graphs was shewn at the time (by Archdeacon Hare, in the Philological Museum, i. 689, fol.) to be entirely without foundation. In the passage of which I speak Sir W. Jones's couplet on the employment of time is called "a wretched conceit," on the strength of a misprint, which is corrected in the errata of the work from which the lines were taken (Lord Teignmouth's Life of Jones), and that not without reason, as appears from the original transcript, printed in the Philological Museum. In Mr. Croker's new edition, in one volume (p. 837, note), we read, "Robert Barclay, esq. of Bury Hill, near Dorking, from whom Mr. Markland derived these memoranda in 1843, died in 1831, at an advanced age." If there be not a misprint, we must, I presume, understand these words to mean, "from whom, through his representatives," or something of the kind. The writer of the article "Anicia Gens," in Smith's Dictionary of Biography, &c. has fallen into the error which a correspondent of the Gent. Mag. pointed out (I think in 1838) in Gibbon, chap. xxxi. (where Mr. Milman has not, I believe, supplied any correction in his last edition). The article runs, " Persons of the name of Anicius are mentioned first in the beginning of the 2nd cent. B. c." Now an Anicius was Cur. Ed. B.c. 304. (Plin. H. N. xxxiii. 6. See Arn. Ilist. Rom. chap. xxxii. vol. 11. p. 295, 1st. ed.)* A line in Tennyson's Princess, p. 13, She to me Was proxy-wedded with a bootless calf, &c. has been found (as I know from actual experience of the fact, and not from conjecture) obscure by some who may not lately have read of the custom alluded to. Perhaps a brief extract from Hall's Chronicle may instruct one or two, and can scarcely offend any, of your readers. "Maximilian, kynge of Romaynes, being without a wife, before this tyme, made suite to Fraunces duke of Briteyne, to have in mariage the lady Annehys daughter, to the which request the duke gentely con *A few other inaccuracies in the Dictionary I noticed some time ago in the Classical Museum, in a letter signed E.B. An ingenious friend of mine construed the two last words" idle parchment." discended. And one whiche by proxie wooed for him, too the entent that the lady should performe that she promised on her faith and honour, he used a new in vencion and tricke, after this maner : when the lady did take her chamber, the night in the bride bed, in the presence of diverse after the affiaunce, she was layed naked noble matrones and prynces called thether as witnesses. The procuratour or deputie for the husbande whiche represented his person was layde in the place of her husbande, and put one of his legges into the bed up to the hard knee, in the sight and compaigny of many noble personages, as who said that the virgin had been carnally knowen, and so the matrimony perfighte and consummate, and they two as man and wyfe. But this fonde new founde ceremony was little regarded and lesse estemed of hym that only studyed and watched how to surrept and steale this turtle out of her mewe and lodgynge.". Hall, Hen. VII. Sixth yere, at the begin. ning. Yours, &c. J. E. B. MAYOR. MR. URBAN, AS papers on etymological subjects frequently appear in your pages, it is probable that many of your readers will take an interest in the question whether the phonetic spelling reform, proposed by Messrs. Pitman and Ellis, which is now exciting so much attention, is likely to be injurious, as many persons say it will be, to the science of etymology. This idea indeed rests on so high authority that it can be no matter of surprise that it has been so generally entertained. Bishop Thirlwall says, "However great an advantage I might consider it for a language that its orthography and pronunciation should coincide, it would not at all follow that I thought it either practicable or desirable, where orthography and pronunciation differ so widely as they do in English, that they should be made to coincide;" and further states his opinion, " that phonetic writing and printing would tend to obscure etymology, and to produce a confusion much more inconvenient than any consequences of the present Another writer still more system." strongly advances the same opinion, and asserts that "among the many inconveniences as well as difliculties that would attend the bringing the new letters and orthography into use would be this, that "all our etymologies would be lost, and, consequently, we could not ascertain the meaning of many common words." In considering these accusations against phonetic spelling I must observe, that, as they are mere assertions, unaccompanied by any proof whatever, to endeavour to rebut them is the difficult task of attempting to prove a negative instead of the comparatively easy one of replying to an argument. This task has, however, been undertaken by Mr. A. I. Ellis, B. A. in his "Plea for Phonetic Spelling," and all I propose to do in this letter is to place before your readers the heads of his arguments with a very