IMAGE EVALUATION 
 TEST TARGET (MT-3) 
 
 
 // 
 
 / 
 
 ^ 
 
 
 {< 
 
 ^ 
 
 
 .> 
 
 
 P., 
 
 (/. 
 
 //^ 
 
 C/jL 
 
 1.0 
 
 I.I 
 
 
 .i'4o mil 2 
 
 ill|l-5= i.V/ 
 
 1.8 
 
 
 ii 
 
 1.25 
 
 U II 1.6 
 
 = ii= 
 
 
 ^ 
 
 6" 
 
 ► 
 
 
 % # % 
 
 i? 
 
 / 
 
 /i 
 
 Photographic 
 
 Sciences 
 
 Corporation 
 
 23 WEST MAIN STREI:T 
 
 WEBSTER, N.Y. 14580 
 
 (?li) 67%4503 
 
 
CIHM/ICMH 
 
 Microfiche 
 
 Series. 
 
 CIHM/ICMH 
 Collection de 
 microfiches. 
 
 Canadian Institute for Historical Microreproductions / Institut Canadian de microreproductions historiques 
 
Technical and Bibliographic Notes/Notes techniques et bibliographiques 
 
 The Institute has attempted to obtain the best 
 original copy available for filming. Features of this 
 copy which may be bibliographically unique, 
 which may alter any of the images in the 
 reproduction, or which may significantly change 
 the usual method of filming, are checked below. 
 
 Z7 
 
 D 
 D 
 
 D 
 
 Coloured covers/ 
 Couverture de couleur 
 
 □ Covers damaged/ 
 Couverture endommagee 
 
 □ Cov 
 Cou 
 
 Covers restored and/or laminated/ 
 verture restaur^e et/ou pellicul^e 
 
 □ Cover titie missing/ 
 Le tit 
 
 titre de couverture manque 
 
 I I Coloured maps/ 
 
 Cartes gdographiques en couleur 
 
 □ Coloured ink (i.e. other than blue or black)/ 
 Encre de couleur (i.e. autre que bleue ou noire) 
 
 I I Coloured plates and/or illustrations/ 
 
 Planches et/ou illustrations en couleur 
 
 Bound with other material/ 
 Reli^ avec d'autres documents 
 
 Tight binding may cause shadows or distortion 
 along interior margin/ 
 
 La reliure serree peut causer de I'ombre ou de la 
 distortion le long de la marge intdrieure 
 
 Blank leaves added during restoration may 
 appear within the text. Whenever possible, these 
 have been omitted from filming/ 
 II SB peut que certaines pages blanches ajoutdes 
 lors d'une restauration apparaissent dans le texte, 
 mais, lorsque cela 6tait possible, ces pages n'ont 
 pas et6 filmdes. 
 
 L'Institut a microfilm^ le meilleur exemplaire 
 qu'il lui a 6t6 possible de se procurer. Les details 
 de cet exemplaire qui sont peut-dtre uniques du 
 point de vue bibliographique, qui peuvent modifier 
 une image reproduite, ou qui peuvent exiger une 
 modification dans la m^thode r.ormale de filmage 
 sont indiqu6s ci-dessous. 
 
 □ Coloured pages/ 
 Pages de couleur 
 
 , Pages damaged/ 
 ^ Pages endommagdes 
 
 I I Pages restored and/or laminated/ 
 
 n 
 
 D 
 
 Pages restaurdes et/ou pellicul^es 
 
 Pages discoloured, stained or foxed/ 
 Pages d6color6es, tachet6es ou piquees 
 
 □ Pages detached/ 
 Pages d^tachees 
 
 ^ 
 
 Showthrough/ 
 Transparence 
 
 I I Quality of print varies/ 
 
 Qualite inegale de I'impresston 
 
 Includes supplementary material/ 
 Comprend du materiel supplementaire 
 
 □ Only edition available/ 
 Seule 
 
 Edition disponible 
 
 Pages wholly or partially obscured by errata 
 slips, tissues, etc., have been refilmed to 
 ensure the best possible image/ 
 Les pages totalement ou partiellement 
 obscurcies par un feuillet d'errata, une pelure, 
 etc., ont 6t6 filmdes d nouveau de facon ci 
 obtenir la meilleure image por iole. 
 
 □ Additional comments:/ 
 Commentaires suppl^mentaires; 
 
 This item is filmed at the reduction ratio checked below/ 
 
 Ce document e?t film6 au taux de reduction indiqui ci-dessous. 
 
 10X 14X 18X 22X 
 
 2ex 
 
 30X 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 J 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 12X 
 
 16X 
 
 20X 
 
 24X 
 
 28X 
 
 32X 
 
The copy filmed here has been reproduced thanks 
 to the generosity of: 
 
 National Library of Canada 
 
 L'exemplaire filrn^ fut reproduit grdce d la 
 g^ndrosit^ de: 
 
 Bibliothdque nationale du Canada 
 
 The images appearing here are the best quality 
 possible considering the condition and legibility 
 of the original copy and in keeping with the 
 filming contract specifications. 
 
 Original copies in printed paper covers are filmed 
 beginning with the front cover and ending on 
 the last page with a printed or illustrated impres- 
 sion, or the back cover when appropriate. All 
 other original copies are filmed beginning on the 
 first page with a printed or illustrated impres- 
 sion, and ending on the last page with a printed 
 or illustrated impression. 
 
 Les images suivantes ont 6t6 reproduites avec le 
 plus grand soin, compte tenu de la condition et 
 de la nettet^ de l'exemplaire filmd, et en 
 conformity avec les conditions du cont/at de 
 filmage. 
 
 Les exemplaires originaux dont la couverture en 
 papier est imprim^e sont filmds en commen9ant 
 par le premier plat et en terminant soit par la 
 dernidre page qui comporte une empreinte 
 d'impression ou d'illustration, soit par le second 
 plat, selon le cas. Tous les autres exemplaires 
 originaux sont film6s en commengant par la 
 premidre page qui comporte une empreinte 
 d'impression ou d'illustration et en terminant par 
 la dernidre page qui comporte une telle 
 empreinte. 
 
