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 THE 
 
 "STANDARD-ALPHABET" 
 PROBLEM: 
 
 OR THB PRKL1MINABY SUBJECT OF A 
 
 GENERAL PHONIC SYSTEM, 
 
 CONSIDERED ON THB 
 
 BASIS OP SOME IMPORTANT FACTS IN THE SECHWANA LANGUAGE OF SOUTH AFRICA, 
 
 AND IN REFERENCE TO THE VIEWS OF PROFESSORS LEPSIUS, 
 
 MAX MULLER, AND OTHERS. 
 
 A CONTRIBUTION TO PHONETIC PHILOLOGY, 
 
 BY 
 
 ROBERT MOFFAT, JUN., 
 
 SURVEYOR, 
 Fellow of the Soyal Geographical Society. 
 
 " The loss of the living traditional pro- " But the linguistic scholar will prefer to 
 
 nunciation implies a loss of much more than follow the written system fixed by literature, 
 
 what we generally call pronunciation." and to neglect the varying deviations and 
 
 Sunen. shades of modern pronunciation." Lepsiui. 
 
 fttfalisjrers. 
 
 LONDON TRUBNEB & Co., PATERNOSTER Row. 
 
 , ( J. C. JUT A, CAPE TOWN. 
 
 a AFRICA. ^ Q BROWNE> NATAL 
 
 1864. 
 The right of Translation is reserved.
 
 Unavoidable delays, contingent on the work being edited in a 
 foreign land, have delayed its publication. The concluding sheets 
 have been revised by the Rev. J. FRfenoux, of Motito, S.A. 
 
 THE PRINTER. 
 October, 1864. 
 
 GEOHGE CNWIN, GBESHAM STEAM PBE88. BUCKLERSBURY, LONDON.
 
 Stack 
 Annex 
 
 5 
 
 735" 
 
 TO HIS EXCELLENCY 
 
 SIR GEORGE GREY, K.C.B., 
 
 A SCHOLAR IN AFRICAN PHILOLOGY, AND AT THE SAME TIME ITS 
 DISTINGUISHED PROMOTER, 
 
 THIS HUMBLE ATTEMPT TO ARRIVE AT SOME OF THE FUNDAMENTAL 
 
 PRINCIPLES OF HUMAN SPEECH, 
 UPON THE BASTS OF A NEW ORDER OF FACTS, 
 
 THE RESULT OF PERSONAL RESEARCHES INTO THE . LANGUAGE OF A REMOTE 
 
 PORTION OF THOSE INDIGENOUS SOUTH AFRICAN TRIBES WHICH 
 
 HAVE LATELY BENEFITED BY HIS EXCELLENCY'S RULE, 
 
 is (BY PERMISSION) 
 
 MOST RESPECTFULLY DEDICATED, BY HIS OBLIGED SERVANT, 
 
 THE AUTHOR.
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 INTRODUCTORY REMARKS, 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 PRINCIPLES OF CONSONANTAL CLASSIFICATIONS 1 
 
 I. Of Classifications at present in use (Ancient and Modern) .... 1 
 II. General Principles of a Classification suggested by the Mutation 
 
 of Consonants in the Sechwana Language 14 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 ANALYSIS OF SECHWANA CONSONANTS 19 
 
 I. The Guttural Series 20 
 
 Parenthetical Section [Confusion in Nomenclature and Ortho- 
 graphy in the usual Classification of the Gutturals] 23 
 
 II. The Lingual Series 40 
 
 III. The Labial Series 51 
 
 CHAPTER IK. 
 ANALYSIS OF~OTHER CONSONANTS EXAMINATION INTO THE POWERS OF 
 
 THE REMAINING LETTERS IN THE GENERAL ALPHABET OF DR. 
 
 LEPSIUS THE CLASSIFICATION OF SUCH AS ARE 'REALLY^ ELEMENTS, 
 AND OF OTHERS THAT MAY BE SUGGESTED BYJTHEM, UPON PRINCIPLES 
 
 RESULTING FROM ANALYSIS IN PRECEDING CHAPTER 57 
 
 I. Faucales (of Lepsius) 58 
 
 (a) Nature of the Spiritus Asper 69 
 
 (b) Are there P.inary or Quantitive forms of the Spiritus ? . . . . 75 
 Cc) The Spiritus influenced by the long quantity or Syllabic Accent 78 
 
 (d) Vocalization oftlte Spiritus, and of some Consonants .. .. 80 
 
 (e) The Nasals and their Vocalization 90
 
 VI 
 
 PAGE 
 
 II. The Palatales (of Lepsius) and the Letter q 99 
 
 The Oriental q probably the elementary form of the aspirated 
 
 consonant 'g noticed under Classification of Sechtoana Gutturals 101 
 
 ILL Cerebrates Indicffi (of Lepsius) " 106 
 
 IV. Linguales Arabicse (of Lepsius) 112 
 
 V. Dentales (of Lepsius) 121 
 
 Inquiry into the nature of the letters s and z, th (in thin), and th 
 
 (in this), and the probable existence of their elementary forms .. 121 
 
 VI. Labiales (of Lepsius) 129 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 STJMMABY OF PEECEDING ANALYSES 131 
 
 1- Compendious View of the Simple Consonants, as suggested by the 
 
 Phonology of the Sechtoana Language 131 
 
 IT. On the Application of the Nomenclature and Orthography, above 
 
 suggested, to systems of permutation in other Languages . . . . 144 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 COMBINATIONS OF Simple Consonants 167 
 
 (a} Latham's " Law of Accommodation," how far correct ?.. .. 168 
 
 C b) Consonantal Diphthongs 174 
 
 (c) The Hottentot or Naman and Kafir clicks explicable upon the 
 
 principles arrived at in this work 
 
 [_No MSS.have been found for this."]
 
 INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 
 
 IT is in the nature of man and his prerogative to generalize, 
 however limited the range of his observation ; and in proportion 
 as this is extended, is he enabled the more or less confidently 
 to demonstrate the truth of his knowledge, or the degree of 
 credibility of what he anticipates. Therefore, I presume that 
 fresh statements, whether of facts or inferences, will be welcome 
 from any individual in a new field of research, however obscure 
 or diffident he may be ; especially in this golden age of inductive 
 science, when particulars, and instances, and data, in every de- 
 partment, are being scrambled after by all classes of students. 
 
 I have been prompted by such considerations as the above to 
 publish, for the information of others devoted to the study of 
 language, the results of my observations during a few years of 
 assiduous research in an elementary branch of the subject. This 
 I had long selected for my own amusement and instruction in 
 leisure moments of a professional vocation ; and having recently 
 been engaged in an active trading life on a wide frontier, among 
 native tribes, the destruction of whose language is as inevitable 
 as their speedy social dissolution, I have enjoyed unusual facilities 
 for the prosecution of my object. 
 
 While the quotations, which confront each other on the 
 title-page of this treatise, present in a concise form the opinions 
 of two of the first continental scholars on the same subject, they 
 will also serve to convey an idea of the nature of the task I have
 
 now undertaken. Where such absolute difference of opinion 
 exists between men possessing stores of learning, there must 
 rather be a deviation in the researches of either of them, than a 
 deficiency in his materials. The one, in a special case, proposes 
 to explain an ancient rock-engraven literature by means of an 
 investigation into the actual relations of the material elements 
 of human speech, as " transcribed * * * from the lips" of 
 those " among whom it has been traditionally preserved ;" * the 
 other attempts to establish an " absolute rule" of phonetics on 
 the historical relations of those elements, as represented to the 
 eye by letters in various existing literatures. I need not proceed 
 to argue the question as to which is suggesting the proper path 
 of research for the collection of data, in order to arrive at the 
 laws of " a natural science," as that of phonetic philology un- 
 doubtedly is ; and whether the rudiments of this science are to be 
 conveyed to the mind by the artificial means of letters to the 
 eye, or rather the more legitimate one of sounds to the ear. 
 
 Dr. Lepsius, by means of an immense command of ancient and 
 modern graphical materials, of both dead and living languages, 
 and taking the Indian grammarians as a guide, has arrived at 
 the construction of a " universal linguistic alphabet ;" but truly 
 elaborate as it is, and however convenient it may be for students 
 whose attention is confined to the historical forms of the Indo- 
 European tongues, there is decidedly something of an artificial nature 
 about it, which must necessarily be discordant with the views of 
 others who, in confining their investigations to the "living 
 traditional pronunciation" of primitive tribes like those of South 
 Africa, are led to arrive at conclusions of a more* demonstrative 
 character. The quotation to which his name is attached sufficiently 
 explains the basis of his system, and the difficulty of his labours. 
 
 * Dr. Lepsius's researches (1835) into the relation between the Egyptian 
 and Coptic, after all, I believe, only extended to the comparison of litera- 
 tures viz., the hieroglyphics and the liturgy.
 
 The following treatise is the result of a mode of research 
 suggested by the pointed remark of the late Baron de Bunsen, con- 
 tained in the other quotation. It is a survey of the elements of 
 articulation as they occur in the crude and simple speech of a 
 barbarous people, and the principles which enter into their various 
 mutations and combinations ; which, in an order analogous to 
 that usually pursued in all natural science, must precede a con- 
 sideration of the more complicated or syntactical stages of the 
 material forms of human language. It maintains at the outset, 
 that " we can understand the historical forms of speech only by 
 watching and comprehending the process of utterance as it goes 
 on even now in the individual speaker ;* but rather by observing 
 the effects of the process on the ear, and in the various permu- 
 tations of the elements of articulation, than the cause in the 
 physiology of the voice which pre-supposes the anatomy of the 
 organs. It, in fact, claims for the humble Sechwana language, 
 spoken by numerous degraded tribes on the south-eastern borders 
 of the South African desert (or Khalagare wilderness), and 
 why not for other unwritten tongues ? that perfection of 
 phonic purity which Professor Max Mliller concedes only to 
 the Vaidik Sanskrit, whose historical orthography is more 
 than two thousand years old ; and for the very same reasons, 
 viz., that it (can be) " studied by means of oral tradition only, 
 and .... in the absence of a written alphabet, the most minute 
 differences of pronunciation (have) to be watched by the ear," 
 and " it (has) suffered less from the influence of phonetic corrup- 
 tion than any tongue from which we can derive our observa- 
 tions.''! While it does not deny that the phonic forms of the 
 ancient vernacular Sanskrit were perfect, whatever corruptions 
 may since have crept into their phonetic representations, it holds 
 that those of the Sechwana, and some other barbaric dialects, are 
 
 * The Saturday Review, Jane 29, 1861, p. 673. 
 
 f Proposals for a Missionary Alphabet, &c.,\)y Max AJ tiller, M.A., p xxii.
 
 perfect, and still accessible to the inductive philologer, but at an 
 immeasurably further advanced stage of inductive science. It 
 therefore deals only with natural facts, discovered in situ by per- 
 sonal observation. 
 
 As thus treated, the subject may be found to have some new 
 phases when viewed by men of learning, for whose consideration 
 I would with becoming reserve and humility submit my views. 
 It is just possible that a few of the facts, and such conclusions 
 as have been arrived at, or to which they may come, may 
 account for various phenomena in the accidence of those written 
 tongues, in which the development of the essential form has 
 greatly modified the accidental structure. Though I have 
 availed myself of the common prerogative of generalizing, and 
 even speculating to the utmost of my ability, and presume to 
 state such a possibility, I have given every particular that has 
 fallen under my notice, to enable the reader to arrive at his own 
 conclusions, by the aid of such accessory knowledge as he 
 doubtless possesses beyond me. 
 
