By the REV. THOMAS GRIFFIN,
_Of Prescot Street_
“A collection will be made after the service for the support of the
Evening Lecture, which was commenced at the beginning of the present
year, and will be continued every Sunday evening, to which the
inhabitants of Wild-street, and its vicinity, are earnestly solicited
to attend.
“_Service commences at half-past six o’clock._”
_Etymology of the Seasons._
_To the Editor of the Every-Day Book._
Mr Editor,
I am, no doubt, with many others, obliged by the information contained
in your _Every-Day Book_, especially in giving the etymology and origin
of things of old and present practices.
But being a dabbler in etymology myself, I was disappointed in finding
none for the present season of the year, autumn; and as many of our
names of places were, no doubt, given by our Saxon ancestors, we in the
north retain more of that language, and consequently more familiar with
the names of places than you in England.
Perhaps there is not one hundred persons in Langbourn ward know any
meaning to the two words by which the ward is called; but to any child
in Scotland the words are significant.
Will you then allow me to give you my etymology of the seasons?
Spring makes itself familiar to almost every one; but summer, or as we
would say in Scotland, means an addition, or “sum-more,” or “some-mere;”
viz. if a person was not satisfied with his portion of victuals, he
would say “I want sum-mere.”
And does not this correspond with the season, which in all the plants
and fruits of the field and garden, is getting “sum-mere” every day,
until the months of August and September, when according to the order
and appointment of the great Lawgiver, they are brought to perfection,
and gathered in?
Then comes the present season, autumn, or as we would in the north say,
“ae-tum,” or “all-empty,” which is the present state of the gardens,
trees, and fields; they are “ae-tum.”
The last season brings with it its own name by its _effects_,
“wind-tere.”
If these observations will add any thing to your fund of information, it
will not diminish that of
Your humble servant,