 The last recorded frame on each microfiche 
 shall contain the symbol -h^ (meaning "CON- 
 TINUED "), or the symbol V (meaning "END '), 
 whichever applies. 
 
 Un des symboles suivants apparaitra sur la 
 dernidre image de cheque microfiche, selon le 
 cas: le symbole — ♦- signifie "A SUIVRE", le 
 symbole V signifie "FIN". 
 
 Maps, plates, charts, etc., may be filmed at 
 different reduction ratios. Those too large to be 
 entirely included in one exposure are filmed 
 beginning in the upper left hand corner, left to 
 right and top to bottom, as many frames as 
 required. The following diagrams illustrate the 
 method: 
 
 Les cartes, planches, tableaux, etc., peuvent §tre 
 filmds d des taux de reduction diff6rents. 
 Lorsque le document est trop grand pour etre 
 reproduit en un seul clich6, il est film6 d partir 
 de Tangle sup^rieur gauche, de gauche d droite, 
 et de haut en bas, en prenant le nombre 
 d'images ndcessaire. Les diagrammes suivants 
 illustrent la mdthode. 
 
 1 
 
 2 
 
 3 
 
 1 
 
 2 
 
 3 
 
 4 
 
 5 
 
 6 
 
^ 
 
 f^- 
 
 I i«iy»i ' H «ll ■ 
 
 " ■*'i»wi! L I M^ff '^ ' - 
 
 C A N A O A 
 
 mTT|^ % II ijiiii II I I 1 . 1 >ii 
 
 NUMBER AND JITURE 
 
 OF 
 
 VOWEL SOUNDS. 
 
 \ ■ 
 
 AN ESSAlY 
 
 Kbad befork the CANADiiir Inoti 
 
 TtrTBp»THI£lSTHorI?«!EMBER. 1884 
 
 BY 
 
 ^^ MARTIN ItrTflfpBOrSE, 
 
 
\ 
 
 
'>/r //' 
 
 / 
 
 c 
 
 ^>// /c-t ^>/^ ' y/lx.> ry-Zd-r^^v 
 
 / 
 
 ^ ft' 
 
 
 essAy 
 
 rpox THE 
 
 NUMBER AND NATDllE OF VOIIfEL SOUNDS. 
 
 To any one who has reflected at all upon his native language, it 
 must have seemed strange indeed that so largo a number of vowel 
 sounds is represented by five symbols. And when he first became 
 acquainted with a foreign tongue, his surprise must have grown 
 intense upon finding the same symbols doing duty for sounds hitherto 
 unknown to him ; while, more curious still, a sound denoted in his 
 own tongue by one of them would in the foreign tongue be denoted 
 by another, and a sound hitherto known by that other sign he would 
 now see represented by a third. Thus the ordinary sound given to 
 a in English is represented by e in French; while the sound given to 
 e in English is ti'ansferred to i in French. 
 
 It would be highly interesting to discover how many vowel sounds 
 are in existence \ and it would be practically useful to invent for 
 them a set of representative symbols to be used in common by all 
 nations. Not that one could expect the nations to change theii* 
 spelling ; but in evei'y bilingual dictionary the vowel sounds in each 
 word could be determined for the foreign reader by marks of reference 
 to a table of common symbols. Nor would such a system be without 
 its value in the ordinary defining and pronouncing dictionary of one 
 language, especially if that language were English, in which one 
 written vowel or vowel combination often indicates many kinds of 
 sound, while one sound is often indicated by many vowels or vowel 
 combinations. The discovery is our aim in this essay; the invention 
 we leave to otlier writers. 
 
 The i)ath has often been trodden before by English lexicographers 
 and grammarians as a matter of necessity, and recently by some 
 eminent Continental inquirers out of a thirst for discovery or as a 
 branch of some other scientific track they were pursuing. 
 
 All we can say of the system of the most renowned of tte 
 Continental explorers, Helmholtz, which we have not had leisure 
 to do more than glance at, is that, while most interesting as showing 
 the musical character of certain of the vowel sounds, it is very far 
 from a complete classification of them. If, on the other hand, we 
 examine the English systems, we find that the earlier ones are very 
 
incomplete, and the later ones still ranch lackiiig in method. Amongst 
 both Englishmen and foreigners there has been too little study of the 
 pronunciation of other languages than their own. ^ 
 
 We will not trouble our readers with a discussion of old Walkers 
 classification, although either in his original dictionary or in dictionaries 
 founded upon his it must have been referred to scores of times by 
 every educated Englishman ; neither will we deal with Webster's, 
 although it is more complete than Walker's. So many well-founded 
 alterations have b een made in their plans by recent clussiiiers that I 
 think no one now can be looking up to them as systems. But we would 
 just say that Webster gives every sound save one existing in the English 
 language, but abounds in reduplications ; while Walker is guilty of 
 three omissions besides reduplications. The arrangements adopted by 
 both writers and the repetitions that they make, prove that they 
 intended rather to show the number of ways wherein each vowel 
 sound could be written than the number and relation of the sounds 
 them.selves. 
 
 Let us rather take up an authority ten years younger than Webster 
 and forty or fifty years younger than Walker which for two decades 
 at least has been guide to the ears of a very large and quick-witted 
 class of men, both in England and America— Isaac Pitman's Manual 
 of Phonography. 
 
 The following is his table of vowels and diphthongs :— 
 
 ♦ 
 
 LONG. 
 
 Simple Vowels. 
 
 SIGN.i 
 
 1. AH, as in half 
 
 2. EH, 
 
 3. EE, 
 
 i< 
 
 p«y 
 
 she 
 
 4. AW, " thought 
 
 5. OH, " so 
 
 0. 00, " poor. 
 
 SHORT. 
 
