Intermarriage between the phones and the graphs or grams is a wedding of equals.  Some families of words, however, are of inferior social standing to other families, and may seek but not hope to be sought in marriage.  Compare the ex’s with the ports.  An ex, as a preposition, belongs to a prolific family but not one of established and unimpeachable dignity.  Hence the ex’s, though they marry right and left, lead the other words to the altar and are never led thither themselves.  Witness exclude, excommunicate, excrescence, excursion, exhale, exit, expel, expunge, expense, extirpate, extract; in no instance does ex fellow its connubial mate—­it invariably precedes.  The ports, on the other hand, are the peers of anybody.  Some of them choose to remain single:  port, porch, portal, portly, porter, portage.  Here and there one marries into another family:  portfolio, portmanteau, portable, port arms.  More often, however, they are wooed than themselves do the pleading:  comport, purport, report, disport, transport, passport, deportment, importance, opportunity, importunate, inopportune, insupportable.  From our knowledge of the two families, therefore, we should surmise that if any marriage is to take place between them; an ex must be the suitor.  The surmise would be sound.  There is such a term as export, but not as portex.

Now it is oftentimes possible to do business with a man without knowing whether he is a man or a bridal couple.  And so with a word.  But the knowledge of his domestic state and circumstances will not come amiss, and it may prove invaluable.  You may find that you can handle him to best advantage through a sagacious use of the influence of his wife.

EXERCISE — Marriage

1.  For each word in the lists of EXERCISE — Dictionary and Activity 1 for EXERCISE — Past, determine (a) whether it is single or married; (b) if it is married, whether the wedding is one between equals.

2.  Make a list of the married words in the first three paragraphs of the selection from Burke (Appendix 2).  For each of these words determine the exact nature and extent of the dowry brought by each of the contracting parties to the wedding.

Prying Into a Word’s Relationships

Hitherto in our study of verbal relationships we have usually started with the family.  Having strayed (as by good luck) into an assembly of kinsmen, we have observed the common strain and the general characteristics, and have then “placed” the individual with reference to these.  But we do not normally meet words, any more than we meet men, in the domestic circle.  We meet them and greet them hastily as they hurry through the tasks of the day, with no other associates about them than such as chance or momentary need may dictate.  If we are to see anything of their family life, it must be through effort we ourselves put forth.  We must be inquisitive about their conjugal and blood relationships.