" AVIATION."
[To TRH EDITOR OP TEE "SPECTATOR."] STE,,—I hope it is not too late for me to express my con- currence in your protest against this barbarism (Spectator, August 28th, p. 295). I can hardly conceive a more unlucky etymological. ambiguity than this attempt to express an essentially modern idea in an ancient language. It is true that avis is Latin for a " bird " ; but there is no verb aviare or aviari, meaning "to fly," and consequently there is no authority for the verbal noun atriatio = "flying," and aviator = "a flyer." • But that is not all. There is a Latin word drills, which means "astray "; and although there is no verb derived from via = "way," there is a verbal noun viator—" a way- farer." By all analogy therefore "aviation" should mean "losing one's way," and " aviator " "one who is straying." By a curious coincidence, I learn from a recent daily paper that Mr. Cody proposes to have his route from London to Manchester marked oat by numbered placards in the fields at intervals of half-a-mile. Does the enterprising aeronaut, then, expect to be an "aviator " in the strictly etymological sense P
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