The Grammar of English Grammars. Goold Brown
having led me to suspect, there is more authority for changing the y than for retaining it, I shall by-and-by exhibit some examples of this change, and leave the reader to take his choice of the two forms, or principles.
OBS. 6.—The vowel a, at the end of a word, (except in the questionable term huzza, or when silent, as in guinea,) has always its Italian or middle sound, as heard in the interjection aha! a sound which readily unites with that of s flat, and which ought, in deliberate speech, to be carefully preserved in plurals from this ending: as, Canada, the Canadas; cupola, cupolas; comma, commas; anathema, anathemas. To pronounce the final a flat, as Africay for Africa, is a mark of vulgar ignorance.
OBS. 7.—The vowel e at the end of a word, is generally silent; and, even when otherwise, it remains single in plurals from this ending; the es, whenever the e is vocal, being sounded eez, or like the word ease: as, apostrophe, apostrophes; epitome, epitomes; simile, similes. This class of words being anomalous in respect to pronunciation, some authors have attempted to reform them, by changing the e to y in the singular, and writing ies for the plural: as, apostrophy, apostrophies; epitomy, epitomies; simily, similies. A reformation of some sort seems desirable here, and this has the advantage of being first proposed; but it is not extensively adopted, and perhaps never will be; for the vowel sound in question, is not exactly that of the terminations y and ies, but one which seems to require ee—a stronger sound than that of y, though similar to it.
OBS. 8.—For nouns ending in open o preceded by a consonant, the regular method of forming the plural seems to be that of adding es; as in bilboes, umboes, buboes, calicoes, moriscoes, gambadoes, barricadoes, fumadoes, carbonadoes, tornadoes, bravadoes, torpedoes, innuendoes, viragoes, mangoes, embargoes, cargoes, potargoes, echoes, buffaloes, volcanoes, heroes, negroes, potatoes, manifestoes, mulattoes, stilettoes, woes. In words of this class, the e appears to be useful as a means of preserving the right sound of the o; consequently, such of them as are the most frequently used, have become the most firmly fixed in this orthography. In practice, however, we find many similar nouns very frequently, if not uniformly, written with s only; as, cantos, juntos, grottos, solos, quartos, octavos, duodecimos, tyros. So that even the best scholars seem to have frequently doubted which termination they ought to regard as the regular one. The whole class includes more than one hundred words. Some, however, are seldom used in the plural; and others, never. Wo and potato are sometimes written woe and potatoe. This may have sprung from a notion, that such as have the e in the plural, should have it also in the singular. But this principle has never been carried out; and, being repugnant to derivation, it probably never will be. The only English appellatives that are established in oe, are the following fourteen: seven monosyllables, doe, foe, roe, shoe, sloe, soe, toe; and seven longer words, rockdoe, aloe, felloe, canoe, misletoe, tiptoe, diploe. The last is pronounced dip'-lo-e by Worcester; but Webster, Bolles, and some others, give it as a word of two syllables only.[142]
OBS. 9.—Established exceptions ought to be enumerated and treated as exceptions; but it is impossible to remember how to write some scores of words, so nearly alike as fumadoes and grenados, stilettoes and palmettos, if they are allowed to differ in termination, as these examples do in Johnson's Dictionary. Nay, for lack of a rule to guide his pen, even Johnson himself could not remember the orthography of the common word mangoes well enough to copy it twice without inconsistency. This may be seen by his example from King, under the words mango and potargo. Since, therefore, either termination is preferable to the uncertainty which must attend a division of this class of words between the two; and since es has some claim to the preference, as being a better index to the sound; I shall make no exceptions to the principle, that common nouns ending in o preceded by a consonant take es for the plural. Murray says, "Nouns which end in o have sometimes es added, to form the plural; as, cargo, echo, hero, negro, manifesto, potato, volcano, wo: and sometimes only s; as, folio, nuncio, punctilio, seraglio."—Octavo Gram., p. 40. This amounts to nothing, unless it is to be inferred from his examples, that others like them in form are to take s or es accordingly; and this is what I teach, though it cannot be said that Murray maintains the principle.
