right.  Thus, on the authority of Johnson, one might write, a stone’s cast, or stone’s throw; but Webster has it, stones-cast, or stones-throw; Maunder, stonecast, stonethrow; Chalmers, stonescast; Worcester, stone’s-cast.  So Johnson and Chalmers write stonesmickle, a bird; Webster has it, stone’s-mickle; yet, all three refer to Ainsworth as their authority, and his word is stone-smickle:  Littleton has it stone-smich.  Johnson and Chalmers write, popeseye and sheep’s eye; Walker, Maunder, and Worcester, popeseye and sheep’s-eye; Scott has pope’s-eye and sheepseye; Webster, pope’s-eye and sheep’s-eye, bird-eye, and birds-eye. Ainsworth has goats beard, for the name of a plant; Johnson, goatbeard; Webster, goat-beard and goats-beard. Ainsworth has prince’s feather, for the amaranth; Johnson, Chalmers, Walker, and Maunder, write it princes-feather; Webster and Worcester, princes’-feather; Bolles has it princesfeather:  and here they are all wrong, for the word should be prince’s-feather. There are hundreds more of such terms; all as uncertain in their orthography as these.

OBS. 31.—­While discrepances like the foregoing abound in our best dictionaries, none of our grammars supply any hints tending to show which of these various forms we ought to prefer.  Perhaps the following suggestions, together with the six Rules for the Figure of Words, in Part First, may enable the reader to decide these questions with sufficient accuracy. (1.) Two short radical nouns are apt to unite in a permanent compound, when the former, taking the sole accent, expresses the main purpose or chief characteristic of the thing named by the latter; as, teacup, sunbeam, daystar, horseman, sheepfold, houndfish, hourglass. (2.) Temporary compounds of a like nature may be formed with the hyphen, when there remain two accented syllables; as, castle-wall, bosom-friend, fellow-servant, horse-chestnut, goat-marjoram, marsh-marigold. (3.) The former of two nouns, if it be not plural, may be taken adjectively, in any relation that differs from apposition and from possession; as, “The silver cup,”—­“The parent birds,”—­“My pilgrim feet,”—­“Thy hermit cell,”—­“Two brother sergeants.” (4.) The possessive case and its governing noun, combining to form a literal name, may be joined together without either hyphen or apostrophe:  as, tradesman, ratsbane, doomsday, kinswoman, craftsmaster. (5.) The possessive case and its governing noun, combining to form a metaphorical name, should be written with both apostrophe and hyphen; as, Job’s-tears, Jew’s-ear, bear’s-foot, colts-tooth, sheep’s-head, crane’s-bill, crab’s-eyes, hound’s-tongue, king’s-spear, lady’s-slipper, lady’s-bedstraw, &c. (6.) The possessive case and its governing noun,