean a slight weight on the mind or conscience. In the Trial Scene of Shakespeare’s Merchant of Venice we have the original