(Kipling, The Rout of the White Hussars.)
The other cashier is of Italian origin. He takes charge of the cash, which formerly meant "counting-house," and earlier still "safe," from Ital. cassa, "a merchant's cashe, or counter" (Florio). This comes from Lat. capsa, a coffer, so that cash is a doublet of case, Fr. caisse. The goldsmith's term chase is for enchase, Fr. enchâsser, "to enchace, or set, in gold, etc." (Cotgrave), from châsse, coffer, shrine, also from Lat. capsa. From the same word comes (window) sash.
Gammon, from Mid. Eng. gamen, now reduced to game, survives as a slang word and also in the compound backgammon. In a gammon of bacon we have the Picard form of Fr. jambon, a ham, an augmentative of jambe, leg. Cotgrave has jambon, "a gammon." Gambit is related, from Ital. gambetto, "a tripping up of one's heels" (Torriano). A game leg is in dialect a gammy leg. This is Old Fr. gambi, "bent, crooked, bowed" (Cotgrave), which is still used in some French dialects in the sense of lame. It comes from the same Celtic root as jambe.
Host, an army, now used only poetically or metaphorically, is from Old Fr. ost, army, Lat. hostis, enemy. The host who receives us is Old Fr. oste (hôte), Lat. hospes, hospit-, guest. These two hosts are, however, ultimately related. It is curious that, while modern Fr. hôte (hospes) means both "host" and "guest," the other host (hostis) is, very far back, a doublet of guest, the ground meaning of both being "stranger." "It is remarkable in what opposite directions the Germans and Romans have developed the meaning of the old hereditary name for 'stranger.' To the Roman the stranger becomes an enemy; among the Germans he enjoys the greatest privileges, a striking confirmation of what Tacitus tells us in his Germania."[112] In a dog kennel we have the Norman form of Fr. chenil, related to chien; but kennel, a gutter—
"Go, hop me over every kennel home."
(Taming of the Shrew, iv. 3.)
is a doublet of channel and canal.
MANŒUVRE—MYSTERY
"Oh villain! thou stolest a cup of sack eighteen years ago, and wert taken with the manner."
(1 Henry IV., ii. 4.)