 SIGN 
 
 1. a, as in that 
 
 e, 
 
 3. i, 
 
 4. o. 
 
 pen 
 
 <s 
 
 not. 
 
 5. u, " one 
 
 6. oo, " foot 
 
'i 
 
 3 
 
 Diphthongs. 
 
 ■• V I • -1 
 
 : I as in wi/ : OW ;is in iwiv ; 01 as in oil ; U as in ucn\ 
 
 ' .'a : : 1 1 
 
 Two Sentences illusti-ating the EtFect of r upon a preceding Vowel : 
 Long Vowels. —Aunt, spare me all those spoons. 
 Short Vowels. — Are her f%s or furn good ] 
 
 What strikes one first in looking at this table is that six simple 
 vowels are given with their long and short forms respectively, anil not 
 iive according to the tradition learnt in our infancy. WalkfM- liad 
 even hinted at this, when in the preface to his dictionary he riglitly 
 called the vowel sound in not the true short form of that heanl in 
 naught ; but Pitman was apparently tho first writer who gave to tlie 
 aw sound an equal footing with the recognized true vowels. 
 
 Again, like Walker in his preface, he makes light of English 
 symbols, and fixes the i of is as the short form of the e in sAe, or of 
 the ea in ease ; and, going beyond his master, he rightly assigns the e 
 of pen as companion to the a of pay or pane. 
 
 But Pitman's classification is manifestly intended for English readers 
 only ; for not only does he ignore the recondite foreign short sounds 
 of a and o, but he makes no mention of the common French u. 
 
 But more — why should this writer intensify an error of Walker's 
 by calling the sound of o in one, the short form of its sound in so ? 
 Substituting better pairs of pattern words, I appeal to your ears to 
 decide whether so bears the same relation to son that naught does to 
 not or ease to is. 
 
 What, then, is the true short form of the o in so ; and what the 
 long form of the o in one ? 
 
 The first is, what the French, Germans, and Italians call short o 
 (their long o being the same as ours) — that brief sound so difficult for 
 Englishmen to discriminate heard in the French sot and the German 
 sold. In English we have it too, but always in unaccented syllables, 
 where its nature is not perceived. Listen, for instance, to the first 
 syllable of ro-tdte and mo-rdlity, and to the second in dn-no-tate. 
 
 As to the second, a common rule of English pronunciation is, that if 
 you double an ensuing consonant, you shorten the vowel that precedes 
 it ; and, conversely, that if you drop one con.sonant from a pair of the 
 «arae kind, you lengthen the preceding vowel. With no consonant 
 does this hold so good as with the letter r : compare harrow and ha/r, 
 carry and car ; merry and mere, berry and here ; Torridge and Tor, 
 borrow and hore, sorrow and sore. The change is not always made 
 into the true correlative long sound : but if the original long or short 
 .sound be the one commonly given to the letter in English, it changes 
 
into tlio short or long sound conimonlv given in English ; oi- if the 
 long or .short Hoiind at first he the one; commonly hoard hct'orti r in 
 our languagj!, it passes into the short or long sound commonly heard 
 before V in our langinige. Thus the long sound of ft in har Hnds its 
 true conelative in a foi'eign sound (hat we shall [H'eseutly mention, 
 and not in the tirst vowel of hiirrow ; and to the sound of ti in merry 
 we have already assigned with Pitman the sound of n in /kiii or iiuite 
 for a correlative : hut just as the o, in barroi'- is the short sound always 
 iieard i)efore /• in English, so is the a in htir the long sound always 
 lieard ; aiul while the e of merri/ is the common English short e,. 
 uttered before any consonant, so is the e of 7tiere the common J']uglish 
 long e. Moreover, the word sm-e and its analogues actually contain 
 the true correlative sound of the o in sorroiv and its analogues. Now, 
 there are a large numbei- of English words in which the sotnul of O' 
 in o)ie is represcnited either by <> or u followed by two vh ; and in 
 every case where a word l)eginning with the .same s])elling can be' 
 found but having one r in.stead of two, the vowel that precedes the 
 r has one pai-ticular sound — that of the u in bui'u : thus worri/, with 
 two ?''s, becomes word, irorhl, and ivorse with one r ; hurri/, with two, 
 becomes hurt with one; nn-rij, with two, cur and curt with one. It 
 is plain, then, that in practice we English folk treat the u of burn as 
 the long foi-m of the o in one and son, or u in sun and bun ? 
 
 Again, that a following r or any other special letter is not always' 
 wanted to bring the ?f sound of burn into being is proved by the fact 
 that the last letter of our few comnum nouns and numerous projjer 
 nouns that end in a has that sound. Thus, we do not pronounce sofa, 
 idea, Clara, and Augusta as if spelt so-faJi, ^-dyaJi, Clair-ah, Aiigust-ahy 
 but as though written so-fur, i-dyur, Clair-ur, and Jugust-ur. But 
 the truth is far more conspicuous in our neighbours' languages ; the 
 final e of German words and final unaccented e of French ones having 
 always this same sound. Pronoiuice, for example, laiife and stubs in 
 German, and se and qiie in French. Therefore the sound is a specific 
 one, not a mere shading.* 
 
 Lastly, we can finrl no long sound that bears a resemblance to the 
 of one or son, or the u of bun, other than the ti of bicrn ; nor, 
 recipi'ocally, can we find any short sound corresi)onding to this save 
 what is heard in one, so)/, and bun. 
 
 We therefore make a final appeal to your ears : is not bun clearly 
 the short way of pronouncing burn, ton of ])i'onouncing turn, hut of 
 hurt, and cut of curt ? 
 
 In the speech of the Lowland Scotch both the contrast and the 
 correlation are well displayed ; since for loorld they say wicrruld, and 
 for murmur, murr-murr. 
 
 (Mr. Pitman does mention the sound of n in burn in the pair of 
 typical .sentences whereby he illustrates the effect of r upon a foregoing, 
 
 * The preceding argument was added after the essay had been read. 
 
