the Tullys, the Livys, to appear, even to us at this distance, as stars of the first magnitude in the vast fields of ether?”—­Burgh’s Dignity, Vol. i, p. 131.  This doctrine, adopted from some of our older grammars, I was myself, at one period, inclined to countenance; (see Institutes of English Grammar, p. 33, at the bottom;) but further observation having led me to suspect, there is more authority for changing the y than for retaining it, I shall by-and-by exhibit some examples of this change, and leave the reader to take his choice of the two forms, or principles.

OBS. 6.—­The vowel a, at the end of a word, (except in the questionable term huzza, or when silent, as in guinea,) has always its Italian or middle sound, as heard in the interjection aha! a sound which readily unites with that of s flat, and which ought, in deliberate speech, to be carefully preserved in plurals from this ending:  as, Canada, the Canadas; cupola, cupolas; comma, commas; anathema, anathemas.  To pronounce the final a flat, as Africay for Africa, is a mark of vulgar ignorance.

OBS. 7.—­The vowel e at the end of a word, is generally silent; and, even when otherwise, it remains single in plurals from this ending; the es, whenever the e is vocal, being sounded eez, or like the word ease:  as, apostrophe, apostrophes; epitome, epitomes; simile, similes.  This class of words being anomalous in respect to pronunciation, some authors have attempted to reform them, by changing the e to y in the singular, and writing ies for the plural:  as, apostrophy, apostrophies; epitomy, epitomies; simily, similies.  A reformation of some sort seems desirable here, and this has the advantage of being first proposed; but it is not extensively adopted, and perhaps never will be; for the vowel sound in question, is not exactly that of the terminations y and ies, but one which seems to require ee—­a stronger sound than that of y, though similar to it.

OBS. 8.—­For nouns ending in open o preceded by a consonant, the regular method of forming the plural seems to be that of adding es; as in bilboes, umboes, buboes, calicoes, moriscoes, gambadoes, barricadoes, fumadoes, carbonadoes, tornadoes, bravadoes, torpedoes, innuendoes, viragoes, mangoes, embargoes, cargoes, potargoes, echoes, buffaloes, volcanoes, heroes, negroes, potatoes, manifestoes, mulattoes, stilettoes, woes.  In words of this class, the e appears to be useful as a means of preserving the right sound of the o; consequently, such of them as are the most frequently used, have become the most firmly fixed in this orthography.  In practice, however, we find many similar nouns very frequently, if not uniformly, written with s only; as, cantos, juntos, grottos, solos, quartos,