306
NOTES AND QUERIES. uo* s. n. OCT. is, im.
teenth private and third public edition, and
is in every way admirable as a guide for, as
the preface states, " compositors and readers
at the Clarendon Press." I have no objection
to its being "offered to so much of the
general public as is interested in the techni-
calities of typography, or wishes to be guided
to a choice amidst alternative spellings."
As such it is a welcome step in the direction
of a much-needed reform, and can thus only
make for good. But it is only a tentative
measure, and its norma scribendi will hardly
meet with general acceptance. This, of
course, is the initial fate of most attempts at
reform in any sphere of activity. Yet there
is something to be said for opposition, apart
from mere literary conservatism. Thus the
substitution of z for s in many instances (e.g.,
anglicize, catechize, &c.) will be objectionable
to many, although Dr. Murray's protest (p. 9)
" against the unscholarly habit of omitting e
from abridgement, acknowledgement, judgement,
lodgement," will find acceptance with many
more; and the compiler's injunction against
phonetic^spellings (such as program, catalog,
&c.) is timely. Also with the use of italics
in foreign words and phrases I am fully in
accord, as with the moderate employment of
capitals. Mr ; Mprley, under this latter head,
in his otherwise incomparable ' Life of Glad-
stone,' has, I fear, declined to the opposite
extreme. We need not copy the German
system of printing almost every noun with
an initial capital ; but such words as Home
Rule, Parliament, House of Commons, <fec.,
require it. But and herein lies my chiefest
grievance against this otherwise estimable
effort this little book of rules forces itself
Autocratically upon authors who submit their
works to the University Press for publication.
A noteworthy sample of this procedure occurs
-at p. 12, in a note on the word " forgo ":
" In 1896 Mr. W. E.Gladstone, not being aware of this rule, wished to include, in a list of errata for insertion in vol. ii. of Butler's ' Works,' an altera- tion of the spelling, in vol. i., of the word 'forgo.' On receipt of his direction to make the alteration, I sent Mr. Gladstone a copy of Skeat's k Dictionary ' to show that 'forgo,' in the sense in which he was using the word, was right, and could not be cor- rected ; but it was only after reference to Dr. J. A. H. Murray that Mr. Gladstone wrote to me, 'Personally I am inclined to prefer " forego," on its merits ; but authority must carry the day. / give in.' "
This is precisely what, pace Drs. Skeat and Murray, I should not have done. The Periodical for June may be right in saying, "That any one so tenacious as Mr. Gladstone should surrender to the ' Rules ' is their best testimonial"; but even this eminent sur- render fails, in my judgment, to justify an
intolerable manipulation, by any compositors
of any printing firm, howevef* illustrious, of
an author's choice of spelling. Besides, in
this particular case, I question strongly the
substitution of forgo im forego. Why eliminate
the e ? To forego is to do without, to pass
over, which forgo does not, I submit, imply
as accurately. Forgo may be strained to
mean "instead of"; but it would more
naturally be led to indicate the slang ex-
pression " to go for." I for one should think
twice before submitting a MS. to the tender
mercies of such ruthless and arbitrary
treatment. Still, these 'Rules' enforced
upon the compositors and readers of the
Oxford University Press are distinctly pre-
ferable to either the American or Furnivall
methods. Honor and tho, linkt and sufferd,
lookt, &c., are abominations which no com-
positor should put in type.
J. B. McGovERN. St. Stephen's Rectory, C.-on-M., Manchester.
[A note on the back of the title-page of the 'Rules,' fifteenth edition, states: "The following Rules are to apply generally ; but directions to the contrary may be given in some cases."]
"PERI," A GTJIANA TERM. Homonyms are always interesting to the lexicographer, and the above, which has nothing to do with the peri who stood at the gate of Eden, may be of interest to Dr. Murray, who is now engaged upon Pe-. It is the name given by the Eng- lish in Guiana to a notorious fish, which naturalists, from the resemblance of its jaw to a saw, call Serra-salmo. For a similar reason the Tupis, or native Indians of Brazil, called it piraya or piranha. The interchange of y and nh in this term is very old. As far back as 1648 Marcgrave, in his 'Hist. Nat. Brasilise,' p. 164, described the fish under the head * Piraya et Piranha.' The colonists of British Guiana seem never to have used the second form, but only the first, which they cut down to peri. The Portuguese of Brazil do just the contrary, that is, they treat piranha as the standard orthography, and piraya as a mere vulgarism.
JAMES PLATT, Jun.
PROF. WILSON AND BURNS. In his article on Prof. Wilson in the 'D.N.B.,' Dr. Garnett says : " Of a later date were some excel- lent papers entitled ' Dies Boreales,' his last literary labour of importance, and an edition of Burns." One of the few thoroughly sound and intimate disquisitions on Burns in the language is the essay entitled ' The Genius and Character of Burns,' in vol. iii. of Wilson's 'Essays Critical and Imaginative.' This eloquent and sympathetic appreciation
