diphthongs that could not originally have been so confounded, is but the culmination of a certain "gracilitas" which Quintilian noted in his day as one of the most distinctive peculiarities of classical Greek. As for the accents, thanks to Aristophanes of Byzantium, the inventor of the familiar accentual marks, and the service of a patriotic church, the popular ear has wandered from the old path in this matter, only in a very few and comparatively unimportant instances. In the general case the modern accent remains faithful to ancient usage; and the fact, which some learned men persist in doubting, that the Greek accent, like the Latin, actually did mean, not only elevation of tone, but increase of stress or emphasis on the accented syllable, stands out everywhere with unmistakable distinctness in the great army of words curtailed of their initial syllable to which we above (p. 498) directed special attention. For in these words, in every case it is the unaccented syllable, as in dèv for oudev,which falls off, and not the contrary. How far the euphony of the language has been affected, or, perhaps, turned into a cacophony by any of the habits of modern Greek orthoepy, is to be determined, not by picking out individual words seamed with a special scar, as is sometimes done, but by the general impression which the language makes on the ear when used by those who use it for the purpose of producing an æsthetical effect. That vasilefs, for instance, the Neo-Hellenic utterance of Baoulévs, is a less melodious word than the same word pronounced in the customary English fashion may be quite true; in all languages, and not least in English, there are single words which, when pronounced most rightly, are not pronounced most beautifully; but the general æsthetic effect of a language is not sensibly affected by such occasional cacophonies. As to a certain feebleness of vocalization supposed to be produced by the Itacism, it ought to be remembered that the instinct of the popular ear, like the instinct which guides the poet, will lead the people to avoid the near repetition of identical sounds, and there may thus in actual practice be no greater danger of satiating the ear with a surcharge of the slender, than in English we feel, when we have occasion to use such words as facility, docility, agility, inanition, Elysian, precision, and such like. As a matter of fact, I can state that in going through the Erotocritos, a poem nearly as long as the Odyssey, and the Klephtic ballads in Passow's collection, my ear was never disagreeably struck with any predominance of the sound ee. On the contrary, the broad, full, and peculiarly Greek sounds of a and oo, (English oo), appeared to me to preponderate. Feebleness certainly, or tenuity of sound, is the last charge that can be brought against such lines as Ολημεροῦλα πολεμᾷ, τὸ βράδυ Καραούλι. or Σκοτώνει τοὺς ̓Αγαρηνούς, πεζοῦρα καὶ καβάλη. or Πολλὴ μαυρίλλη ἔρχεται, μαυρὴ σὰν καλιακούδι. from Passow, or Σὰν, ὅταν μεσοπέλαγα δυὸ ἄνεμοι σηκωθοῦσι Εξάφνου, καὶ μὲ τὴν βροντὴν φυσῶντας πολεμοῦσι, from Cornaro; and if this alleged offence of the Itacism be practically of so little significance, it is needless to remark that the other prominent peculiarity of modern Greek æsthetical composition, viz. the substitution of accentual for quantitative rhythm, does not in the slightest degree mar the euphony of Romaic verse. The same substitution, as everyone knows, took place both in Italian and in the hymnology of the Latin Church; and in both cases not to the damage of harmony, but with the creation of a new harmony, which may justly take its place as the legitimate sister of the old. I have said nothing hitherto of that element of adulteration from foreign sources which generally appears when an old-established language, like Latin or Greek, begins to be shaken out of its original compactness. In Italian and French the Teutonic element occurs not scantily sprinkled through the mass of the old Latin; and in modern Greek, likewise, every foreign influence which lasted long enough for the purpose, was sure to leave its visible print on the face of the spoken dialect. So Byzantine Greek came to be spotted with Latin, the Greek of the medieval Turkish kingdoms with French and Italian, and the Greek of the Epirotic Klepths with Turkish and Albanian. But the peculiarity of the Greek as contrasted with the French and Italian was and is that the foreign elements, by which it was at different times corrupted, were only attached externally to the original organism, not worked into the blood and bone; so that, like the scurf of a cutaneous disease, when the national health revived, they were naturally cast off, and this so completely, that at the present day the occurrence of a foreign word in a Greek sentence is as rare as the sight of a Turk in the streets of a Greek city. I may conclude the present hasty sketch of philological features with two speculative remarks, the one retrospective, the other prospective. Casting the eye backward into the earliest history of Hellenic speech, the question may well be asked how far the present form of the language is to be looked on as the revival of the old Acolo-Doric dialect, which had so long been suppressed by the graceful tyranny of the Attic; and to this question one answer lies very much on the surface, viz. that, as from the very nature of the case a certain sprinkling of non-Attic peculiarities was to be expected, and specially of the widely-dominant Doric, so, in point of fact, such a sprinkling does undeniably discover itself. The favourite as of the masculine agent in the first declension is certainly Doric. Doric also is ζητᾷ for ζητεῖ, τηρᾷ for τηρεί ; and not less τάζω for τάσσω, and other verbs of the same flexion. On the other hand, the favourite change of o and o into oo as in κovdovvɩ for kódov is Ionic; and more distinctly the slender 7 instead of a in the nominative singular feminine of adjectives in pos as in μαυρή for μαυρά. Το me, upon the whole, judging by the impression on the ear, the Doric seems the more potent of the two elements; it is, however, scarcely so marked as to justify the