Whither goeth 'trod'?

I just finished a biography of H. Rider Haggard (1856-1925), the phenomenally popular Victorian novelist. Never heard of him? He wrote “She,” “King Solomon’s Mine” and “Allan Quartermain.” Before he was 30 he had four best-sellers in print and was the most popular novelist in the English-speaking world. In his autobiography, he mentions that he had two pet toads in his greenhouse (Martha and Jane) and one day he accidentally trod on one (Jane). He said the toad recovered but always regarded him with suspicion and dislike from then on. (Based on that anecdote, I purchased Haggard’s “A Farmer’s Year,” a diary for the year 1898, hoping to learn some more about his domestic affairs.)

My favorite anecdote containing the word trod is by Mark Twain. There was a Memorial Day celebration at a Civil War cemetery. The officiating minister, a Rev. Twichell, gave an interminable speech. It was a hot, sweltering, dusty day and a squad of soldiers was lined up at attention in their wool uniforms. Finally, the ceremony was to conclude with a prayer. According to Twain, “... somebody trod on a dog and the dog let out a howl of anguish that could be heard beyond the frontier. The major said, ‘God damn that dog!’ — and Twichell said, ‘Amen.’”

I first read that story 15 years ago but I can still see perfectly clearly the line of soldiers, the crowd, the preacher and the poor old dog, wandering aimlessly across the cemetery, to its literary destiny.

Of course, “whither” has also been removed from the vehicle of language, but whither is kind of a frilly word - perhaps a little too delicate for the rough and tumble of everyday usage. But trod was a sturdy workhorse; there’s no reason for it to disappear.

There’s another peculiar word, surprisingly related to trod, that strikes my fancy, and that is “inculcate.” Unlike trod, this word is in its full bloom of popularity, at least in certain circles. Inculcate is an academic word. You only hear it on college campuses or in talks about college. It is used sort of as a synonym for “teach,” and in, “We will inculcate our young people with the virtues of study, hard work and dedication.”

But if you look at the word’s etymology - where it came from - you find that the root is the Latin inculcatus, the past participle of inculcare, “to tread on,” which itself come from in + calx, the heel. So the original sense of the word was to grind into the dirt with the heel - a rather forceful method of instruction, you will agree. From now on, whenever you hear the word inculcate (spoken by an officious pedagogue) you will, like me, see a dirt field full of college students, buried up to their necks, with only their heads showing, and a grizzled professor industriously squashing each one into the ground with his heel.

To describe this scene you would have to say that the professor trod on each student in order to inculcate his ideas. No other word would be quite right.

Willis Cook is a retired electrical engineer who was born in New Orleans and grew up in the Mississippi Delta. He lives in Franklin County.