_Latin Pronunciation_
A French savant, M. Garaud, has just published a book which professes to
settle the vexed question of pronunciation of Latin by the ancient
Romans. He says: “The patois of Pamiers, in the Department of Ariège, is
nothing else than Latin exiled on the borders of the Ariège. It has been
brought there with its original pronunciation and accentuation. Without
the aid of any book the ear has sufficed to preserve its first form and
intonation after eighteen centuries’ use. The most delicate inflections
of the voice have been kept. Thanks to the instinct of harmony and the
love of sonority, Latin pronunciation has been exactly transmitted to
us.”
_Prevention better than Cure_
We learn from the parish records of Oberammergau that when the plague of
1633 was sweeping the by-ways of the Bavarian Tyrol, eighteen peasants
met together and vowed that if the plague were stayed they would, once
in ten years, present in living pictures the Passion of Christ. That vow
has been faithfully kept. On Fish Street Hill, in London, where the
great fire of 1666 started, the citizens erected a commemorative
monument as an expression of their gratitude that the fire had destroyed
the last vestige of the pestilence which, in the course of a few months,
had carried off sixty-eight thousand five hundred and ninety-six of the
inhabitants of the metropolis. We who live in an age of broader
enlightenment have learned that the line of practical beneficence leads
to prophylaxis rather than to religious vows or sacrificial offerings,
and points to higher promise and larger performance. We, too, are
building a monument, but it will be more enduring than stone or bronze,
and will immortalize its trust in one word, SANITATION.