few supplementary remarks of my own. Should these not appear satisfactory, they will find the subject more fully treated in Mr. Ellis's work, together with replies to all other objections that have hitherto been urged against the proposed reform. It may seem almost superfluous to say anything in answer to the assertion that, if etymology were lost, "we could not ascertain the meaning of many common words;" and the more so as it can be shown most satisfactorily that such a loss would not result from the introduction of phonetic spelling: but as I would not appear to avoid any part of the discussion, a few words may not be thrown away on this subject. The following remarks of Dr. Franklin are quite decisive, and though I would never quote authority as a substitute for argument, yet no one can think that an argument can lose any weight from being advanced by a high authority. "Words in the course of time change their meanings as well as their spellings and pronunciations, and we do not look to etymology for their present meanings. If I should call a man a knave and a villain, he would hardly be satisfied with my telling him that one of these words originally signified a lad or a servant, and the other an under ploughman. It is by their present usage only that the *Letter from Miss S. to Dr. Franklin. See his Works. London, 1806, vol. ii. p. 361. + London, 1848, published by F. Pitman, Phonetic Depôt. meaning of words is to be determined." Works, vol. ii. p. 363. I should only fill up uselessly your valuable space were I to add more to this. Every one knows that the words which Franklin adduces as illustrations are not solitary instances, but only two out of many hundreds. This, I think, will scarcely be disputed by any one after a moment's reflection. It remains to show that our present spelling is no sure guide to etymology, and that if it were, the information it contains could not be lost even if it were possible to abolish at once the Johnsonian orthography, and replace it by a phonetic system. It will be more convenient to take these propositions in an inverse order. Let us assume first that our orthography is a complete and certain guide to the etymology of every word in the language. A single copy of Johnson's Dictionary contains, on this supposition, a compendious statement of etymological science. But would the establishment of phonetic spelling annihilate at once every existing copy of that work (not to mention all other works printed in the present spelling)? Most surely not; but it is quite certain, still retaining the same hypothesis, that if the etymology of every word be so exhibited by its present spelling, it is only accessible to those who have the key to it in a very thorough acquaintance with the languages from which ours is derived, namely, Greek, Latin, Anglo-Saxon, Norman French, and Modern French, not to mention those which have contributed to it in a lesser degree; and how few are these persons! Would it not be much better to explain these etymologies in a work which would be more generally understood, than to put every person who has occasion to write for any purpose to the trouble of recording them again and again, without either instruction to himself or benefit to science? But it may be said that our orthography does not supply this full information on etymologies, but only certain valuable hints : this is only bringing forward a part of the objection, which has just been refuted as a whole. These hints, if they be all that is known on the subject, would be as well, and if only a part would be better, recorded in an etymological essay or dictionary, than in the spelling book. But is our present spelling so sure a guide to etymology? Are even the hints that it affords to be depended upon with absolute certainty? Certainly not, if it can be shown that there are numerous exceptions in which the spelling is calculated only to mislead. Mr. Ellis observes, "In writing island with an s there is an evident allusion to the Latin insula, through isle or ile. It would have shown much more wisdom in the person who first chose this spelling if he had adopted the orthography ighland, as the word is pure Anglo-Saxon, where it is writ ten ealand, ealond, igland, iglond, meaning water-land, a most intelligible derivation. Another learned Theban,' whose mind was bent upon his own Boeotia, treated us to the magnificent orthography rhyme, with a clear reference to the companion word rhythm, which is undoubtedly of Greek origin. Our independent Milton, it is true, persisted in writing rime, and with much more reason, for the AngloSaxon is rim which means a number. 