Note 89 — Chapter III · THE LAWS OF SPECIAL SIGNIFICANCE, OR THE CREATION OF ROOTS.
Reading edition
When a boy answers a lady in the words “Yes, ’m,” he is not aware that his “’m” is a fragment of the five syllables mea domina (madonna, madame, madam, ma’am, ’m.) “Letters, like soldiers, being very apt to desert and drop off in a long march.”—Divers. of Purley, pt. i. ch. vi. “Les noms des saints et les noms des baptêmes les plus communs en sont un exemple.”—De Brosses.