 1 
 
♦ 
 
 vowel. But he gives it no distinct footing ; leaving his |m])il3 to 
 represent it in either of two ways, according as it is spelt with n and 
 r, or, as is often the case, witU e and r. Compare '^/lus" and ''her" 
 in the couplet.) 
 
 Followhig Walker but not Wehster, Pitman omits from his catalogue 
 the sound of a. in s/xtre or cdre, or of ea in bear or ni in jmir. In 
 his couplet ho treats it merely as a subordinate or slightly shaded form 
 of the a or ai in Spain, cane, ba)ie, and pane or pain, ))roduced by the 
 influence of the succeedinaf r. 
 
 But, for that matter, I'itmau's is the view commoidy taken u]) to 
 the jiresent time by the graunnarians and lexicographers of England, 
 France, and Italy, if not of Germany also, Ollendorff s French- 
 Italian grammar, for instance, gives to the e in the second syllalije of 
 credcte the same sound as to tliat in the secojid syllable of credere ; 
 Noel and Ohapsal, taking their stand wholly upon accent-marks, would 
 make the uttered vowel of gr^ve identical with tlie uttered vowel of 
 /re re. 
 
 Yet let us look again at the effect of r upon certain vowels that it 
 follows. 
 
 Walker calls the a in 7nart the long Italian a soinid, and the a in 
 the French word matin (as it truly is) the corresponding short sound ; 
 and he also treats the o in corn as the long form of the o in co}i. By 
 analogy and an a[)peal to sensitive ears, we have further concluded 
 that the n, in burti is the long form of the u in bun. 
 
 Now, in not one of the long-sounding words here given is the r pro- 
 nounced at all ; it simply effects the exchange of a short vowel for its 
 correlative long one. But no more is it pronounced in ca,re, bear, and 
 2xdr or their cognates ; and by substituting i)articipial forms of the 
 same words or of words having the same sound, we get cared, bared, and 
 ■pared, M'hich are in j)erfect analogy with viart, corn, and burn. We 
 ask our readers to conclude that cared, bared, and pared, or care, bear, 
 and ^jrtt?', contain the respective long forms of the vowels heard in cad, 
 bad, and pad, or carry, Barrij, and parry. 
 
 Is the sound heard in care a simple vowel or diphthong? We 
 answer, a diphthong — composed of the short e in met, followed by 
 the short it in bun. Utter them quickly together, and judge for 
 yourself 
 
 It is remarkable that in Anglo-Saxon many words to the vowels of 
 which we now give the sound of a in carry were written with ae 
 di])h thong, which is the way wherein the Germans now represent the 
 sound of a in care (at least when a word begins with a capital letter 
 — otherwise by a). Thus at, back, bast, and cap were originally aet, 
 baeck, baest, and caeppe ; and our great Alfred's name was written 
 Alfred. If our word had, in the sense of ordered, be descended 
 from hatan to bid, and have in the present tense for order be a 
 corruption, then the inscription round the jewel found near the lale 
 
6 
 
 of Atliolney iiml preserved at Oxford, "yKlfred Imedde nie gewercan,"" 
 would road in modern English nlnio.st identically, " Alfred liad me 
 woik.-d." 
 
 NVIiy should the sound of eio in )H'ri) he treated hy Titman iis ii 
 di|iht]ioiig ] Why more than the comhinations of »/ with other vowel.s 
 heard in 
 
 yar^i, yea, yeast, yaion, and yoke, 
 yam, yea, yo)i, at)d young 1 
 
 NV'c Just now styled the Continental short o, and o recondite sounds i 
 and. iiuleed, they are usually seized \^lth niucli ditHculty by Englisli- 
 nit'H— the o because, as we have already said, it is only found in English 
 in unncoented syllables, the a because it does not exist in our 
 lanminge at all. The French lidjipe is not our liap, nor the (ternifiiii 
 woi'il matt our viat ; nor is the Italian a)iiw to be pronounced as the 
 last )iart of piatio is by the English : yet by far the greater number 
 of I'nglishnien who can conver.se in French, German, or Italian 
 utter the words after this fashion. Ilappe is really the brief way 
 of aiticulating our harp, matt of ov'r mart, and anno of the river 
 Arini after di'0])iiing the r. 
 
 Tilt* wi'iter is doubtless giving an .experience like that of many 
 others when he tells how, after spending a year and a half iu' 
 Switzerland between the ages of twelve and fourteen, having thought 
 in French for a year past, and being able to s|)eak ami write fluently 
 in the language, he one day Ijegan I'epeating to a tiny Swiss }ioy the- 
 words of the song — 
 
 " J'ai du T)on tabac," i^c. 
 
 when the youngster mockingly cut me .short with, " Que.st-ce que tu 
 dis, done i" 
 
 " J'jii du bou tapin.'" 
 
 Possibly if we had had fewer English and more French associates, 
 we should not have made the mistake. 
 
 The Germans and Italians, on the other hand, do not possess our 
 common short sound of a ; and the French have it only in their nasal 
 forms in, ain, or ein, as the little boy shov^^ed by his inquiry. The 
 Fi-ench vin, pain, and teint each really contain the same vowel as our 
 rail, pan, and tan ; and in keening with what we have already said 
 as to the long form of this vowel, vvarent and tinrent will be found 
 stepping stones from vin and teint to the French verre and terre, or to 
 our vary and tare. 
 
 Let us now, the better to substantiate our charges against previoiis- 
 classifiers, and the more firmly to build up our own system, pass a 
 few criticisms upon the favourite English lexicographer of the present 
 day, Mr. Austin Nnttall. 
 
 V 
 
Tliis wi-itcr, cHii<];iii<,' to oM tiinlitioii, ro))ifts<*nts the tir.st vowel 
 sound in (v/r// uiid irari/ ami llioir aii.ilogur.s in tin* .siiiiie wiiy iis the 
 first ill )iinkiiig and takhig — rtjwriting these examples ])h(»netieally 
 vd-re, wd-re, tnd-kUuj, and (d-kliii/. 
 
