206 On certain Tenses Review of Hermann's Supplices, on v. 772), even if we are not warranted in introducing e/c^eco into the text. So that a single fragment of a comic poet is all that can now be adduced in behajf of a second future active. A little better show can indeed be made in favour of the second future middle: but that is all. The Attic future of ^axofxai is ixa'^ovimai^ that of ttittto) Treaov/maL^ that of KaOe^ofxaL KaOe- ^ovfxai : TTiov/uLm is used by the later Greek writers, re/coi/- /uLat in the hymn to Venus, juaOovjaai in a passage of Theo- critus. It is possible that other similar forms, such as XafiovfAaL^ TV')^ovjuLaL^ eXOou/uiah niay have been found in particular dialects: but unless, like Buttmann, we give the name of second futures to the ordinary futures of verbs in X(i)^ juw^ vct)^ pw — which from their connexion with the first aorist are called first futures by the old grammarians — the few instances just enumerated are unquestionably insufficient to shew that Greek verbs, generally speaking, had any such tense. Besides it is pretty certain that the futures in w and ov/uai are not independent forms, but merely contracted modifications of those in aw and (jojuar. thus there is scarcely more reason for dignifying them with the name of a distinct tense, than for calling I3iolo a second genitive. Hence there do not seem to be any strong reasons for hesi- tating to adopt the opinion pronounced by the editor of the translation of Matthiaes Grammar, that " the second future ought to be expunged from the common school-grammars:^' and thus it has been left out for example in that publisht by Dr Russell for the use of the Charterhouse school. It is true that in grammar, as in other matters, there is always some inconvenience attending a departure from any received usage. But when a law, like that allowing the wager of bat- tle, is become a dead letter, and the recollection of it is only revived by the inconvenience resulting from an appeal to it in a particular instance, the most cautious legislator need not scruple about rescinding it : and such is just the case with the second future, of which we are seldom reminded, except when some ignorant critic tries to defend a corrupt reading or an erroneous interpretation by means of it. In fact, with reference to the actual state of things, Buttmann'^s practice of calling tc/ulw and crreXco second futures is a much wider
