600 Proceedings of the Royal Society 
nervus is supposed to be the same as snare, which is a word for a 
string. 
The Greek makes use of the initial combination sm, which the 
Latin rejects; but the Greek is not constant to that combination 
of letters, and the s is often dropped, so that we have <rfwcpos and 
/ uKpos , oyxapaySos and /xapaySos. The word /mSiaw does not show 
any initial or, but it may be conjectured that the a was once there, 
and has been dropped. The prosody and form of Venus’s epithet 
cf)i\ofjL/uLeL8ys would be well explained by considering it as a corrup- 
tion of ^Aocr/xetS^s. If we adopt this view, we then establish an 
affinity between the Greek /xeiSiaw and the English smile, which is 
further supported by the well-known tendency of the Greek 8 to 
become an l. 
In those words in other languages which have an initial s and 
a consonant, the s is often dropped in Latin, while the rest of 
the word is retained. We see examples of this in comparing 
Greek and Latin words. Thus we have the Greek o-^aAAco be- 
coming in Latin fallo; cr^oyyos becoming fungus ; and or^v8ovr], 
funcla. The Greek cn-eyco and oreyos seem to be identical with 
tego and tectum , and in other languages the s seems also to be 
lost, as in the Gaelic teach, the English thatch, and the German 
decken. 
In some cases we find an initial s in the Teutonic languages, 
where it is wanting in Latin and Greek. Thus the Latin taurus 
and the corresponding Greek ravpos seem to be represented by the 
Teutonic word steer, of which a diminutive is stirk. The Greek 
KtLpa) appears in English in the form of shear, an s being prefixed, 
and the other consonant thereby softened. This root in the 
Teutonic languages is very productive, there being many forms of 
it connected with the process of cutting or dividing, as shear, 
share, ploughshare, scar, score, sharp, &c. Probably, also, short 
comes from this source, and fully represents the Latin curtus with 
a sibilant prefixed. The Latin caveo seems to have a cognate in 
an Anglo-Saxon word scevian, from which come our common 
words of shy and shun, for the Latin caveo has completely the 
idea of shunning or being shy of an object. “ Hunc tu Eomane 
caveto.” The Latin carus with careo may possibly be connected 
with the English scarce, for the radical idea in carus is that of 