 In craving the candid attention of the reader, and lest the 
 title of this treatise should lead him to expect more than it con- 
 tains, I would beforehand state 
 
 a. That the object of the work is not to prescribe a new 
 system, but rather to contribute to the construction of one,* or to 
 illustrate the science of universal phonics by the collection and 
 arrangement of instances from the phonology of the Sechwana 
 language of South Africa. It is an attempt to treat inductively 
 on a subject, which, by being usually based on the physiology of 
 the human voice, has hitherto only been examined deductively ; 
 nevertheless, reserving to myself the privilege of employing the 
 
 * On reference to the tables of consonants in Chapters IV. and V., the 
 letters in bold type will show the reader the extent to which the classification 
 is based on data furnished by the language; those in italics", the mode in 
 which I have attempted to complete it by a train of speculation suggested 
 by them.
 
 latter speculative mode of analysis, besides so much of classi- 
 fication as the extent of my train of facts will have admitted. 
 Without -venturing to assert that, by a consideration of the 
 elements of articulation of any one spoken language, a correct 
 system of phonics may be framed applicable to all, it will satisfy 
 me to intimate that at least an imperfect, and not-incorrect or frag- 
 mentary, system may thus be framed ; and that the consideration 
 of other languages, containing additional elements, would, by in- 
 creasing the number of instances, contribute to a more copious 
 induction. I have, therefore, proceeded upon the principle that 
 it is absolutely necessary, for the purposes of this elementary 
 branch of the science, to arrive at fixed results in one pure and 
 living dialect, before advancing to a comparative view of different 
 tongues. This will, I trust, obviate, in my case, a common 
 objection urged against writers whose observations are confined 
 to a single language. 
 
 b. However I may feel the want of some fixed mode of re- 
 gistering my researches, as a saving of both time and labour, a 
 graphic scheme is entirely secondary to my immediate object. 
 Anything of the kind, even though it may emanate from a 
 master-mind in philology, must be regarded as immature, till 
 suggested by a phonic system resulting from an inductive survey, 
 similar to, but of a far more comprehensive nature than, that I have 
 attempted. It is in vain to expect it so long as men seek to arrive 
 at the nature of vowels and consonants exclusively, either by 
 experiments on the action of the vocal organs, or by artificial 
 contrivances to imitate them, or by the comparison of existing 
 historical alphabets. 
 
 To the self-experimenting phono-physiologist in the one case, 
 the facetious advice of Professor De Morgan to the meta- 
 physical student is particularly applicable, viz. : " I would not 
 dissuade a student from * * * inquiry ; on the contrary, I would 
 rather endeavour to promote the desire of entering upon such 
 b2
 
 subjects : but I would warn him, when he tries to look down his 
 own throat with a candle in his hand, to take care that he does 
 not set his head on fire."* In the second case, it happens that 
 though the ingenious contrivers of speaking machines "have 
 succeeded in imitating a great part of the sounds used in speech," 
 they confess that " every simple and independent sound and 
 consonant requires a special apparatus ;" they must, consequently, 
 admit that the production of the unique combination and operation 
 of the different apparatus would be a task about as hopeless as that 
 of any optician who would attempt to devise a means of imitating 
 the peculiar structural arrangement of the eye, whereby the 
 automatic alteration in the curvature of the crystalline lens adjusts 
 it to different ranges of vision ; in fact, that what the telescope with 
 its sliding focal adjustments (spite of its comparative perfection) 
 is to the wonderful structure of the visual organ, so are " reed 
 tubes" and " vibrating tongues" to the complicated organism 
 required in the perfect enunciation and articulation of the most 
 simple elements of voice. In the third case, it may be urged that 
 the fact of the English, or any other historical alplwbet, only indi- 
 cating a limited number of elements, does not necessarily imply that 
 the language does not contain several additional elements, though 
 these may be represented by irregular combinations of letters. In 
 the transliteration of such, " where," to use the words of Professor 
 Mliller, " for reasons best known to the archaeologist, one sign 
 may represent different sounds, and one sound be expressed by 
 different signs, new and entirely distinct questions are involved, 
 and capable of solution by archaeological and philological research 
 alone. "-f Hitherto the advocate of historical orthography has as 
 little to show as either the physiological observer or the artificial 
 experimenter, in any attempt to establish a natural classification 
 of the elements of speech. The one mode of research has only 
 
 * " Formal Logic," p. 27, Note. f " Proposals," &c., p. 20.
 
 shed a few rays of light on the other, and phonology, instead of 
 being already " reduced to its last analyses," as a learned American 
 writer remarks, is, in his own words, as echoed from Sir Robert 
 Taylor's Institution, Ox/ord, -verily and without equivocation, 
 "exactly the same that Sanskrit grammarians more than two 
 thousand years ago defined its elements to be in their own 
 primeval tongue ;"* but not what it may be, if the modern 
 philologer will base his inferences on facts of a proper descrip- 
 tion.f 
 
 In corroboration, it may be alleged that the whole system of 
 phonetic philology, as at present based on ancient and existing 
 alphabets, and physiological classifications, is but a labyrinth of 
 graphic schemes. To the various powers given to the Roman letters 
 in different European alphabets, and various letters representing 
 the same power, there may be added (1) both letters and 
 sounds introduced by travellers and navigators of different 
 nations, in lists of words collected irregularly and carelessly 
 from uncivilized tribes ; (2) the more complete alphabets of 
 
 * Bibliotheea Sacra, Oct., 1859, p. 673. (See also Proposals, &c., by 
 Max Miiller, p. 22.) 
 
 f- The following, from the pen of no less distinguished a philologer than 
 the late Rev. Richard Garnett, of the British Museum, and which has 
 occurred to me since the above quotation was written, approaches more to 
 the sober and truthful: 
 
 ' It is presumed that enough has been advanced to show that the scale 
 of permutations in the Indo-European languages, as laid down by Grimm 
 and Pott, will admit of being considerably extended beyond the limits 
 which they have assigned; and that it is very unsafe to fix upon Sanscrit, 
 or any other known language, as a model to which all others are to be 
 referred. It is believed that there are numerous phenomena in language 
 of which neither Sanscrit, Greek, Teutonic, nor all in conjunction, can 
 furnish a satisfactory solution ; and that the real original articulations of 
 speech have in many cases yet to be ascertained. This can only be 
 attempted by a copious induction of all known varieties of cognate forms, 
 and all that we can rationally expect to achieve is an imperfect approxima- 
 tion to the truth." Philological Essays, p. 254.
 
