SYLVA CRITXCA CANADENSIiyM, %^ 



like the place called M/Mai, at Athens, stagnant water. See on V.^ 

 2, 8. Varro, L.L., T., § 43-44 : ' Olim palndibus mons (Aventinus) 

 erat ab reliquis disclusiis, itaque ex urbe advehebantur ratibus, qnoius 

 vestigia, quod ea,qua turn vehebantur, etiam nunc dicitvtr Telabrum.' — 

 ' Yelabrum a v^ehendo. Yelaturain facere etiam nunc dicuntur, qui 

 id mercede faciunt.' " 



There seems to be no doubt, from the above and similar passages 

 (e. g., Ovid, F., VI., 505), that the Velabnim was originally a marshy- 

 spot. It has occurred to me that a more satisfactory derivation than 

 either of those given above, would be to suppose it connected, by the 

 medium of the digamma, with the Greek ?/lo?, " a marsh ;" and if, 

 as philologists suppose, the Latin vallis is of cognate origin with i^o<;, 

 this example would greatly add to the probability of the derivation 

 which I propose. With regard to the termination of Velahrum, 

 possibly, as in volutabrum, it is a mere suffix ', possibly, as in eandela- 

 hrwm, the termination, brum, retains the meaning of the root BEAR 

 (found in fipu),fero, &c.), " bear," with which it is generally supposed 

 to be connected. In this case, Velahrum would be, "The ferry of 

 the marsh ;" and the old derivation from veho would not be so far 

 wrong after all. 



15. Luscinia. This word is variously derived in the Lexica ; 



(1) luscus and cano, "the bird singing at night." 



(2) lux and cano, " the bird siaging at dawn." 



(3) Xvu) and cano, " the liquid songstress." 



Of these derivations the first is commonly rejected, on the ground 

 that luscus and cano would properly signify "the one-eyed songstress;" 

 the second, because the bird does not sing merely at daybreak but 

 all the night long, and frequently in the daytime too. 



With regard to the third, which has been received with more 

 favour, I would object that, in almost every passage where the night- 

 ingale is mentioned by the ancients, it is not the sweetness but the 

 sadness of her song which appears to have impressed them. Why 

 did this bird redouble her plaints dui-ing the niglit, when other birds 

 of song were still and silent 1 The myth of Philomela, Procne, and 

 Tereus (Ovid, Metam. YI. 424 foil.) furnished an answer to this 

 question. Everywhere the nightingale, whether called Procne, Philo- 

 mela, or drjdwv, is used as a symbol of ceaseless mourning. Sophocles 

 speaks of her as the frantic mourner, whose unending plaint of " Itys 

 ever Itys," best accords with the melancholy fancy of the forlorn 



