NOTE ON THE "ONE SINGLE RULE DETERMINING THE FRENCH GENDERS."
ALAS, there is no royal road to the knowlbdge even of French genders, and the " versified rule" of M. ACHILLES ALnixis, with its accompanying " histories," is little better than a toy to amuse the tyro and display his own ingenuity. A correspondent, appa- rently a Frenchman, has taken the pains to muster such an array of exceptions to the " versified rule," as satisfies us that it is no rule at all : so the learner must just plod on patiently in the old way— there is nothing for it but time and perseverance.
Our correspondent admits that " the nearest approximation to a rule is founded on the terminations in vowels and consonants"- " But the writer of the work in question must not be allowed to take to him- self the credit of having originated that rule. It is correctly given in HAMEL'S Grammar, published many years since, with all its exceptions ; and it has always been a matter of surprise to me that it has never been copied nor recog- nized in more modern ones. The rules there laid down, if once acquired, really conquer the difficulty which the one in question only pretends to do. The book has been many years out of print: it is not very valuable in other respects; but a copy may be occasionally met with at book-stalls, and is worth the pur- chase if only for the sake of the rule above referred to."
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