 missionaries and priests labouring under the same disadvantages 
 of a diversity of plan ; (3) the host of cumbrous alphabets of 
 Oriental languages, dead and living; and (4) the numerous 
 "transliterated" forms of these alphabets introduced by Oriental 
 scholars of different schools, each according to a " method of 
 notation peculiar to himself," not to mention the orthoepical 
 schemes of many authors ; so that it may truly be said, 
 the operations of the linguist are trammelled by his own 
 materials.* This complexity of his phonetic materials has been 
 especially increased since the efforts of Sir William Jones, in 
 1788, and of Count Volney, in 1795. Missionaries labouring 
 among conterminous tribes have often made attempts to arrive 
 at uniformity, and philologers have as frequently seen the 
 absolute necessity of a universal alphabet for the analytical 
 purposes of their science; but the general public, with Isaac 
 Pitman before them, are too prone to suspect every innovation 
 as only a preliminary to the practical " abrogation" of the ancient 
 forms of literature. Therefore, such characters as I have made 
 use of, or even any suggestions on modes of writing the elements 
 of articulation, must be regarded as arbitrary, though, as much 
 as possible, in keeping with the Roman graphic system ; at all 
 events, most of my remarks upon them are confined to the foot- 
 notes. It will, nevertheless, be seen that, by working on a new 
 basis, I have attempted to provoke a little discussion on a subject 
 which every student of unwritten tongues must be most anxious 
 to see satisfactorily settled ; in order that the constant trouble of 
 making myriads of alterations may be dispensed with in the col- 
 lection or publication of orthographical data. 
 
 c. Much less do I presume to enter into the controversy on 
 the subject of " Romanizing" existing ancient and cumbrous 
 
 * The numerous comparative tables, occurring in this work, of letters 
 intended by different authors to represent the same series of sounds, will 
 alone show the confusion of alphabetic systems.
 
 alphabets, in which some of the first Oriental scholars have been 
 engaged.* Independently of all the arguments which it is pos- 
 sible to allege for or against such an innovation on Oriental 
 graphic systems, it must be confessed that it would amply repay 
 the labour of any man with the necessary ability, and possessed 
 with the " phonetic crotchet," as it has been called, to reduce the 
 " twenty different vernacular tongues" of India, having now "fifteen 
 various alphabets," to the same phonetic system, based upon iden- 
 tical phonic principles, without consul ting one volume of philosophy, 
 poetry, or theology. He would verily be examining them in situ, 
 and classifying them by a most rigid analytic formula ; while, by 
 giving his attention to Pali, Sanscrit, and Arabic, he would have 
 to resort to the " books" of the Buddist, the Hindu, and the 
 Mussulman which ancient literary repositories, in point of value, 
 bear the same relation to the living dialects, that a few drawings 
 of fossils in a museum would have to originals still im- 
 bedded in the rock. It cannot, then, be denied that a body of 
 men, by a division of labour, and acting upon preconcerted views 
 of a phonetic system, would arrive at still more comprehensive 
 results, which no existing literatures could ever afford. In the 
 same manner as the learned Bunsen showed that a knowledge 
 of the traditional Koptic, gathered from the priests, would be 
 necessary to enable the Egyptologer to decipher the illegible 
 groups of hieroglyphics, so it would be easy to prove that a 
 still surviving colloquial dialect would shed light on the most 
 ancient sacred literature ; for " all sacred language is * * 
 essentially, nothing but an earlier stage of the popular dialect, 
 
 * For: Sir William Jones, Volney, Gilchrist, Monier Williams, Sir C. 
 Trevelyan, H. T. Prinsep, Dr. Yates, Dr. Duff, Dr. Caldwell, Max Miiller, 
 Lepsius, the " Times," and others. 
 
 Against : J. Prinsep, J. Tytler, Dr. Jarrett, H. H. Wilson, Mohl, and others 
 See Evangelical Christendom, May, 1860, p. 237.
 
 preserved by means of the sacred books,"* only in an imperfect 
 and fragmentary, however correct, form. 
 
 d. Nor do I attempt to expatiate on the necessity of intro- 
 ducing a uniform phonetic system for the practical purposes of 
 the missionary. If we are to credit the opinions of many writers 
 of the present day, as to the qualifications of a missionary for 
 example, in India then he requires the preparation of a savan. 
 He has not only to master the root language of the people among 
 whom he is labouring, but also that from which its theology has 
 
 * " Egypt's Place in Universal History." Bunsen, Vol. I., p. 258. 
 
 Indeed, if we would wish to form an idea of the objective value of a 
 sacred literature, in a philological point of view, and compared with the 
 traditional language of the people among whom a new religion has been 
 introduced, we have only to examine any elaborate modern translations 
 of the Bible into unwritten tongues, such as the Sechwana, for instance, 
 which will bear comparison with many. The missionary acknowledges 
 that, in order to maintain the tenor of Scripture, he is compelled in a 
 measure to mar the colloquial idiom in a few cases; ex gr., to indulge in 
 circumlocution, where a curt phrase would convey the identical meaning 
 more elegantly. It cannot be otherwise, as, in the colloquial idiom, there 
 is so involved a reference to the instinctive customs, habits, and modes of 
 thought of the barbarian, that it would often be inappropriate, and in 
 many cases unnecessary, to introduce it; for, excepting the book of Job, 
 with its host of allusions to the scenes of the outer world, the subject of 
 all sacred books is generally too confined to allow of the introduction of 
 more than & fourth part of the spoken words in a comprehensive language. 
 