OBS. 10.—Proper names of individuals, strictly used as such, have no plural. But when several persons of the same name are spoken of, the noun becomes in some degree common, and admits of the plural form and an article; as, "The Stuarts, the Cæsars."—W. Allen's Gram., p. 41. These, however, may still be called proper nouns, in parsing; because they are only inflections, peculiarly applied, of certain names which are indisputably such. So likewise when such nouns are used to denote character: as, "Solomons, for wise men; Neros, for tyrants."—Ib. "Here we see it becomes a doubt which of the two Herculeses, was the monster-queller."—Notes to Pope's Dunciad, iv, 492. The proper names of nations, tribes, and societies, are generally plural; and, except in a direct address, they are usually construed with the definite article: as, "The Greeks, the Athenians, the Jews, the Jesuits." But such words may take the singular form with the indefinite article, as often as we have occasion to speak of an individual of such a people; as, "A Greek, an Athenian, a Jew, a Jesuit." These, too, may be called proper nouns; because they are national, patrial, or tribal names, each referring to some place or people, and are not appellatives, which refer to actual sorts or kinds, not considered local.
OBS. 11.—Proper names, when they form the plural, for the most part form it regularly, by assuming s or es according to the termination: as, Carolina, the Carolinas; James, the Jameses. And those which are only or chiefly plural, have, or ought to have, such terminations as are proper to distinguish them as plurals, so that the form for the singular may be inferred: as, "The Tungooses occupy nearly a third of Siberia."—Balbi's Geog., p. 379. Here the singular must certainly be a Tungoose. "The principal tribes are the Pawnees, the Arrapahoes, and the Cumanches, who roam through the regions of the Platte, the Arkansaw, and the Norte."—Ib., p. 179. Here the singulars may be supposed to be a Pawnee, an Arrapaho, and a Cumanche. "The Southern or Floridian family comprised the Cherokees, Creeks, Chickasaws, Choctaws, Seminoles, and Natchez."—Ib., p. 179. Here all are regular plurals, except the last; and this probably ought to be Natchezes, but Jefferson spells it Natches, the singular of which I do not know. Sometimes foreign words or foreign terminations have been improperly preferred to our own; which last are more intelligible, and therefore better: as, Esquimaux, to Esquimaus; Knistenaux, to Knistenaus, or Crees; Sioux, to Sious, or Dahcotahs; Iroquois, to Iroquoys, or Hurons.
OBS. 12.—Respecting the plural of nouns ending in i, o, u, or y, preceded by a consonant, there is in present usage much uncertainty. As any vowel sound may be uttered with an s, many writers suppose these letters to require for plurals strictly regular, the s only; and to take es occasionally, by way of exception. Others, (perhaps with more reason,) assume, that the most usual, regular, and proper endings for the plural, in these instances, are ies, oes, and ues: as, alkali, alkalies; halo, haloes; gnu, gnues; enemy, enemies. This, I think, is right for common nouns. How far proper names are to be made exceptions, because they are proper names, is an other question. It is certain that some of them are not to be excepted: as, for instance, Alleghany, the Alleghanies; Sicily, the Two Sicilies; Ptolemy, the Ptolemies; Jehu, the Jehues. So the names of tribes; as, The Missouries, the Otoes, the Winnebagoes. Likewise, the houries and the harpies; which words, though not strictly proper names, are often written with a capital as such. Like these are rabbies, cadies, mufties, sophies, from which some writers omit the e. Johnson, Walker, and others, write gipsy and gipsies; Webster, now writes Gipsey and Gipseys; Worcester prefers Gypsy, and probably Gypsies: Webster once wrote the plural gypsies; (see his Essays, p. 333;) and Johnson cites the following line:—
"I,