Page:The crater; or, Vulcan's peak.djvu/15

 1 THE CRATER. CHAPTER I. &quot; T was a commodity lay fretting by you ; Twill bring you gain, or perish on the seas.&quot; Taming of the Shreu. THERE is nothing in which American Liberty, not always as much restrained as it might be, has manifested a more decided tendency to run riot, than in the use of names As for Christian names, the Heathen Mythology, the Bible, Ancient History, and all the classics, have long since been exhausted, and the organ of invention has been at work with an exuberance of imagination that is really wonderful for such a matter-of-fact people. Whence all the strange sounds have been derived which have thus been pressed into the service of this human nomenclature, it would puzzle the most ingenious philologist to say. The days of the Kates, and Dollys, and Pattys, and Bettys, have passed away, and in their stead we hear of Lowinys, and Orchistrys, Philenys, Alminys, Cytherys, Sarahlettys, Amindys, Marindys, &.c. &c. &/c. All these last appellations terminate properly with an a, but this unfortunate vowel, when a final Ietter 4 being popularly pronounced like y, we have adapted our spelling to the sound, which produces a complete bathos to all these flights in taste. The hero of this narrative was born fully sixty years since, and happily before the rage for modern appella tions, though he just escaped being named after another system which we cannot say we altogether admire; that of using a family, for a Christian name. This business of names is a sort of science in itself and we do believe that