The question of abolishing the somewhat ancient custom of printing the quinquennial catalogue of the university in Latin, which has been agitated for some time, has recently received considerable discussion in the daily papers. The general opinion seems to be that the change is sure to come, sooner or later, and that Harvard should not miss the opportunity of taking the lead among the colleges in introducing this innovation. Some even go so far as to take exceptions to the implication that the catalogue of men who have received degrees from Harvard is printed in Latin, and assert that the language used is a sort of mongrel composed of English and Latin. If we cannot have pure Latin we can at least have pure English. In English there would also be a uniformity which is at present sadly lacking in the language used in the catalogue. A correspondent of the Transcript thus sums up the inconsistency of the translator : "It is positively unpardonable that Ensign Man should stand unchanged, when it can be exactly translated by Signifier Homo. The translator neglects also to turn the given name Cotton into Gossipium, Penn into Stylus, Prince into Princeps, True into Verus, Clark into Scriba, Rest into Requies, Kinsman into Consanguineous, Oxenbridge into Bovepons; Greenlief into Viridfolium, etc., and he was doubtless utterly stumped by Nyot, Leverett, Zoheth, Gad, Elbtidge, Epes, Byron and Shearjashub. Many Hebrew names stand unchanged, as Jared, Samuel, Benjamin, Thomas. James is "Latinized" into Jacobus, so that no "us" can be attached to Jacob, as is done in Adamus, Sethus, Abrahamus and Isaacus."

It is certainly an agreeable surprise for a man to be able to recognize his own name, either in the quinquennial catalogue or in the commencement program, which is open to the same objections in its present form as the catalogue. In addition to the names, there are the strange abbreviations which are intended to make known to the world the honors which have been received by each man, but which, in a great many cases, fail to accomplish their object.

It may be well to keep the greater part of the Latin which adorns the catalogue and commencement programs, for it is indeed Latin; but let us give up by all means the practice of translating the names of the graduates into a language which is not Latin and which can not be rendered into Latin. It seems but just that we should have modern names for modern things, and especially for modern persons. Latin undoubtedly has its place in every college education, and we should regret to see anything infringe upon synch a language, but we do not think a list of names, some of which are pure Anglo-Saxon, affords a favorable opportunity for observing the beauties of the Latin language.