Page:Transactions of the Linnean Society of London, Volume 1 (1791).djvu/203

Rh for culmus &c. Some of these words, as nectarium and pericarpium, are become so familiar to learned botanists, that they will perhaps hardly be persuaded to give up the Latin termination. The final in a may be admitted more readily; and corolla having use on its side, will doubtless be preferred by many to corol which has not so melodious a sound. Naturalists talk familiarly of a butterfly's antenna; and cupola, which in the last century was considered as a stranger, is in this admitted to be a denizen. I must observe, however, that by changing the final a into e, some confusion will be avoided, which arises from not distinguishing the Latin feminine singular from the neuter plural; and by using stipule for stipula, we shall no longer hear of a leaf-stalk or petiole having two stipula.

But whatever allowance may be made in singular terminations, the plurals must certainly follow the analogy of the English tongue; and if we tolerate corolla and anthera, nectarium and pericarpia, we cannot possibly allow of corollæ and antheræ, nectaria and pericarpia; but we must use either corollas or corols, antheras or anthers, nectariums or nectaries, pericarpiums or pericarps, according as we preserve the original term entire, or anglicize it.

All derivatives and compounds ought to follow the analogy of the original words from which they are derived, or of which they are compounded. Thus from corol we regularly form corollet, as from crown, coronet: if we adopt the terms prickle and thorn, we must use the adjectives prickly and thorny, not aculeate and spinose: from glume we form glumose; from ament, amentaceous; from awn, awned and awnless; from axil or axilla, axillary; from pinna, pinnate, bipinnate, &c. from calyx are formed calycle, calycled, calycine; from petal, anther, berry, we make the compounds five-petalled, anther-bearing, berry-bearing, not bacciferous; from cell, two-celled; from leaf, two-leaved; from seed, two-seeded.

Without, however, entering too much into the minutenesses of this