'He lisped in numbers, for the numbers came.' But without wearying the reader's patience with such like mistakes, we would ask how the present spelling indicates the proper etymology in both cur-few and ker-chief (couvre-feu, couvre-chef); in both bow and bough (boga in both cases); in con-vey, in-veigh, veh-icle, (con-veh-ere, in-veh-ere, vehiculus); at-torn-ey, tourn-ey, turn, (atourn-'s, old French, tourn-oi, tourn-er,) and so on? It would lead us too far, in a popular work like the present, to enter into particulars which could only interest the professed philologist. Enough has been adduced to show that in a great number of instances the true etymologies are not only not exhibited by the hetéric* spelling, but a false one is pointed out." (Plea for Phonetic Spelling, pp. 92, 93). We have now seen that our so-called orthography is no sure guide to etymology, that even if it were, or so far as it is of use to etymologists, there is no reason to fear that the information it contains would be lost in conse Hetéric spelling, the other as distinguished from Phonetic, a term adopted to avoid circumlocution. quence of a change; and that as etymology itself is no certain guide to the meanings of words, there is no advantage in exhibiting it in the mode of writing to be adopted for ordinary purposes; nor is there any probability that under any change "the meaning of many common words" would be more difficult to ascertain than at present. But there is one more light in which I would place the subject. The favourers of the reform assert that a great positive advantage to the science of etymology would be obtained by spelling phonetically. spelling phonetically. I shall again quote from Mr. Ellis's book. "The Englishman who studies the etymology of his own language, and knows the pronunciation of each word, may indeed be considered as in the position of the foreign etymologist who has access to the old spelling, and is furnished with the new. The former may help in some instances to guide (though it will in many only misguide); but it is on the latter alone that his deductions can be based. For what is a language? A collection of significant sounds. sounds are known and exhibited, their Until, then, these etymological changes cannot even begical investigation. Without phonetic come the subject of serious etymoloof the sounds of a language, etymospelling, or an equivalent knowledge logy is impossible, and for this reason, we cannot trace the history of a word until we know what that word is, and we cannot tell what the word is, until we know its sound-for words are sounds and nothing more,—or its equivalent phonetic representation. Thus if we write laugh, we have not the slightest idea, from studying the hetéric alphabet, of the sound which this word assumes. If we are told that the gh is preserved because of the original guttural in the Anglo-Saxon hlihan or the guttural is still to be pronounced, hlihhan, we may be led to imagine that or at least to be simply omitted, as in some other cases; but who would have any idea of its being replaced by f? a real etymological fact of much importance, certainly as necessary to be indicated as the change of the AngloSaxon vowel from i to ah (which we may presume to be indicated by the spelling au), or as the omission of the guttural or whisper (h) before the l. In advancing arguments against phonetic spelling on etymological grounds, sufficient attention does not seem to have been paid to the fact that our present spellings are not the relies of words as they existed in the languages from which we derived them, but are registers only of the derivations which Dr. Johnson or others supposed them to have had-are the records not of facts but of opinions. On the other hand, Hetéricism obscures the most important facts of all, namely, what the words which are the subject of etymology really are, and is apt to lead etymologists to forget that it is their business to trace back, not our spelling but our language to its origin, not our words as symbolized by dead signs, but our living spoken words; and if it does this it degrades etymology from an important branch of Ethnological science to a mere matter of curious speculation or literary amusement. Yours, &c. R. C. N. RETROSPECTIVE REVIEW. Anthologia Oxoniensis. Decerpsit Gulielmus Linwood, M.A. Ædis Christi [The present article has been forwarded to us by a Correspondent, who gives a brief review of most of the writers of Modern Latin Poetry. To some of these we have already recently directed our readers' attention.*] THE composition of Latin verse is acknowledged to prove an agreeable mode of habituating the mind to thinking, and certainly may be deemed an advantageous method to pursue for the formation of a literary taste. Without entering into an enumeration of its collateral advantages and disadvantages, it doubtless affords a refreshing recreation from graver studies, and even possesses no contemptible tendency to soothe the vexations of human life. Ovid, during his dreary banishment, felt the consolatory power of the muse. Ergo, quòd vivo, durisque laboribus obsto, Nec me sollicita tædia lucis habent, Tu requies curæ, tu medicina mali.-Trist. 