  We present spectroscopy of MIR emission lines in twelve starburst regions,
located in eleven starburst galaxies, for which a significant number of lines
between 2.38 and 45micron were observed with the ISO Short Wavelength
Spectrometer, with the intention of providing a reference resource for MIR
spectra of starburst galaxies. The observation apertures were centred on
actively star forming regions, including those which are inaccessible at
optical wavelengths due to high levels of obscuration. We use this data set,
which includes fine structure and hydrogen recombination lines, to investigate
excitation and to derive gas phase abundances of neon, argon, and sulphur of
the starburst galaxies. The derived Ne abundances span approximately an order
of magnitude, up to values of ~3 times solar. The excitation ratios measured
from the Ne and Ar lines correlate well with each other (positively) and with
abundances (negatively). Both in excitation and abundance, a separation of
objects with visible Wolf-Rayet features (high excitation, low abundance) is
noted from those without (low excitation, high abundance). For a given
abundance, the starbursts are of relatively lower excitation than a comparative
sample of HII regions, possibly due to ageing stellar populations. By
considering the abundance ratios of S with Ne and Ar we find that, in our
higher metallicity systems, S is relatively underabundant by a factor of ~3. We
discuss the origin of this deficit and favour depletion of S onto dust grains
as a likely explanation. This weakness of the MIR fine structure lines of S has
ramifications for future infrared missions such as SIRTF and Herschel since it
indicates that the S lines are less favourable tracers of star formation than
is suggested by nebular models which do not consider this effect.
