No doubt in some cases an imitation of the cry of some
bird or wild beast would suggest the name that should be attached to
it; occasionally the sound of an operation such as grinding may have
influenced the choice of the letters g, r, as the root of many words
that denote a grinding, grating, grasping, crushing action; but I
understand that the number of words due to direct imitation is
comparatively few in number, and that they have been mainly coined
as the result of connections so far-fetched and fanciful as to
amount practically to no connection at all. Once chosen, however,
they were adhered to for a considerable time among the dwellers in
any given place, so as to become acknowledged as the vulgar tongue,
and raise readily in the mind of the inhabitants of that place the
ideas with which they had been artificially associated.
As regards our being able to think and reason without words, the
Duke of Argyll has put the matter as soundly as I have yet seen it
stated. "It seems to me," he wrote, "quite certain that we can and
do constantly think of things without thinking of any sound or word
as designating them.
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