One of the greatest advantages a language can possess, is the power of forming compound words. This materially contributes to its conciseness;—makes it comparatively easy to express much in few words—and thus assists, by concentrating its force, in rendering it vigorous and impressive. This power of compounding is found chiefly in the Teutonic languages of Europe; and is comparatively unknown in the Romance. In our own case, it was considerably modified by the Norman Conquest, which introduced a French (or Latin) element into English. We still, however, possess this power to a considerable extent; and herein we enjoy certain advantages unknown to French or Italian. German, the most cultivated of all the Teutonic languages, has much more of this characteristic; and, in point of closeness and compactness of expression, is superior to English. But there are symptoms of its still further decrease in our language, and it is worthy of observation that the general tendency with us is to give up Saxon compounds, and to substitute for them Latin or French terms. The old word ‘deathsman’ has its present equivalent in ‘executioner;’ ‘mildheartedness’ has become ‘mercy;’ ‘long-suffering,’ ‘patience,’ &c. The verb ‘to gainsay’ still lingers in the language, but its place is now generally taken by ‘to contradict.’ ‘To gainstrive’ is supplanted by ‘to oppose.’ ‘To inspect’ is preferred before ‘to look into;’ and ‘to despise’ is used rather than ‘to look down upon.’

The first English poet who gave prominence to this power of combination was Chapman, who applied it with wonderfully happy effect in his Homer’s Iliad, in translating the compound Greek epithets which so frequently occur in that poem; such as ‘swift-footed;’ ‘ivory-wristed;’ ‘white-armed;’ ‘many-headed;’ ‘rosy-fingered,’ &c. Most of these were afterwards adopted by Pope. There is a tendency in some modern English writers to carry this compounding power to an unwarrantable extent, a practice which should certainly be resisted, as being opposed to the genius of our language, and also giving evidence of aping after Germanic forms, and thus transgressing the proper limits of the language. The late Madame d’Arblay, in her ‘Memoirs of Dr. Burney,’ speaks of the ‘very-handsome,-though-no-longer-in-her-bloom-Mrs. Stevens!’ and this authoress also has the ‘sudden-at-the-moment-though-from-lingering-illness-often-previously-expected-death.’ But this is really too bad. ‘It out-Herods Herod;’ and in these cases is a mere piece of affectation.

The mania at one time for these long-tailed adjectives, was very cleverly ridiculed by the brothers James and Horace Smith, in their ‘Rejected Addresses.’ Here in caricaturing the style of the ‘Morning Post,’ they speak of the ‘not-a-bit-the-less-on-that-account-to-be-universally-execrated-monster-Bonaparte.’ Another of these extraordinary epithets is:—‘That-deeply-to-be-abhorred-and-highly-to-be-blamed-stratagem-the-Gunpowder-Plot!’ But the climax of the caricature is reached in the following. Speaking of Covent-garden market, the writer calls it ‘The-in-general-strewn-with-cabbage-stalks-but-on-Saturday-night-lighted-up-with-lamps-market-of-Covent-garden!!’ But such legitimate compound forms as ‘ill-assorted,’ ‘cloud-capped,’ ‘far-darting,’ &c., are highly valuable, and of great service to the language. It is to be observed that none of these are literally translatable into French. For such an adjective as ‘broken-hearted,’ there is no corresponding equivalent in that language. The only way to express, in French, any approach to the meaning of our word, is to use a ponderous circumlocution, which will require at least three or four terms. The expression is thus enfeebled by being broken up into a number of words, and it loses all the force and vigour of the English. A ‘broken-hearted father’ would be probably expressed in French by ‘un pÈre qui a le coeur brisÉ’—exactly five words for our one. And so of all other compound terms. In fact, French does not lend itself to closeness and compactness of expression; and, in this respect, is far inferior to any of the Teutonic languages.

One peculiarity of the Saxon part of English is its monosyllabic nature. This was chiefly caused by the falling-off of the endings. All our prepositions and conjunctions, beside most of the nouns, verbs, and adjectives in common use, are monosyllables. These form the staple of the English language, and are the chief elements of closeness and brevity of expression. Our legitimate compound words seldom consist of more than two, or at most three, elements. The greater number are made up of monosyllables; as ‘milk-maid,’ ‘oat-meal,’ ‘foot-boy,’ ‘hail-storm,’ &c. In a few cases, they are compounded of three terms, as ‘out-of-doors,’ ‘matter-of-fact,’ ‘out-of-the-way,’ &c.; but these are comparatively rare. There are few, if perhaps any, cases of English words which have more than seven syllables. This seems to be the length of our tether in this respect. Perhaps it is as well that it should be so; for whatever may be said of the use of the compounding principle, as giving closeness and energy of expression, there is no doubt that, when carried to excess, it has a directly contrary effect. When a very large number of elements are fused together into one word, there is naturally a difficulty in getting at the original root and primary meaning of the whole; and the expression becomes cumbrous and unintelligible.

This combining or compounding power is of different degrees in different languages, but in the Mexican language it is carried to an incredible extent. Here, combinations are admitted so easily, that the simplest ideas are buried under a load of accessories. For example, the word for a ‘priest,’ consists of eleven syllables, and is there called ‘notlazomahuizleopixcatatzin,’ which means literally, ‘venerable minister of God, whom I love as my father.’ A still more comprehensive word is ‘amatlacuilolitquitcatlaxtlahuitli,’ which means ‘the reward given to a messenger who brings a hieroglyphical map conveying intelligence.’

This system displays a most curious mechanism, which, by bringing the greatest number of ideas into the smallest possible compass, condenses whole sentences into a single word. Many of our older writers indulged in derivatives and compound words to an extent which the language does not now admit, in consequence of its having lost part of its Saxon character. We still have ‘to undo;’ but to ‘unput’ (for to take away) and to ‘undestroy’ (for to rebuild) were formerly used, and Fuller even employs the verb ‘to ungrayhair,’ in the sense of ‘to pull out gray hairs.’ He writes of a man being ‘ungrayhaired,’ when all his gray hairs were plucked out of his head!