 H<! also drawn ;i false distinction lietween tli(^ sound of no in ii'ainl 
 and /''oo/ and that of n in /id/ or />k//. Is there any dillerence to 
 the ear, I ask, lietween nil in pull, which ho writes j)n/, and ool in 
 ivool, which he writes ii'odI / Surely nn pull '\h U) jinop so is tntitl to 
 tooof. In confusion our author at last writes vuidd kud, and icotdd 
 tvOod. 
 
 Lastly, Mr. Nuttall wrongly declares the a in the sutlix -ahh' to 1)0 
 the short Italian a— the ^sllorl sound corresponding to the long a ill 
 fat/in' ; whereas it really has no sound of a at all, but the one so 
 commonly occurring in unaccented syllables hoard in Imu on the ono 
 hand and /iidian and opudon on the other. Say " Fre /, )/()ur riib'll 
 kill that tly," an 1 you titter tht word diwdbh with a inert' diderenco 
 ill the stress; wliile readalAe is just redoubl-i witli tlie accent on tho 
 first syllable instead of the second. 
 
 Even were Nuttall's dictionary without the- and otlier flaws 
 besides, and were its system so far altennl as i.uv;iriably to represent 
 a particular sound by a particulav letter or ^ oup <>f letters' it would 
 onl}' ijo a classification of J/.glish sounds .ater all. ■^^ iiat we are 
 mak' lur goal here is the co(iip](>to tabling of ail the vowels and 
 vowel conipomuls uttei'ed by ilie diderent nations- mi tiif world. It is 
 true that for this purpose we have only exuminr-u four languages of 
 westei-n Europe ; yet from what we have hea -1 concerning the 
 pronunciati(jn of other tongues and from ceitaiu striking f(vduros of 
 perfeetion that the iiuml)ers in our collection present, we are led to 
 the conclusion that we have discovered and arranged all the simple 
 vowels that exist. 
 
 In the following table, for the composition of which we have 
 thoroughly prei)ared the reader, we have arranged ty|)ical words 
 from each language containing the same sound (where any such exist) 
 in one horizontal line ; the words showing the long and short form 
 thereof being placed side by side in ])airs. We have underlined in 
 each word the sound exemplitied ; and further, where the word is 
 polysyllabic we have marked with a thick accent the syllable on 
 which the stress is laid, if it affects the length or species of a vowel in 
 the same syllable or another. We have numbered all the simple 
 sounds in the first double column, or the blanks therein corresponding 
 to sounds in the other columns, by pairs ; giving a figure with the 
 long mark over it to each long vowel, and the same figure with a 
 short mark to the corresponding short vowel. Lastly, we have used 
 the same numbers to identify the simple sounds that take part in 
 forming each diphthong. (The stress is marked with au accent 
 thicker than the conventional onorj.) 
 
 
mm 
 
 ^mm^^^mmmi' 
 
 8 
 
 Table op the Vowel Sounds used in the Four Languages of 
 
 Western Europe. 
 
 Simple. 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 KNGLTSH. 
 
 FRENCH. 
 
 GERMAN. 
 
 ITALIAN. 
 
 1 boom T bush 
 
 boue, 
 
 bourre 
 
 kidi, kund 
 
 piu,+ 
 
 fanciuUa 
 
 . "2 mote ^ morAlity 
 
 maux (pi.) 
 
 mot 
 
 so, sold* 
 
 no. 
 
 poeta 
 
 3 dawn 3 don 
 
 corps, 
 
 correcte 
 
 dort, dotter 
 
 fu6ri,:l 
 
 : porre 
 
 4 path 4 
 
 pate, 
 
 patte 
 
 kahn, kann 
 
 ma. 
 
 Anno 
 
 5* bum 5 bun 
 
 de, 
 
 
 liebe, liebes. 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 (j age 6 edge 
 
 d£. 
 
 dette 
 
 spiit, speck 
 
 tre. 
 
 bello 
 
 ^ 
 
 
 suspendre 
 inuocent 
 
 IfiiVil KiiimTipl 
 
 
 
 7 7 
 
 "S keen ^ kin 
 
 vigne, 
 
 uie, nicht 
 
 si, 
 
 Agio 
 
 C'uiiijxjniid. 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 4+T cow 
 
 
 • 
 
 frail 
 
 
 
 
 
 ^ + 8 boy 
 
 
 
 neu 
 
 
 
 0'+5 pare, parry 
 
 p^re 
 taille. 
 
 
 sehr 
 frei 
 
 sera 
 
 
 4 + S nice 
 
 
 
 
 --^ s^ 
 
 deux 
 
 
 ol 
 
 
 
 5 + / 
 
 ' 
 
 A Triphthong. — The North Geniians add their sound of il to our 
 «(/ ill ju-ououiiciiig PAi ; and we quesiion whether all educated Germans 
 out of 8wabia do not give this pronunciation to an,, as in gehdade for 
 
 instance. 
 
 Remarks. — In uttering the king form and the short form^ of the 
 same vowel the lips and tongue are placed in the same position, the 
 difterence being produced with the throat only. 
 
 * Tills instance of the second short sound has been chaiiged to one given in 
 the body of the essay, as the fruit of criticism at the Institute. 
 
 + Mouosylhibic. t Dissyllabic. 
 
 I 
 
 s<i' 
 
rmmir^ 
 
 r 
 
 9 
 
 Diphthongs are compounded of -hort vowels, not of long ones : 
 long vowels will not coalesce, but continue to be separately heard, 
 producing such sounds as the di and e (e + e) in the French words 
 naif and oneme, and the au in the Italian hau-e. The Italians make 
 it a principle to sound every written vowel ; hence they would have 
 no diphthongs, but that they have failed to observe that subtle r, 
 when brought in after e, will always change it into a diphthong. 
 