 Bearing this in mind, and the fact that a sacred literature is a new subject 
 in the language of an ancient or barbarous people, it is not surprising that 
 we hear of slurs cast by scholars in India on missionary vernacular, and in 
 this country on school Kaffir. In South Africa, I have heard an intelligent 
 missionary, after one year's application to the " book," or otherwise " sacred," 
 Sechwana, convey the simple truths of Scripture to the natives in the most 
 intelligible strain, becaiise, during the acquisition of the language, his 
 phraseology has been confine/l, almost exclusively, to that new subject ; while, 
 again, I have heard some, comparatively uneducated, of a few years' 
 standing, so attached to this book or sacred idiom, without at the same time 
 making themselves daily more acquainted with the common idiom for 
 colloquial purposes, that their garrulous repetition of it on all subjects was 
 absolutely disgusting. It is sometimes as well that a translator is as much 
 at home in the one as in the other.
 
 XVII , -. 
 
 been derived, and, of course, their respective alphabets. Of the 
 six systems of Indian philosophy, the Nyaya, with its excess of 
 logic ; the Sankhya, with its excess of metaphysics ; and the 
 Mimansa, with its excess of theology,* all claim his versatile 
 attention.! To accomplish his object, he must study those tongues 
 thoroughly, for a smattering is often no better than, absolute 
 ignorance. But, in order to understand the true end of his 
 exertions, it is as well to compare his calling and sphere with 
 those of the philologer. 
 
 The vocation of a missionary, who provides an unwritten 
 language with an alphabet, or finds one imperfectly prepared, is 
 entirely independent and peculiar ; his aim is the communication 
 of Divine truth to the instinctive ignorance of heathens; to 
 substitute for the vague impressions which exist on their 
 minds of impersonal " rude powers," or subtle deities, the re- 
 vealed fact of a personal God, or supreme moral Governor for a 
 superstitious adherence to any human method of expiation, a 
 living faith in His incarnation and redemptive act for a servile 
 willingness to appease aught that will quiet conscience, the spirit 
 of penitence and reformation for the fear of death, the hope of 
 future existence. Whatever the medium, he seeks to address 
 man, " be it an A'rya or a Sudra." His teachings have to be 
 conducted, not so much by an " argumentative exposition" of 
 his doctrines, and an "elaborate confutation" of those of his 
 opponents, as " in the form of a testimony * * with respect 
 to the mode of exhibiting it, though not in the spirit of the 
 teacher * * dogmatic. r \ He has to declare " intrinsic 
 
 * " Indian Logic," by Max Miiller. Appended to " Laws of Thought, by 
 W. Thomson, D.D.," p. 363. 
 
 f " Moreover, as is well known, the peculiar philosophical notions of the 
 learned Hindus must be understood by those who would effectively evan- 
 gelise that race." Evangelical Christendom, May, 1860, p. 244. See Ibid., 
 Oct., I860, p. 524. 
 
 | Works of Rev. Robt. Hall, by Olinthus Gregory, LL.D., Ac., Vol. I., p. 302.
 
 xviu 
 
 primordial truths," without the aid of a " syllogism, or quo- 
 tation" * of human wisdom, and by the mere external means of a 
 new vernacular. Therefore, in many cases he considers it 
 immaterial to him what orthography he may use,f as his practical 
 operations differ from those of the philologer, of whose science 
 he applies such a knowledge as he happens to have acquired to 
 suit his own peculiar plans. Moreover, as to his sphere of 
 duty, what is true of human nature in South Africa, where 
 the most rigid statist would be compelled to admit it, will be 
 true of man in all lands viz., that it is only amongst poor, or 
 isolated, or dismembered communities, that the missionary has 
 been most successful. One would think, therefore, that as he 
 has more immediately to explode popular notions, and not systems 
 of philosophy ; to dispel the superstitious polytheism of the 
 " unthinking multitude," rather than the atheism and pan- 
 theism of philosophic sects : in fact, to deal with the vulgar 
 rather than with the learned he would endeavour to command 
 a knowledge of the popular dialect, independently of existing 
 ancient vernacular literatures, in which " the spelling of words is 
 no longer phonetic but traditional." Indeed, if the fact admitted by 
 the "Friend of India" and cited by Sir C. E. Trevelyan,f may be 
 regarded as an approximate estimate of the proportion of the 
 educated classes to the ignorant masses in India viz., " that only 
 one million out of the thirty millions of Bengal can read" their 
 indigenous literature, the missionary can have no doubt as to 
 which ought to engage his attention, and the mode of writing 
 speech most likely to facilitate his labours. The amount 
 
 * Vinet. 
 
 f " But as it is so immaterial how the language is written, and the only 
 essential point being that the Word of God may be taught in it, I entirely 
 waive the question as to the mode of writing, &c." Rev. H. G. Knudsen, 
 R,M.S., in Carres. S. A. A. B. Society, p. 5. 
 
 t Papers originally published at Calcutta in 1834 & 1836, on the application 
 of the Roman Letters to the Language of Asia. London, Longman, 1854.
 
 XIX 
 
 of success which has attended the labours of missionaries in 
 South Africa during the last half century, in the introduction 
 of a native literature,, is only a proof that as much could be 
 accomplished among the illiterate of every nation by any who 
 would choose the same course ; for it must be patent to all, that 
 what is communicable to the vulgar must be intelligible to the 
 learned. 
 
