perhaps, but it was still very palpable, and not only in the vocabulary. Of words of German origin, saurkraut and noodle, as we have seen, had come in during the colonial period, apparently through the so-called Pennsylvania Dutch, i. e., a mixture, much debased, of the German dialects of Switzerland, Suabia and the Palatinate. The new immigrants now contributed pretzel, pumpernickel, hausfrau, lager–beer, pinocle, wienerwurst, dumb (for stupid), frankfurter, bock–beer, schnitzel, leberwurst, blutwurst, rathskeller, schweizer (cheese), delicatessen, hamburger (i.e., steak), kindergarten and katzenjammer.[1] From them, in all probability, there also came two very familiar Americanisms, loafer and bum. The former, according to the Standard Dictionary, is derived from the German laufen; another authority says that it originated in a German mispronounciation of lover, i. e., as lofer.[2] Thornton shows that the word was already in common use in 1835. Bum was originally bummer, and apparently derives from the German bummler.[3] Both words have produced derivatives: loaf (noun), to loaf, corner–loafer, common–loafer, to bum, bum (adj.) and bummery, not to mention on the
- ↑ The majority of these words, it will be noted, relate to eating and drinking. They mirror the profound effect of German immigration upon American drinking habits and the American cuisine. It is a curious fact that loan–words seldom represent the higher aspirations of the creditor nation. French and German have borrowed from English, not words of lofty significance, but such terms as beefsteak, roast–beef, pudding, grog, jockey, tourist, sport, five–o'clock–tea, cocktail and sweepstakes. "The contributions of England to European civilization, as tested by the English words in Continental languages," says L. P. Smith, "are not, generally, of a kind to cause much national self–congratulation." Nor would a German, I daresay, be very proud of the German contributions to American.
- ↑ Vide a paragraph in Notes and Queries, quoted by Thornton, vol. i, p. 248.
- ↑ Thornton offers examples of this form ranging from 1856 to 1885 During the Civil War the word acquired the special meaning of looter. The Southerners thus applied it to Sherman's men. Vide Southern Historical Society Papers, vol. xii, p. 428; Richmond, 1884. Here is a popular rhyme that survived until the early 90's:
Isidor, psht, psht!
Vatch de shtore, psht, psht!
Vhile I ketch de bummer
Vhat shtole de suit of clothes!</poem>Bummel-zug is common German slang for slow train.
