=indigo.= This word has a very interesting history. It means
"Indian." The celebrated dark-blue dye came from India. This dye
was first known to the Greeks who called it "Indikon," then to
the Latins who called it Indicum, then to the Italians and
Spaniards who called it Indigo. It was introduced into England
from Italy by artists and painters who kept the Italian word
"indigo" without change.
=genie.= There is a Latin word "genius," meaning originally a spirit
inhabiting a special place. It is from this word that our English
common noun "genius" is taken, meaning a specially gifted or
inspired person, e.g. "a man of genius." But in the Arabian Nights
a completely different Arabic word is found, viz. "jinn" with its
feminine form "jinni." This was written in English "genie" and was
confused with the word "genius." The plural of genie when used in
this sense is genii, which is really the plural of the Latin word
genius.
=macadamised.= This is quite a modern word in English. It comes from
the name of the inventor of this kind of road-paving, who was Mr.
J. L. Macadam. He discovered that different layers of small stone
rolled in, one after the other, can stand the wear and tear of
traffic. We have similar words from proper names. Compare,
_boycott_, _burke_, _lynch_, etc.
=allude.= From the Latin "ludere," to play. Compare _prelude_,
_interlude_, _delude_, _collusion_, _elude_, _elusive_,
_allusion_.
=guava.= This word came into English from the Spanish. It is of great
interest to trace the names of the fruits in English back to
their sources, e.g. _currant_, comes from Corinth; _mango_ from
the Portuguese _manga_ (from the Tamil "mankay" _fruit-tree_);
_orange_ from the Arabic "narang" and Hindustani "narangi";
_apricot_ from Arabic al-burquq; _date_ from the Greek "daktulos,"
meaning "finger."
=alphabet.= The two first letters in the Greek language are called
"alpha" and "beta." Then the whole series of letters was named an
alphabeta or alphabet.
=consonants.= From the Latin "sonare," meaning to sound. Consonants
are letters which "sound with" the vowels. Compare _dissonant_,
_assonance_, _sonant_, _sonorous_, _sonata_.
=canal.= This is one example of a word taken into English from the
Latin, through the French, having a companion word in English. The
companion word in this case is _channel_. Compare _cavalry_ and
_chivalry_, _legal_ and _loyal_, _guard_ and _ward_.
=dumbfounded.= This word has come into the English language from
common speech. It is a mixture of the English word dumb, and the
Latin "fundere," "to pour" which we find in _confound_,
_profound_, _confusion_. It is not often that we get such hybrid
words in earlier English, though to-day they are becoming common
in the case of new words such as _motorcar_, _speedometer_,
_airplane_, _waterplane_, _automobile_, etc. The old rule used to
be that a compound word in English should have _both_ its parts
from the same language (e.g. both parts Latin, or Greek, or Saxon,
etc.). But this rule is rapidly breaking down in common practice
as new words rush into the English language to express all the new
discoveries of science. We have English and Greek roots mixed
(such as _airplane_), and Latin and Greek roots mixed (such as
_oleograph_).