s. 283. _Boxes, churches, judges, lashes, kisses, blazes, princes._--Here there is the addition, not of the mere letter _s_, but of the syllable _-es_. As _s_ cannot be immediately added to _s_, the intervention of a vowel becomes necessary; and that all the words whose plural is formed in _-es_ really end either in the sounds of _s_, or in the allied sounds of _z_, _sh_, or _zh_, may be seen by analysis; since _x_=_ks_, _ch_=_tsh_, and _j_ or _ge_=_dzh_, whilst _ce_, in _prince_, is a mere point of orthography for _s_. _Monarchs, heresiarchs._--Here the _ch_ equals not _tsh_, but _k_, so that there is no need of being told that they do not follow the analogy of _church_, &c. _Cargoes, echoes._--From _cargo_ and _echo_, with the addition of _e_; an orthographical expedient for the sake of denoting the length of the vowel _o_. _Beauty, beauties; key, keys._--Like the word _cargoes_, &c., these forms are points, not of etymology, but of orthography. s. 284. "A few _apparent_ exceptions."--These words are taken from Observation II. in the present section. The apparent exceptions to the rule there laid down are the words _loaf_, _wife_, and a few others, whose plural is not sounded _loafs_, _wifs_ (_loafce_, _wifce_), but _loavz_, _wivz_ (written _loaves_, _wives_). Here it seems as if _z_ had been added to the singular; and, contrary to rule, the final letter of the original word been accommodated to the _z_, instead of the _z_ being accommodated to the final syllable of the word, and so becoming _s_. It is, however, very probable that instead of the plural form being changed, it is the singular that has been modified. In the Anglo-Saxon the _f_ at the end of words (as in the present Swedish) had the power of _v_. In the allied language the words in point are spelt with the _flat_ mute, as _weib_, _laub_, _kalb_, _halb_, _stab_, {229} German. The same is the case with _leaf_, _leaves_; _calf_, _calves_; _half_, _halves_; _staff_, _staves_; _beef_, _beeves_: this last word being Anglo-Norman. _Pence._--The peculiarity of this word consists in having a _flat_ liquid followed by the sharp sibilant _s_ (spelt _ce_), contrary to the rule given above. In the first place, it is a contracted form from _pennies_; in the second place, its sense is collective rather than plural; in the third place, the use of the sharp sibilant lene distinguishes it from _lens_, sounded _lenz_. That its sense is collective rather than plural (a distinction to which the reader's attention is directed), we learn from the word _sixpence_, which, compared with _sixpences_, is no plural, but a singular form. _Dice._--In respect to its form, peculiar for the reason that _pence_ is peculiar. We find the sound of _s_ after a vowel, where that of _z_ is expected. This distinguishes _dice_ for play, from _dies_ (_diez_) for coining. _Dice_, perhaps, like _pence_, is collective rather than plural.