SCIENTIFIC NAMES—PRONUNCIATION. 269 
be in the direction in which opinion now seems to be tending, viz., that, 
when we borrow the words of a foreign nation, we must borrow the 
pronunciation too, however unlike that may be to our own. This is done 
to some extent already, and if we once adopt the principle we shall have 
no tenable ground left for refusing to apply it to the classical tongues. I 
will proceed to indicate the chief points in the “ old” pronunciation of 
Latin. Besides giving a number of the ordinary rules, I have also 
endeavoured to investigate the truth about some cases in which I believe 
the common practice or belief to be faulty. 
One most important point to.be remembered is that every vowel must 
be pronounced ; there areno silent vowels—thus, vulgare has three syllables, 
Cardamine and Trichomanes four each. The final syllables of such words 
have the sound of the final syllables of the words duty and duties. It is 
sometimes indicated in books by accenting the letter, thus é or 2 or (less 
properly) é. Another point is that each of the vowels can be either long 
or short; thisis called its “quantity,” and is marked in all the dictionaries, 
in every case where it is required, by the signs ~ for long and ” for short. 
The usual sounds of the vowels are given in the following pairs of words :— 
Ban, bane; mét, méte; pin, pine; con, cdne; tun, tine; cyst, cyme. 
It is a general rule that one vowel immediately preceding another 
is short; in this case the quantity need not be marked. Thus Gladiolus 
will be found marked as given; the i is short by position, as it is called, 
before the 0, and the word if fully marked would appear as Gladiolus. 
From this rule we must except all cases where the vowel preceding 
represents either of the Greek long vowels @ and 6, or diphthongs, which 
are necessarily long. So the o in Polyzéa is long, and the i in Conium, 
(Gr. koneion, “‘hemiock,”) as also in many other words in -iwm, which 
custom, however, seems to permit us to pronounce short. 
When it is said that all vowels must be pronounced separately, of 
course the case of two vowels forming a diphthong is excepted. The 
chief diphthongs occurring in true Latin words are these five :—2, o, 
(both pronounced like e in méte,) au, ei, and eu, (pronounced as in laud, 
height, and Europe ;) in Greek there are the additional ones a and ou, 
represented by the first two of the above five, (with afew exceptions, as 
in dioicus and Aira,) and ov represented by u. (See “‘ Midland Naturalist,” 
Vol. I., p. 152.) Consequently, whenever in words formed from true 
classical sources we have any two vowels coming together which are not 
among the above-mentioned five, we may generally conclude that they 
do not form a diphthong, and must be pronounced separately. For 
example, Hézoén, Aizoén, Hypecoiim, bromoides, each of which consists 
of four syllables; aizoides, conoidetis, pyrenaicum, each five; and 
hiéracioides, seven. Sometimes, even the five combinations first men- 
tioned are not diphthongs, especially when they come at the end of a word— 
as Hippophaé, Hierochloé, Isoétes, Silaiis, Nereis, Rhetim, Heracletim, 
graminetis, &c. It should be noticed that wu, standing between s, q, or g, 
and a vowel, is pronounced like win English; thus swecicus begins like 
sweet, and so with Suseda, Quercus, Lingua, &c. 
The consonants, in the old style, are pronounced almost exactly ag 
in English, even to the extent of giving ti, si, and ci, in such words as 
