[194] Ölmusa or Almusa is the Greek Ἐλεημοσύνη, the German Almosen, and the English Alms (Cleasby).
[195] He died November 2, 1872.
[196] The author is aware that a student who reads Greek and Latin, Italian, Spanish, Portugese, French, German, and English, will find almost all the Talmud, certainly all the valuable parts, in translation at the library of the British Museum. But, unhappily, British Museums do not exist everywhere. Till the constitutional days of Italy the five Jewish Synagogues at Rome were not allowed to own copies of this vast repertory of Hebrew lore.
[197] If English, as appears likely, is to become the cosmopolitan language of commerce, it will have to borrow from Chinese as much monosyllable and as little inflection as possible. The Japanese have already commenced the systematic process of “pidgeoning,” which for centuries has been used on the West African Coast, in Jamaica, and, in fact, throughout tropical England, Hindostan alone excepted.
[198] The dialects vary so much that we can hardly speak of modern Greek. The only approach to it is the bastard, half-classical jargon, almost confined to the professors and the λογιώτατοι of the capital and chief towns. Worse still, all the Romaic grammars and dictionaries are devoted to teaching a tongue which no illiterate person speaks, ever spoke, or ever, it is to be hoped, will speak. Except by actual travel it is hardly possible to learn the charmingly naïve dialects of the peasantry.
[199] The two cathedrals of Catholic days were burnt: their successors were humble buildings; that of Skálholt was a wooden barn; the building at Hólar was, like the Viðey church, of stone, a rare thing outside Reykjavik.
[200] Bishop Pètursson (299-305) supplies a “Specification” of all the priesthoods and their revenues in the island.
[201] Gullbringu is the Sýsla which contains Reykjavik; but the cathedral town is, of course, under a separate jurisdiction.
[202] Bóndi (of old, Búandi and Bóandi), plur. Buéndr or Bóendr (Germ. Bauer, Eng. Hus-band) included all the owners of landed property and householders (Bú), from the petty freeholder to the franklin, especially the class represented by our yeomen and the “statesmen” of Cumberland and Westmoreland. It is still opposed in Iceland to the “klerkar” (clergy), to the knights, to the barons (Hersir-or Lendir-menn), and to the royal officers (hirð). In more despotic Norway and Denmark, “bóndi” became a word of contempt for the lower classes; and in modern Danish, Bönder means plebs, a boor. Bú, from að búa, to build, to inhabit, is the household and stores, opposed to Bær, the house (Cleasby).
[203] In 1873, no less than 4385 “livings” in the Church of England were under £200 per annum: of these, 1211 were under £100; 1596 ranged between £100 and £150; and 1578 from £150 to £200. Measures have lately been taken to abate this scandal, which pays less for the “cure of souls” than for the care of stables.