 W and y do not make true diphthongs or triphthongs with the 
 sounds that follow them. In true dii)hthongs and triphthongs each 
 vowel is sounded to the same degree, and hence the blending is 
 complete ; whereas when to or ij precedes a vowel or cluster of 
 ^ vowels, the w or y is heard much more faintly than the other part of 
 
 the combination. W and y may be compared to grace notes in music ; 
 whereas diphthongs are like chords. W and y are formed by bringing 
 the lips and tongue into the same position as for sounds 1 and 8 ; but 
 they are not uttered until the instant that the vowel or diphthong 
 following is ready for utterance, when the breath is jerked from them 
 on to it. all the pause and sti-ess being thrown upon it, none upon 
 10 or y. 
 
 We find lo in English attached to sixteen different sounds, which 
 in the order of our list are shown as follows : — 
 
 woo, tooke, loarn, waft, world, toane, ween ; 
 
 wool, ivan, won, went, win ; 
 
 woimd (past tense), loare, wise, 
 
 loax, 
 
 Y, again, combines with eleven sounds, as heard in 
 
 youth, yoke, yawn, yarn, yearn, yea, yield, 
 
 occ//pied (=okyupied), yon, young, yes ; 
 
 besides yon,p (vulgar), and yare (obsolete). 
 
 The French sound of ou, equivalent to our id, and of II and gn, 
 equivalents to our y and ny, are probably heard before an equally large 
 proportion of vowels and diphthongs ; though on is not heard before 
 its own true vowel sound whether long or short, as lo is in the English 
 combinations looo and wool, while II and gn, of course, do nob occur 
 nearly so often as the consonantal y. The Gci mans have no equivalent 
 of 10 ; but their y, which has the sime effect in introducing a syllable 
 as our ?/, is probably heard before as many of their vowels and 
 diphthongs. The French also form a kind of w from sound 7 in such 
 words as liuit and huile. 
 
 If we now count up the sounds arranged in each double column of 
 the table, we shall find that Italian possesses twelve simple vowels and 
 one dii)hthong ; French, fifteen simple vowels and three diphthongs ; 
 Englisli, chirteen ar.d five respectively, and German, the full sixteen 
 and five (besides one triphthong). 
 
ssBsm 
 
 mmmm 
 
 10 
 
 German is thus far richer than any of the other three tongues in 
 vowel utterances ; and this, to our thinking, is one reason why 
 German sounds so peculiarly grand when sung, the other reason being 
 that the gutturals give vigour to the music while being somewhat 
 toned down by it. Gutturals, when not too frequent or too loud, 
 resemble the rough blast of a trumpet intermingling with the soft, 
 rich melody of a harp, and the plaintive warbling of a flute, to which 
 the other consonants and the vowels might, in turn, be likened. 
 
 Still, as spoken, English and French are not disfigured by the 
 constant repetition of the harsh ch sound, nor, wo may add, by the 
 Loo frequent sibilants chai'acteristic of German ; while, on the other 
 hand, they have a far more copious assortment than Italian of vowels 
 and diphthongs, and make up for falling short of German in this 
 respect by possessing what German is without, a large number of 
 combinations with w. 
 
 We have left nasal vowel sounds out of account in our table, they 
 being on a distinct footing. In uttering nasal vowels the mouth is 
 opened in exactly the same way for each as for true oral vowels ; but 
 half tlie breath is allowed to pass down the nose. The different nasal 
 vowels in use in French are heard in the words 7Uon, san{g), brun, 
 main, (the last answering, as we have already ])ointed out, to our true 
 oral sound in man). But we are inclined to consider nasal vowels as 
 corrupt forms, and cannot see that the number of sounds thus added 
 to the French categoiy increase the beauty of the language. 
 
 The natural melody and harmony of French, German, and English 
 may well be comjjared by examining three of the choicest extracts 
 culled from the poets of the three nations. Such are the following. 
 In each we have marked the vowel sound, simple or compound, where 
 it occurs for the first time, by the figures placed op]70site it in the 
 table. 
 
 La mort a des rigueurs k nul autre pareilles : 
 
 4 3 G 8" 5 + 7 f 2 4' 
 
 On a beau la prier ; 
 
 3 
 
 La cruel le qu'elle est se bouche les oreilles, 
 
 76 . ^ ^ 2 
 
 Et nous laisse crier. 
 
 Lo pauvre dans sa cabane, ou le chaume le couvre. 
 
 Est sujet a ses lois ; 
 Et le garde qui veille aux barrieres du Louvre 
 
 N'en defend point nos rois. 
 
 — Malherhe. 
 
 I 
 
11 
 
 Komm hcrab dii schone holde, 
 
 3 64 T 5 + 75 2 
 
 Und verlass dein stolzes Schloss. 
 1 4 + 8 5" 
 
 Blumen die der Leiiz geboren 
 
 8 6 + 5 3" 
 
 Streu ich dir in deinen Schooss. 
 
 3 + 88 "2 
 
 Horch ! der Hain ei-scballt von Liedern, 
 
 Und die Quelle rieselt klar ; 
 Rauin ist in dev kleinsten Hiitte 
 
 Fiir oin gliicklich Liebenyjaar. 
 
 Can storied urn or animated bust 
 
 6 + 5 3 8 5 6" 5 
 
 Back to its mansion call the fleeting breath ] 
 
 T 8 6 
 
 Can honour's voice provoke the silent dust ; 
 
 ~3 3 + 8 2 2 4 + 8 
 
 Or flattery soothe the dull, cold ear of death ? 
 
 r 
 
 — Goethe; 
 
 — Gray. 
 
 In the French stanzas there are fourteen different vowel sounds in 
 the first forty syllables and twelve in the last forty ; in the German 
 verse sixteen in" the first forty and seventeen in the last ; and in the 
 forty syllables that make up the English verse fifteen. 
 