special designation of Aeolo-Doric, by which some writers have wished to baptize the present form of the spoken dialect. The prospective question which a conjectural glance into the future suggests, is simply this, how far is it probable that the Greek language in its present state will survive any changes in the political system of Europe which the events of the next centuries are likely to produce? To this question the answer seems plain. There is no likelihood that a language which has survived so many changes of political decrepitude at home, and political violence from abroad, will be perniciously affected by any changes likely to take place in the balance of the European system. As long As long as the Greek kingdom, the creation of three strong and jealous powers, shall stand, even with the meagre amount of success of which hitherto it has been able to boast, so long, as a matter of course, must the Greek language in its present Avatar of restored beauty, go on prospering and to prosper. Should the little kingdom, on the other hand, be snuffed out some day, and become a part of one of the great empires that came forward to nurse its cradle, most probably of Russia, in this case also there is not the slightest reason to fear that a cultivated language, so rich in powerful intellectual tradition as the Greek, should give way to Slavonic in the same way that Gaelic, in the Scottish Highlands, is now giving way to the Saxo-Latin speech of the men of the Low country. Russia, besides, could have no motive that should induce her to wish to stamp out Greek in Athens, in the same way that she is endeavouring to stamp out Polish in Warsaw. The relation betwixt Greece as an incorporated part of Russia and the great Muscovite Empire, would rather be one of the most friendly description; and the Czar would be forced to preserve the language of the Greek Church and the Greek intellect, as one of the brightest gems in his crown. The Russian clergy, in fact, would be more ready to be Hellenized by studying Chrysostom and St. Basil, than the Greek people would be to sink their aristocratic nationality in a Slavism of huge geographical amplitude, but without intellectual power or literary prestige. And in this way the same captive Greece that conquered Rome two thousand years ago, may before the lapse of another century have conquered Petersburg and Moscow; and then the day may not be far distant when, to realize the bright imagination of an illustrious French Hellenist,* the formal and meagre Latin shall give place to the flexible and luxuriant Hellenic, as the Catholic organ of intellectual intercourse between educated men of all nations, from the Ganges to St. Francisco. [J. S. B.] *Monsieur Gustav d'Eichthal. ANNUAL MEETING, Wednesday, May 1, 1872. SIR HENRY HOLLAND, Bart. M.D. D.C.L F.R.S. President, The Annual Report of the Committee of Visitors for the year 1871 was read and adopted. Sixty-six new members were elected in 1871. Sixty-three Lectures and Twenty Evening Discourses were delivered during the year 1871. The Books and Pamphlets presented in 1871 amounted to 115 volumes, making, with those purchased by the Managers, a total of 217 volumes added to the Library in the year, exclusive of periodicals. Thanks were voted to the President, Treasurer, and Secretary, to the Committees of Managers and Visitors, and to the Professors, for their services to the Institution during the past year. The following Gentlemen were unanimously elected as Officers for the ensuing year : PRESIDENT Sir Henry Holland, Bart. M.D. D.C.L. F.R.S. MANAGERS. George Berkley, Esq. C.E. William Bowman, Esq. F.R.C.S. F.R.S. John Carrick Moore, Esq. M.A. F.R.S. William Pole, Esq. M.A. F.R.S. Sir W. Frederick Pollock, Bart. M.A. Gen. Sir Edward Sabine, R.A. K.C.B. The Marquis of Salisbury, M.A. F.R.S. Charles William Siemens, Esq. D.C.L. Sir Charles Wheatstone, D.C.L. F.R.S. WEEKLY EVENING MEETING, Friday, May 3, 1872. SIR HENRY HOLLAND, Bart. M.D. D.C.L. F.R.S. President, WILLIAM SPOTTISWOODE, Esq. LL.D. M.A. Treasurer R.S. and R.I. On Optical Phænomena produced by Crystals submitted to Circularly Polarized Light. ON a former occasion I exhibited some phænomena depending upon circular, or, as it was then also called, successive, polarization, and in particular I adopted and explained a method for producing circularly polarized light devised by Sir Charles Wheatstone. I propose on the present occasion to pursue the subject into some of its ulterior consequences. In terms of the wave theory, light is said to be circularly polarized when the vibrations are circular, as distinguished from plane polarization, when they are rectilinear. And further, it is known from mechanical principles that a circular vibration may always be produced by the combination of two rectilinear vibrations, the amplitudes or extents of which are equal, and whereof one is in advance or in rear of the other by one or by any odd number of quarter-wave lengths. In the former of these cases the circular motion will take place in one direction, say right-handed; in the latter in the opposite, say left-handed. The contrivance used for producing circular polarization this evening is known by the name of a "quarter-undulation plate," and consists of a plate of mica split to such a thickness that one of the two rays into which plane polarized light is divided on entering it is retarded by an odd number of quarter-wave lengths behind the other. The optical phænomena produced by crystals when submitted to polarized light are usually divided into two classes, viz. (1) those arising from the use of parallel light, and consisting of broad sheets of colour; and (2) those due to convergent light, and consisting of the rings and brushes, the general character of which is well known. I propose to take a few specimens from each class, and to examine the modifications which the known phænomena undergo when the light is both polarized and analyzed circularly, i. e. when one quarterundulation plate is interposed between the polarizer (Nicol's prism) and the crystal to be examined, and the second between the crystal and the analyzer (Nicol's prism). |