were familiar to all antiquity? There cannot be a doubt that
'aurum', 'oro', 'or', made themselves felt in the shapes which the word
assumed in the languages of the West, and that here we have the
explanation of the change in the first syllable, as in the low Latin
'aurantium', 'orangia', and in the French 'orange', which has given us
our own.

It is foreign words, or words adopted from foreign languages, as might
beforehand be expected, which are especially subjected to such
transformations as these. The soul which the word once had in its own
language, having, for as many as do not know that language, departed
from it, or at least not being now any more to be recognized by such as
employ the word, these are not satisfied till they have put another soul
into it, and it has thus become alive to them again. Thus--to take first
one or two very familiar instances, but which serve as well as any other
to illustrate my position--the Bellerophon becomes for our sailors the
'Billy Ruffian', for what can they know of the Greek mythology, or of
the slayer of Chimaera? an iron steamer, the Hirondelle, now or lately
plying on the Tyne, is the 'Iron Devil'. '_Contre_ danse', or dance in
which the parties stand _face to face_ with one another, and which ought
to have appeared in English as '_counter_ dance', does become '_country_
dance'{266}, as though it were the dance of the country folk and rural
districts, as distinguished from the quadrille and waltz and more
artificial dances of the town{267}. A well known rose, the "rose _des
quatre saisons_", or of the four seasons, becomes on the lips of some of
our gardeners, the "rose of the _quarter sessions_", though here it is
probable that the eye has misled, rather than the ear. 'Dent de lion',
(it is spelt 'dentdelyon' in our early writers) becomes 'dandylion',
"_chaude_ melee", or an affray in _hot_ blood, "_chance_-medley"{268},
'causey' (chaussee) becomes 'causeway'{269}, 'rachitis' 'rickets'{270},
and in French 'mandragora' 'main de gloire'{271}.

{Sidenote: '_Necromancy_'}

'Necromancy' is another word which, if not now, yet for a long period
was erroneously spelt, and indeed assumed a different shape, under the
influence of an erroneous derivation; which, curiously enough, even now
that it has been dismissed, has left behind it the marks of its
presence, in our common phrase, "the _Black_ Art". I need hardly remind
you that 'necromancy' is a Greek word, which signifies, acc