 In variety of vowels German here plainly excels both the other 
 languages, while English outvies French. English and German, again, 
 are equally shown to be much richer than French in diphthongs, which 
 are the chords of the musical rhythm. And lastly, the English verse 
 is not blemished like the French stanzas by luonotonies such as '• crueile 
 qu'elle" or " dans sa cabane," while a closer inspection would reveal 
 that a few sounds recur much oftener in the French poetry than 
 in the English; nor is the smoothness of the English numbers 
 marred by the harsh repetition of sibilants which appears in its 
 German rival (we allude, of course, to the second line of the German 
 verse). 
 
 Two more instances will helj) to show how well distributed 
 the various vowel sounds are among English words. A couplet of 
 Macaulay's Horatius begins with six difi"erent long vowel sounds in 
 close succession ; nor will any sameness be found in the rest of its. 
 melody : 
 
 " Tall are the oaks whose acorns 
 
 3 4 
 Drop 
 
 3 
 
 8 2 
 in dark 
 
 8 
 
 1 6 
 Ausei-'s rill." 
 
 6 
 
12 
 
 How varied! How stately! And how rich again both in single 
 sounds and chords is the music in that line of Longfellow's Ode to 
 the Night : 
 
 "Thou lay'st thy fingers on the lips of care." 
 4+1 6 4 + 8 8 5 3 5 6 + 5 
 
 Our x'eaders may have been struck with the number of simple 
 sounds that we have been able to collect — eight. It I'eminds one of the 
 number of notes in the octave. Can there be any connection between 
 the two 1 For some years past the attention of scientific men has been 
 turned to the discovery of a musical pitch in vowels. Graham Bell 
 was led to the invention of the telephone by researches of this nature, 
 in the course of which he found that tuning forks of certain pitches 
 were reinforced by the breathing of certain vowels upon them ; but 
 he was perplexed by finding that some vowels had apparently a 
 double musical pitch. At the same time Helmholtz, making similar 
 researches, met with the same difficulty ; but, discovering the secondary 
 pitches, he reproduced some of the vowels by an electric current passing 
 through two forks at the same instant. Yet Helmholtz, whose grand 
 book we have recently examined, has not succeeded in making a 
 • complete scale of the vowels ; nor has any other writer that we are 
 aware of. And our examination of what Helmholtz says of his own 
 labours and those of other continental inquirers, makes us think thai 
 they are unlikely to do so, through an imperfect scrutiny on their 
 part of a language whose pronunciation was strange to them, namely, 
 our own. 
 
 After many experiments, and sus))ecting from the outset an analogy 
 between music and speech (creation is full of such beautiful analogies), 
 we discovered at length the eight long simple vowels enumerated in 
 our tables ; and we were able to arrange them in an ascending musical 
 order which, when whispered, they plainly followed to our ear. 
 We whispered them because we had read that Bell did so in his 
 experiments; and we attempted to make piano wires answer to our 
 breathing, but in vain. Then by repeating our ascending scale over 
 and over again until our ears rang with it, and patiently ])lodding at 
 the pianoforte until we thought we had matched it, we actually did 
 ascertain our key-note (the pitch of the sound of oo), and seemed 
 likewise to ascertain the intervals between our others. This key-note 
 in our adult male voice is the first e below the bass stave upon high- 
 pitched pianos, or they* next above it upon low-pitched ones. The 
 intervals which we suggest for our readers' confirmation ai'e 
 
13 
 
 1 
 
 m 
 
 '^~ 
 
 -1 
 
 
 -^- 
 
 S^l 
 
 
 zit: 
 
 19- 
 
 oo oh aw ah u(r) eh ii ee 
 
 Italian or German : ii 6 o(r) a e(r) e ii I 
 French: ou o o(r) ae(tinal)e u I. 
 
 At the same time (in keeping with what has been stated and proved 
 by Helmholtz and Bell as to vowels having a double pitch) we have 
 perceived a secondary descending scale of fainter sounds, proceeding 
 concurrently with the ascending scale and reversing its intervals ; 
 at least we sometimes seem to trace this descending gamut from the 
 keynote throughout, but it is especially conspicuous with the last 
 three vowels — numbers 6, 7, and 8 of our table, doubtless because in 
 uttering them more of the breath escapes at the side of the tongue. 
 Thus our whole harmony would run — 
 
 rt)f 
 
 .s>-^:€^-. 
 
 
 ^--p-_zt: 
 
 11 
 
 -^9- 
 
 00 oh aw ah u(r) eh ii ee 
 
 1^=^ 
 
 It 
 
 -&- 
 
 
 We then bethought oui-selves of trying the vowels as spoken instead' 
 of as whis})ered. They seemed to be chromatic ; but that clashed 
 with their whispered form, so we could scarcely credit it. Dropping 
 the study for some time, we tried once more ; and we were convinced 
 that chromatic they were. Thus an impression that we, and doubtless 
 many besides ourselves, have had in childhood, that a chromatic scale 
 sounded like people talking, is fully explained. 
 
 The keynote for the spoken vowels we find to be the same as for 
 the whispered ones. 
 
 But now comes a strange discovery. Whereas if all the notes on 
 the keyboard, black and white, be played from e natural to b natural, 
 all our long simple vowels are sounded, if only the white notes be 
 played, the vowel sounds that alone bear a name in most European 
 languages — the German and Italian a, e, i, o, u — will be heard and 
 no others. Thus, marking the spoken sounds by their most common 
 symbols, we find that their correspondence in musical characters is — 
 
 ^ 
 
 1 
 
na 
 
 14 
 
 Qi. 
 
 •i9- 
 
 u 
 
 '^■^=5^S^H^-1J^^ 
 
 -4- 
 
 o(r) ^ e(r) 
 
 Lastly, whether whispered or spoken, we discriminate the short 
 ■form of each vowel to be a tone and a half above the long form. 
 
