Page:The Sources of Standard English.djvu/284

Rh essaying to account for the origin of oar Standard English. The Danish settlers of 870 gave fresh life-blood to our race; their pith and manliness have had, I suspect, a far greater share in furthering England's greatness than is commonly acknowledged. Much do we owe to the Scandinavian cross in our breed. They could not, it is true, keep their Kings upon the English throne; but their Norse words by slow degrees made their way into every corner of the land: we have seen how under King John many of the terms, employed by this pushing and enterprising race, took root in distant counties like Worcestershire and Dorset, where there never was a Danish settlement. Often has a Danish word become confused with an Old English word, as in the case of the verbs beita and beatan: often has a Danish word altogether driven out an Old English word, closely akin to Sanscrit. Thus the Scandinavian draumr (som&shy;nium), corrupted into dream in Suffolk, has altogether made an end of the older sweven; and the former word has moreover become confounded with the English dream, which of old meant nothing but sonitus or cantus: the sense of these Latin words has long vanished from dream as we now employ it.

It may often be remarked that one form of a great speech drives another form before it. Thus, in our own day, the High German is always encroaching on its Northern neighbour the Low German; and the Low German, in its turn, is always encroaching upon its Northern neighbour the Scandinavian. Something of the like kind might have been seen in England six hun&shy;dred years ago; but with us the Dano-Anglian speech