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 a confusion of the O.Ir. dative and accu&shy;sative forms. The accus. ending ‑thu of O.Ir. lethu, trethu, airrthiu was added to the dative ‑b, thus producing ‑fə which is now attached to all simple prepo&shy;sitions ending in a vowel, e.g. lʹɔ꞉fə, ‘with them’, di꞉fə, ‘from them’, dɔ꞉fə, ‘to them’, w⅄꞉fə, ‘from them’, fʹrʹi꞉fə, ‘through them’, fwi꞉fə, ‘under them’. Further in verbs with root ending in bh, mh we get f in the future tenses < bh, mh + f (= h), as in ʃkʹrʹi꞉fə mʹə, ‘I shall write’. The only instances in which the f of the future has been preserved are rαfə mʹə, tʹi꞉fʹə mʹə, v. §. But fʹ is more frequent than h in the ending of the condi&shy;tional passive.

In two instances of loan-words from English f has been inserted for no evident reason, viz. in gʹαftə, ‘gate’; rαftαn, ‘rat’, < Engl. ‘ratten’. k⅄꞉frαn, ‘a dry clod’, seems to corres&shy;pond in meaning to Di. caorán but I am unable to explain the form.

χw sometimes produces f a change which O’Donovan only admits for N. Connaught (cp. RC. xiv 115) but which is very common in parts of Ulster, v. Dinneen s. cuafadh, faofóg, triufanna. I have frequent&shy;ly heard gα ·fwelʹə ꬶinʹə (also gαχ fwelʹə ꬶinʹə), = gach uile dhuine. In fwïpʹ < Engl. ‘whip’ we have substi&shy;tution of fw (fw̥) with bilabial w (w̥) for Engl. w̥.

The O.Ir. preposition fo appears to have split up into fwi꞉, ‘under’ (< 3rd sing. fói), and fα(꞉), ‘around, about’. It is easy to see from the passages quoted in Windisch how the meaning of ‘around, about’ could arise but I am inclined to think that fα also repre&shy;sents O.Ir. imm. Cp. M.Ir. ba for ma = imma Diss. p. 27 and Scotch G. mu, Manx my- in mygeayrt, my-chione. In Donegal this prepo&shy;sition usually aspirates but we find it eclipsing in fα ·di꞉widə, ‘concern&shy;ing’, < fa dtaobh de; fα du꞉rʹimʹ in bwiLʹə fα d., ‘a guess’, but fα hu rʹimʹhu꞉rʹimʹ [sic] kʹɛəd, ‘about a hundred’.

When aspirated by a preceding word f disappears together with the w off-glide which accom&shy;panies it. Examples – dyəi ʃi꞉, ‘she sewed’; erʹ ə Nαruw, ‘on the roost’; əNsə Nõ꞉wər, ‘in the autumn’; mʹïpʹ, ‘my whip’; də Nïlʹ, ‘to the blood’; α lʹehəd(ʹ) ʃɔ ə ꬶïlʹ, ‘such blood’. In compounds fh has no effect on a preceding mh or bh, e.g. krα̃꞉viαχ, ‘a sea-bird’, Di. cnáimh-fhiach; krα̃꞉vɔ꞉d, ‘a narrow strip of grass-covered turf between two culti&shy;vated patches’, < cnáimh-fhód. Con&shy;sequent&shy;ly f is frequent&shy;ly wrongly prefixed to words with vocalic initial but in this