Later words
retain the _u_, as 'vestibule', 'reticule', 'molecule'.
STEMS IN -NO. The many words of this class are a grief to the
classifier, who seeks in vain for reasons. Thus 'german' and 'germane'
have the same source and travelled, it seems, by the same road through
France. The Latin _hyacinth[)i]nus_ and _adamant[)i]nus_ are parallel
words, yet Milton has 'hyacinthin' for the one and 'adamantine' for
the other. One classification goes a little way. Thus 'human' and
'urban' must have come through French, 'humane' and 'urbane' direct
from Latin. On the other hand while 'meridian' and 'quartan' are
French, 'publican', 'veteran', and 'oppidan' are Latin. Words with
a long _i_, if they came early through France, shorten the vowel,
as 'doctrine', 'discipline', 'medicine', and 'masculine', while
'genuine', though a later word, followed them, but 'anserine' and
'leonine' did not. Disyllables seem to prefer the stress on the
ultima, as 'divine', 'supine', but even these are not consistent. Some
critics would scan Cassio's words
The d['i]vine Desdemona,
though Shakespeare nowhere else has this stress, while Shelley has.
Shelley, too, has
She cannot know how well the s['u]pine slaves
Of blind authority read the truth of things.
The grammatical term, too, is 's['u]pine'. Later introductions also
have this stress, as 'b['o]vine', 'c['a]nine', '['e]quine'.
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