 The aim of the philologer is far otherwise. While, on the 
 one hand, he has solved some most interesting ethnologic pro- 
 blems, such as the identification of the radical language of the 
 " rude Kelt" of the corners of Britain, with that of the "effemi- 
 nate Bengali'' of the Indian promontory; and, more' recently, 
 the stock of the Hottentot of the Southern extremity of 
 Africa, with that of the ancient Egyptian of the extreme 
 North and discerns in the future still greater triumphs ; 
 on the other hand, he feels assured that if " truth consists in the 
 conformity of the names by which the representations of the mind 
 are expressed to the representations themselves," and if " lan- 
 guage is the only external condition on which philosophy is 
 dependent,"* he has the whole range of mental science at his feet. 
 To effect these objects, the analysis of language, phonetic as well 
 as grammatic, is his great power ; the former, by the comparison 
 of the material forms of human thought, as are to be found in 
 the various sets of combinations of the elements of articulation, 
 and in the collocations of words, which distinguish different 
 tongues ; the latter, by an inquiry into the essential form, or 
 the law of the process, by which the varieties of names and 
 syntactical constructions in different languages are but different 
 expressions for similar cognitions in all.f His sphere of re- 
 
 * Sir William Hamilton's Lectures, Vol. I., p. 382. 
 
 f This will perhaps be the fittest place for me to append, in explanation 
 of my meaning here, the following remarks, which I have extracted (slightly 
 modified) from a letter addressed in February, 1857, to a distinguished 
 individual greatly interested in the study of aboriginal tongues :
 
 XX 
 
 search alone is analogous to that of the missionary's duty. As 
 with the missionary, the more unsophisticated and humble the 
 people, the more successful he is likely to be ; so with the 
 philologer, the more simple and primitive the language in which 
 he works, the more correct are his conclusions likely to be in 
 all cases ; for in it the various forms and combinations of either 
 sound or meaning* are more easily discernible, and resolvable 
 
 " It has often appeared to me that many of the so much misunderstood 
 elementary principles of universal grammar, which are the subject of great 
 diversity of opinion among scientific men in Europe, may be explained and 
 proved, and in some instances discovered, by a clear investigation of such 
 hitherto unwritten tongues, when carefully reduced to writing ; e.g., 
 
 " Mr. Home Tooke's idea of prepositions and conjunctions is, that they 
 do not form distinct classes of words, but are merely abbreviations of nouns 
 and verbs." Eneye. Brit., Vol. X., p. 673. 
 
 Page 657. " It has been proved, by such evidence as leaves no room for 
 doubt, that if, though called a conjunction, is in fact a verb in the im. 
 perative mood, of the same import with give, so that we may substitute the 
 one for the other without in the smallest degree altering the sense." 
 
 The identical word holds good in the Sechwana, in the sentence ha Tti 
 bobola nka shwa (If I sicken, I may die) ; ha, the equivalent of our con- 
 junction if, is nothing else than the verb h.a (give), which is in a measure 
 obsolete in the language, and is usually employed in asking a gift, or at 
 meals, as mo ha (help, or give him), naea being the more common word 
 on other occasions. 
 
 AGAIN "From (the preposition) merely means beginning, and nothing 
 
 else." "As from always denotes beginning, so to and till always 
 
 denote the end. There is, however, this difference between them, that to 
 denotes the end of any thing ; till, only the end of time." Ibid., p. 681. 
 
 Now, in the Sechwana sentence, ki le lea ea go CWa (or go simolola ha) 
 Kuruman go ea Khatwe, the words go cwa and go ea, which are nothing 
 else than prepositions in their primitive forms, respectively mean to come 
 out (or to begin tvith), and to go to. Go tsamaea (to be in the act of going), 
 which is used for till or until, implies time. These are coincidences 
 showing that, however the accidental forms of language may vary, the 
 essential form or meaning is the same. 
 
 * In illustration I add the following from my note-book, with an example 
 from the primitive dialect of the Sechwana : 
 
 Nothing is more common in writings on mental science than a reference 
 to the connexion between thought and language; but this seldom exceeds 
 ' half belief and feeble assertion.' The remark of Professor de Morgan,
 
 XXI 
 
 into their elements. I have somewhere met with the remark, 
 that " the concerns of barbarians, unconnected and remote from 
 all contact with literature and civilization, and destitute of all 
 
 " I doubt whether we could have made thought itself the subject of thought 
 without language," (Formal Logic, p. 34) is, however, more bold and sug- 
 gestive ; and he surely speaks here of language in its essential forni. But 
 though we are told by another able author that logic is a science of " the 
 structural laws according to which man thinks," and by the above profound 
 logician that " logical truth depends upon the structure of the sentence," I 
 doubt whether either of them would concede that logic " can but result as a 
 generalization * * * from an inductive survey" of the science of 
 universal grammar, i.e., language in its essential form. To any inclined to 
 this opinion, as well as to those who maintain that language "is not 
 essential to thought," and go so far as to say " it must not be supposed 
 that an examination of the rules of language would answer every purpose of 
 a logical system," the undermentioned facts cannot be devoid of interest. 
 For it is to be expected that parties holding such opposite views must be at 
 variance as to whether or not the modality of a judgment belongs to the 
 copula in other words, whether "logic can take cognizance of the pro- 
 bability of any given matter;" that is, more plainly speaking, to say, 
 whether the expressions will be and may be, and their negatives, are not also 
 simple forms of the copula as much as is or is not. 
 
 The Sechivana auxiliary verb, deprived of a host of accessory particles, 
 may be simply classified under two tenses and three moods (proper). 
 Moods. Tenses. 
 
 Past. Present. 
 
 1. INDICATIVE. Jci le Jca tsamaea. Jci ea tsamaea. 
 
 I did go (=1 went.) I am going. 
 
 2. p Jci le M tla tsamaea. Jei tla tsamaea. 
 
 I (did) shall go. I shall go. 
 
 3. POTENTIAL. Jci le Jci Jca tsamaea. iiJca tsamaea. 
 
 I (did) may go. I may go. 
 
