Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 41.djvu/709

Rh such a revision was appointed, and made its final report at the meeting of 1891. This report says:

During the past four years, your committee has sought to obtain from the members of this section, from leading American philologists, and from American chemists in general, an exhaustive and thoroughly representative expression of opinion on the questions coming within the scope of its commission, which has been essentially the attainment of uniformity in the orthography and pronunciation of the terms used in our science.

Three preliminary reports were distributed to American chemists in the years 1889, 1890, and 1891, inviting extended criticism and suggestion. The substance of the replies to these was carefully digested and submitted to the Chemical Section each year for detailed discussion and decision. The present and final report of your committee embodies the results of these four years of correspondence and discussion, as completed by the sectional action at the present meeting of the Association. It is presented in the hope that all chemists, especially those engaged in teaching, will cordially unite in the effort to bring about the desired uniformity in usage.

The reasons for the adoption of a few more radical changes in our nomenclature are to be found in the report for 1890. Those specially interested in the subject who have not attended the recent sessions of the Association may freely correspond with individual members of the committee, who will gladly furnish more detailed explanation of the principles involved.

The following summary of rules is not to be regarded as final. Your committee recognize the fact that, after a fair trial for a decade or even less, certain modifications will in all probability be generally regarded as desirable.

In conclusion, the committee express their sincere thanks to their many colleagues throughout the land, who have so promptly and fully responded to the successive requests for data, suggestions, and opinions.

Among the decisions of the committee (all being accepted by the Chemical Section) is to sound the i short in the names of the halogens, and the spelling is changed by dropping the final e, so as better to indicate this pronunciation: thus, chlorin, bromin, etc. The "pentalemma" of quinine is conquered by adopting a sixth pronunciation kwǐ'nǐn and the final e is dropped, making the spelling quinin. Similar treatment is accorded to anilin, morphin, glycerin, cocain, etc. The similarity between -ide and -ite is removed by changing the former to -ĭd, giving chlorid, bromid, oxid, etc.

Polysyllables in the metric system are regarded as compound words, each part with its own accent; thus, not centi'meter, but cen'time"ter. The spellings aluminum and asbestos displace aluminium and asbestus; gramme is preferred to gram (probably to avoid confusion with grain in indistinct handwriting); al'kalǐne retains the long i and its final e; al'loy, both as noun and as verb,