_Mythe versus Myth_ (Vol. vii., pp. 326. 575.).--It gives me much pleasure
to have afforded MR. THIRIOLD an opportunity for displaying so much
learning and sagacity; but I hope he does not imagine that he has confuted
me. As I only spoke of words which, like [Greek: muthos], had a single
consonant between two vowels, such words as _plinth_, _labyrinth_, &c. have
nothing to do with the question. If _mythe_, differing from the other
examples which are to be found, happens to have _the_ for its termination,
and thus resembles words of Anglo-Saxon origin, I cannot help it, but it
was formed _secundum artem_. As to MR. THERIOLD's _m[=y]th_, unless so
written and printed, it will always be pronounced _m[)y]th_, like the
French _mythe_.
As to the _hybrid_ adjectives, I only wished to avoid increasing the number
of them. The French, I believe, have only one, _musical_; for though, like
ourselves, they have made substantives of the Greek [Greek: mousike] (sc.
[Greek: techne]), [Greek: phusike], &c., in all other cases they retain the
Greek form of the adjective, as in _physique_, substantive and adjective,
while we generally have pairs of adjectives, as _philosophic,
philosophical_; _extatic, extatical_; &c. Some may think this an advantage;
I do not.