 It is evident, from the above, that there is no such thing as a "future 
 tense ;" but rather, besides what are popularly called the indicative and 
 potential moods, another mood, of which this " future tense" has all along 
 been the erroneous representative, and which might, for common gram- 
 matical purposes, be called the conjectural mood. There is very little doubt, 
 in my own mind, that these three moods express " modality," or degrees of 
 knowledge, at times past and present, viz., certainty, probability, and pos- 
 sibility ; but, as my attention is for the present confined to phonology, I can- 
 not here enter more fully into the subject. The fact will also, no doubt, be
 
 xxii 
 
 historical records, will scarcely be thought to require any great 
 portion of attention from a philosophical inquirer." True 
 judging from the fate of such nations and tribes as have in many 
 countries been discovered by the traveller and navigator, and 
 which have dwindled before the approach of the colonist, very 
 much in the same manner as the herds of elephants, ostriches, 
 and antelopes, before the repeated sallies of relentless hunters 
 such a remark carries with it a phase of plausibility ; but it is a 
 false conclusion, based upon the assumption that, inasmuch as a 
 barbarian is a degraded being, everything pertaining to him 
 must be correspondingly liable to depreciation. Civilization has 
 advanced to such a consummation, through all its stages of 
 improvement, from writing and printing, to the electric, and 
 more recently the printing telegraph, that distance and time alike 
 have become annihilated in human intercourse, and enlightened 
 man has forgotten his ancient position, wherein, without the 
 means of constructing the symbols of his thoughts, he spoke in 
 native fluency and simplicity the language he now transmits, 
 in all its complexity, with the speed of lightning, across con- 
 tinents and seas. Each science and art, in the historical order 
 of its occurrence to the human mind, and its application to the 
 supply of human necessities, has developed and modified, and in 
 fact, destroyed the original language to such an extent and his 
 facilities of intercommunion have increased so amazingly by 
 means of the various modes of expressing thought that he is apt 
 to magnify the nature of the idiom he speaks, forgetting that it 
 
 interesting to those writers who have lately been speculating on the nature 
 of the auxiliary verbs shall and will, as they occur in English. " Whether 
 Aristotle's rudiments of logic have not antecedent rudiments which time 
 may yet bring to light is a somewhat unsettled problem in speculation." 
 (See Ferriers "Institutes of Metaphysic," p. 14.) Where, but in the 
 principles of universal grammar, are such rudiments to be found? and 
 whether more likely in the primitive dialect of the barbarian, or the complex 
 idioms of the civilized ?
 
 XX111 
 
 is only the measure of its power that has been enhanced by the 
 means of its communication ; that its development and complexity 
 are the result of the development of mind, and the accession of 
 new kinds of knowledge ; that, whether man avail himself of 
 electricity or printing, or his organs of speech, he cannot surpass 
 the rapidity of his thoughts, and in this respect the degraded 
 Bushman can vie with the philosopher. When, therefore, we 
 are told that Home Tooke conceived an "original thought" 
 regarding the significance of the particles in his native tongue, 
 and, though " ignorant of the characters even of the Anglo-Saxon 
 and Gothic languages," acquired their crude and barbarous forms, 
 " to ascertain whether he had made a discovery," and this most 
 successfully ; and again, that Jacob Grimm was indebted for his 
 " law" to his researches into the ancient forms of the German 
 language, it seems surprising that students in philology have not, 
 ere this, inferred from such facts the probability that, in the 
 simplicity of the barbarous and unwritten tongues of newly 
 discovered regions, are to be found most of the data necessary 
 for the solution of some of the difficult problems in their science.* 
 It seems not unreasonable for us to expect that, just as men are 
 indebted for the greater part of what they know of metaphysical 
 
 * I am enabled to fortify these remarks by the following quotations from 
 able authorities : " The language of tribes who roam wild in a condition 
 of savage life, is necessarily simple and primitive. So long as they continue 
 separate and distinct from a civilized race, it is marked by the genuine 
 impress of nature ; but as soon as they mix with nations more refined than 
 themselves, in proportion as they gain morally or mentally by the inter- 
 course, it is observable that, in the same degree, the parent language 
 becomes vitiated or changed. Modifications and inflexions, unsanctioned 
 additions, tralatitions, and neologisms, like parasitical plants adhering to an 
 ancient and venerable stock, are then first observed disfiguring the natural 
 root; and, as the genius of modern literature has become disdainful of 
 indigenous compounds, a kind of hybridous vocabulary takes the place of 
 the old tongue." Edinburgh Review, April, 1844, p. 455. 
 
 " It is in.the ruder languages that the important phenomena of develop- 
 ment and growth the laws of language are best studied." R. O. L., 
 Encyc. Britann., Sth Ed., Vol. XI11. p. 195.
 
 science to so much of what the ancients knew as was preserved 
 in the monasteries of the middle ages, so they will have to look 
 to the perspicuous structure of these primitive languages, which 
 have hitherto remained concealed in the dark recesses and shades 
 of history, for any principles elucidative of the laws of speech 
 and thought. 
 
 But the condition of harbarous man is ephemeral ! Guided by 
 the knowledge of the past, we can only rest our hopes or fears of 
 him on sheer probabilities. That his normal constitution will be 
 annulled, and his social system dismembered, and that this will 
 result in his gradually disappearing from the dismal scenes of his 
 degradation, the whole tenor of modern history only convinces 
 us. This ephemeral nature renders him the more interesting to 
 both the missionary and the philologer. The former redoubles 
 his efforts in scattering the seeds of knowledge, and raising the 
 bright cloud in the path of the benighted to futurity ; the latter, 
 in grasping at each new appearance of truth, is rendered impatient 
 by the conviction that " every day destroys a fact, a relation, or 
 an inference." It is not to be wondered, then, that the missionary 
 occasionally anticipates the duties of the philologer, and that the 
 philologer sometimes borrows his materials from the missionary. 
 It appears impossible that all that would be " acceptable to the 
 scholar" in a uniform system of notation could be " convenient 
 to" the evangelist ; for the one requires a perfect and elaborate 
 system of phonetic symbols as a means of etymological analysis, 
 the other " a commoner alphabet, more suited to a work-day 
 age" of missions ; nevertheless, if the two can accommodate their 
 plans to each other, it is to be expected that mutual facilitation 
 must result. 
 
