126 CALIFORNIA ACADEMY OF SCIENCES. [Proc. 3D Ser. 



but those great mountains of words massed one upon the 

 other — a single word often translatable only by a long, in- 

 volved sentence — are no more to be compared artistically 

 with the Greek compounds than the hundred -handed 

 Vishnu is to be compared with the Hermes of Praxiteles. 



30 In forming New Latin compounds of Greek elements 

 there are, just as in the case of Latin compounds, two 

 possibilities: (1) that the word formed will be a noun; 

 (2) that the word formed will be an adjective. Which it 

 will be depends entirely upon the will (and, perhaps, the 

 skill) of the coiner. The rules in either case might be 

 formulated thus: 



I. Nouns. 



3 1 1. We may find the Greek compound already borrowed 

 entire or manufactured by the Romans and take it just 

 as it stands in the Latin lexica. [Most words of that kind 

 available for generic names in Zoology or Botany have 

 already been found and used.] 



3 2 2. We may take the compound as it exists in Greek and 

 simply transliterate it into Latin letters. 1 



33 1 The accepted transliteration of the Greek letters into Latin is as follows: 



(p rh; pp rrh) 



a 



a 



'P 



b 



7 



g 



8 



d 



e 



e 



K 



z 



V 



e 



e 



th 



1 



1 



K 



c 



\ 



1 



h- 



m 



V 



n 



e 



X 











TT 



P 



P 



r ( 



a 



s 



T 



t 



V 



y 



$ 



P h 



X 



ch 



•yjr 



ps 



(0 







The rough breathing ' is represented by h, the smooth breathing ' is taken 

 for granted and not represented in Latin. Final -09 and -ov, of the second 

 declension, are represented by -us and -um. But final -<«? is, of course, ren- 

 dered by Latin -os. This distinction is an obvious one, and yet the error of 

 transliterating -<«? by -us is one into which even the best may fall. For in- 

 stance, Dr. Gill, in his address before the American Association for the Ad- 

 vancement of Science ("Science, "Vol. IV, p. 587), protests against the rule as 