1. iv. el. 10. At the revival of letters scholars emulated each other in their imitations of the better Latin poets. The Italians, especially the scholars of the sixteenth century, from a rather close resemblance of the Latin and Italian languages, succeeded beyond others as a nation in the cultivation of the Latin muse. The See reviews of Gruter's Collection of the Modern Latin Poets of Germany in June, 1846, and January, 1847 of those of France in April, May, and June, 1847; of Italy in May, 1847; of Belgium, Dec. 1847, and March, 1848; of the Latin Poems of Bishop Pearson in Feb. 1848; of those of Dr. Duport in May, 1848. French also, from a similar cause, have exhibited successful efforts in the same field of learning and taste. The German, Dutch, and English languages breathe a native Gothicism difficult to break through, unless to those who had been early accustomed to the fairest models, and tutored by elegant instructors. The leading geniuses of the different European nations who have won for themselves evergreen laurels in the garden of Latin poesy may perfunctorily be mentioned for the information of the less-experienced student. Amongst the Italians we have for elegy and hendecasyllables the polished M. Antonius Flaminius, and M. Molsa. For Virgilians we have Vida, Fracastorius, Sannazarius, and Peter Bembo. A collection of the illustrious modern Latin poets of Italy was published at Florence 1719-22, in nine volumes, large duodecimo. The Germans may justly boast of their great Ovidian Latin poet, Petrus Lotichius, and their elegant Ferdinand Furstenburgh. The Dutch have Hoschius and Joannes Secundus, and the two Heinsiuses; and the Flemish have Wallius; and the Poles have Casimir. At home we have the two Scottish poets, the exquisitely classical Buchanan, and the elegiac poet Arthur Jonston. The French have Commire, scrupulously formed on a truly classical model, Rapin, Sautel, Santeuil, Polignac, Le Jay, and Vanière, the author of the Prædium Rusticum, and to whom we owe the useful Gradus ad Parnassum. For our own country, we may cite the continuation of Lucan by May, and the fine translation of Milton's Paradise Lost by Dobson. We decline in this place bringing forward many minor British productions. Almost every scholar is acquainted with the charming poems of Vincent Bourne, in whose compositions every expression, with few exceptions, is classical, appropriate, and unostentatious, emanating from a rare sensibility of what is in harmony with good taste. We may add to our minor Latin poets, but of superior power, Milton, Cowley, Addison, Jortin, Thomas Warton, Dr. William King, Bishop the classical master of Merchant-Taylors' School, Anstey, Holdsworth, Theodore Bathurst the translator of Spenser's Shepherd's Calendar, Sir William Jones, who, had he devoted his genius to Latin poetry, would have attained the summit of his art; see his "Carminum Liber," hexametrical translation, from Firdoosee, the Persian Homer, and his Elegiacs. Mr. Landor's Latin poems we have not yet perused. Although the contributors to the "Anthologia Oxoniensis" cannot, in our judgment, take their seats in the conclave of modern Latin poets on the same bench with the Fracastoriuses, the Vidas, and the M. Flaminiuses, we cheerfully award them a wavy palm of poetic elegance and superior scholarship. The learned editor and culler of the present poetical bouquet, "penè indignabundus," these are his words, rejects the supposition that the present volume made its appearance in emulation of the "Arundines Cami." We suppose, at any rate, that pleasing publication suggested this. We remark, by the way, that the editor has inadvertently admitted into his preface the phrase "minutiis incumbamus;" it should be "in minutias," &c. The contributors to this volume consist of nineteen at least. Out of these we think very high praise due to the verses of the Reverend George Booth, the Marquess Wellesley, Mr. G. Smith, Lord Grenville, Mr. Bode, Mr. Lonsdale, Mr. Holden, and to some others. Mr. Booth, of the living poets, is a superior hand. In him we find perspicuity and elegance of phrase, and a fine sense of what is beautiful. Much the same may be predicated of the Marquess Wellesley, and of Lord Grenville. Mr. Booth's translations from Moore are, upon the whole, of the first order. His version of the stanza "I do not think, where'er thou art," "Quæ loca cunque tenes," pp. 18, 19, is a proof of his fine powers in this kind of poetical imitation. His original Latin poems, as they are here brought forward, are not equal to his translations. So true is it, that a mind may exercise most felicitously the art of a translator, but fail, more or less, in original composition, through deficiency of rich inventive power, combined with a thoroughly chastened judgment. Mr. G. Smith, a much younger man, of great promise, displays classical elegance in the pieces inserted in this collection, and we doubt not that time and practice will still further mature Mr. Smith's poetical excellences, and raise him to a very high place among the |