 There is another discovery of a different nature that we have made 
 in the course of our study of vowel sounds. It is a strange fact that 
 many nations of the world dwelling far apart and s|)eaking tongues 
 very unlike each other, possess certain interjections in common. 
 Thus the English, the French, the Germans, the Hindoos, and the 
 Japanese use oh ! to express surprise, and ah ! or ach ! to betoken 
 sorrow ; the Englisli, the French, and the Japanese use eh ! to 
 enforce a question ; and while the boys of England use aw ! to show 
 extreme wonder, the men of Japan have recoui-se to aioee ! for the 
 same ])urpose. May not these interjections be the remnant of a 
 language that the peoples of the earth had in common before they 
 wei"e dispersed at the building of Babel, and which they were suflfered 
 to retain as evidence of their community of speech ] Do not they 
 help to prove the oneness of the human race, like the nodding of the 
 head for ' yes ' and tl e shaking of it for ' no,' common to so many widely 
 severed and ali^n races, and like the division of the day into twelve 
 hours, practised by the Hindoos and Japanese equally with ourselves 1 
 But a special discovery, with a record of which we will close this 
 essay, is, that each of the eight long simple vowels that we have dis- 
 criminated is used in English as an interjection with a distinctive 
 meaning (albeit sometimes with the help of a guttural attached to it). 
 
 Thus oogh! 
 oh! 
 aw I 
 ah! 
 urgh ! 
 eh! 
 ueh ! 
 eegh ! 
 
 expresses anger, 
 
 surprise, 
 
 wonder, 
 
 sorrow, 
 
 disgust, 
 
 inquiry, 
 
 contempt, 
 
 pain. 
 
 In conclusion the writer would say that if, as he is daily growing 
 ■more assured, his alleged discoveries are real, he will rejoice at 
 having added another to the many known instances of symmetry 
 in the Creator's handiwork — a common plan underlying two branches 
 of creation long thought to be fai apart. 
 
 M. L. ROUSE. 
 
f 
 
 J 
 
 15 
 
 Since tha public reading of this essay the fdllowing symbols have occurred 
 to the writer's mind as simply yet sufficiently distinguishing the three kinds of 
 vowel added to the received list, namely, 
 
 for the vowel in dawn and c/on O, © ; 
 
 for the vowel in burn and bu7i 31 9B i 
 
 for the vowel in kiifil, or first vowel in kiimmel, U,\I • 
 
 It will be seen that these symbols by their form mostly give to the new 
 vowels their true relative position on the vowel scale (that they do not do so 
 altogether is due to the writer's desire to avoid confusion). Thus the a?o sound 
 <!omes between the real o and real a sounds, the ur sound just before the real 
 e, and the German ii sound just before the real i (while bearing a general 
 resemblance to the real u). 
 
 And this in turn corresponds with their comparative affinity, as shown by 
 the changes that they undergo in dialects or by lapse of time. Thus hiUl, call, 
 and fall, are pronounced hnh'l, cah'l, and fah'l, in Scotch, or perliaps more 
 commonly still, hah, cah, and fah ; while Htorij and <jli>rij, on the other hand, 
 are pronounced stoh-nj and (jloh-ry : and a great many Torontonians turn 
 box, locks, xockii, and the like into hax, sax, and lacti, with the foreign short 
 sound of a. So, again, the final German e'a, occurring for example in bitte, 
 klcine and hase have in Swabia the true short sound of e given to them instead 
 of the sound heard in burn. And so, lastly, is the sound of kiihl or schwuhl 
 turned into the long sound of i over a good part of southern Germany. 
 
 The short sound, witii these symbols as with all the rest, might satisfactorily 
 be distinguished from its long correlative by using tlie classic marks ; and the 
 whole vowel alphabet would tlien read : 
 
 U, O, CDiA,a:,£:, U,I . / \u,o,a),ai,de.e,4.i. 
 
 Finally, since under such a phonogrAphic system there would be no other 
 double letters to confound with them, the diphthongs miglit each be written in 
 full, showing the vowels tliat make them up ; the double sh(jrt mark over all 
 being dispensed with as superfluous. Thus — 
 
 cow, boy, pare, parry, nice, deux. 
 
 would be written- 
 
 kau, i)©i,peaeT, peaeri, Ixai5,d^ewi■ 
 where, again, two vowels coming together formed no diphthong but were 
 heard separately, their concurrences would be distinguished from true 
 diphthongs by giving each vowel its own mark of quantity. 
 
 caique, niais, baide, assai,/ah{g, thuest, imyer, and seeing, 
 would stand — 
 
 kdlk, me, hdule, asai,felhk, tuest, pe^, and sling. 
 
 It will have been observed that we found no place in our catalogue for what 
 Worcester calls the intermediate sound of a. We think this a vain attempt at 
 a compromise between the two principal ways in which the first vowel is 
 uttered in such worda as branch, cantle, glass, lance, and past — namely, either 
 as our a or as our ex, of which the first is adopted by most Englishmen south 
 
m* 
 
 wmm 
 
 16 
 
 of the Humbcr and the second by most Yorkshiremen and Americana. A few 
 uncnltured Americans utter it as eoi, with a nasal twang to boot. Many 
 iScotclunen and Lancaahiremen, again, pronounce it as 2 ; and Webster asserts 
 that Fulton and Knight, wlioni Worcester claims as his supporters, really 
 treated it as a short form of the Italian «, or in other words as our <i, Webster 
 himself sustaining this view. But in sustaining it, he states that Thackeray in 
 his lectures always pronounced the a in such words with the long Italian souncl, 
 that by report all the chief English preachers, statesmen, and noblemen ()f liia 
 time so uttered it, and that educated Englishmen in general rendered it thus 
 down to the close of last century, when Walker, in his zeal to avoid a drawl, 
 brought the short sound heard in fat {ixi) into fashion. The last fact, coupled 
 with a desire to conform l-higlish pronunciation as far as possiljle to tiie typical 
 system, makes us lean in these words to the long Italian sound — our d. 
 
 M. L. R.