 In conclusion it cannot be denied the subject which I have 
 chosen is an unusually dry one, inasmuch as it is an attempt to 
 arrive at the laws of a process which the great Macaulay 
 would have said " is not likely to be better performed merely
 
 because men know how they perform it ;" and cannot, therefor e 
 be expected to command the attention of more than a few of the 
 most zealous students of phonetic science, much less of those 
 who are indifferent to the gratification of "finding out laws 
 from facts, causes from effects, necessary truth from fleeting 
 occurrences of the day." At the same time, it must be admitted 
 that a writer on such a subject could never hope to realise any- 
 thing remunerative, beyond the gratification of having embodied 
 opinions, based on his own researches, and of anticipating dis- 
 cussion in imparting them to others. But if even the materials 
 contributed are turned to account, without regard to my own 
 opinions, I shall consider myself fully compensated for my labours. 
 Throughout the work, which will be issued in three separate 
 parts, it will be my endeavour to trace the facts and phenomena 
 of the language to first principles. In the following pages on 
 the Consonants, I have worked upon a few materials which have 
 been known to missionaries for the last forty years viz., the 
 permutations of Initials ; especially as they have occurred to my 
 own observation during the last four years. I have dealt only 
 with simple consonants and their mutual combinations, as well 
 as other elements affecting them. It may be thought that, in 
 confining my generalization of particulars to initial consonants, 
 I have made an arbitrary selection, and avoided any reference 
 to numerous permutations which are perceptible in the 
 comparison of different tribal idioms of the Sechwana such, for 
 instance, as may be seen on a considerable scale in the comparison 
 of the " three members of the Bantu family of languages," which 
 Dr. Bleek considers " can be brought under certain laws, 
 similar, to some extent, to those detected by Jacob Grimm, as 
 affecting the relations between the different Teutonic tongues, 
 and other members of the Indo-European family of languages, 
 I have only to allege, in defence, that in the one class of instances 
 which I have chosen for analysis, the changes are constant, and
 
 limited to cognate pairs of consonants no one initial element 
 being changeable to a third ;* whereas, this cannot be said of the 
 other class alluded to by Dr. Bleek. It must not be supposed 
 that, while thoroughly analysing the constant examples, I am 
 neglecting the dialectical variations, to a proper discrimination 
 of which, however, a far more critical knowledge of the South 
 African languages than has hitherto been published for sacred 
 purposes is absolutely requisite. 
 
 I should have preferred to treat of the Vowels first, but have 
 found it necessary to reserve the consideration of them for the 
 Second Part. This portion of the work will be based entirely on 
 a series of new facts, the fruits of my own researches into the 
 phonology of the language, on the subject of a peculiar order of 
 mutation existing among the vowels. The Third Part will be 
 confined to " sounds" formed by the combinations of simple or 
 compound consonants, with simple or compound vowels, and 
 which answer to the "Palatals" of some writers, the " Un- 
 stable combinations" of Dr. Latham, and the "Specific Modi- 
 fications" of Professor Max Miiller. My peculiarly unsettled 
 circumstances will render the issue of these remaining parts 
 rather uncertain. 
 
 As it is the first public essay of one who, during the last 
 twelve years, has seen little of current literature, and still less of 
 society, and the greater part of it has been penned in the native 
 village or at the wild encampment, it will be needless for him 
 to attempt to disarm the censures of critics, by defending him- 
 self on the score of style. Having, amidst the harassing 
 vicissitudes of Colonial border-life, long neglected the art of 
 composition, his work might doubtless have been rendered 
 " more readable" had the phraseology been corrected throughout 
 by some literary friend; but it has not been his lot to find 
 convenient access to any one. 
 
 * Except in one instance of h to A:/ for which I have attempted to account.
 
 After a practical knowledge of this language during the few 
 years of childhood, an alternating use of the low Dutch patois 
 and English in the Cape Colony during youth, followed by an 
 education in England, and subsequently by a return to a rude 
 life among South African Boers, and more recently intimate 
 intercourse with the same tribes among whom I was born, it 
 cannot be said that any of these tongues is properly vernacular 
 to me ; or that I am open to charges of either national prejudice 
 or organical habit, which would be unfavourable to a proper 
 comprehension and discrimination of new elements. At all events, 
 the desultory nature of my experience will help to explain and 
 palliate any want of literary ability in the execution of a laborious 
 task. The work having been printed in England, during my 
 residence about 600 miles within the South African coast, some 
 allowance will no doubt be made for any lapses and mistakes 
 which I should otherwise have been enabled to rectify. 
 
 It was not till the Second and Third Chapters were in the 
 press that I succeeded in procuring a copy of "The English 
 Language," by Dr. Latham, nor till the first proof of the Third 
 had been returned, and the Fourth was in the press, that I met 
 with the " Missionary Alphabet" of Professor Max Miiller, and 
 the works of Professor Monier Williams, the Rev. Richard 
 Garnett, and Dr. J. Miiller, together with an exposition of 
 " Grimm's Law," in the 8th Edition of the " Encyclopedia Bri- 
 tannica." I was, nevertheless, enabled, in correcting the later 
 proofs, to avail myself of any notes or quotations from these 
 works, by interpolations, wherever they appeared to place my 
 own views in relief. 
 
 In reperusing it, I have reason to regret that a controversial 
 tenor is perceptible throughout ; but it is difficult to see how this 
 can be avoided in a work containing innovations on prevailing 
 notions. However I may have presumed to differ from Dr. 
 Lepsius, I need only say, that its publication was suggested by
 
 his able and interesting pamphlet, without the thorough perusal 
 of which I could not have placed the results of my researches in 
 the form in which they now appear. 
 
 R. M., JUN. 
 Natal, South Africa, 
 
 January 28th, 1862. 
 
 These pages must be offered to the public in an unfinished 
 state. The lamented author did not live to complete what was 
 to him a labour of love. He died in his 36th year, at Mangeeri, 
 near Kuruman, South Africa, after only a few days of acute 
 suffering. In him the aborigines of interior Southern Africa, 
 whose language was his favourite study, have lost a disinterested 
 and enlightened friend. 
 
 The attempt is now made, in accordance with the desire of 
 his widow, to present in as complete a form as possible the result 
 of his investigations. As far as the 64th page, the proof-sheets 
 had been fully revised and corrected by himself. Beyond this, 
 it has been deemed best that nothing should be added, but the 
 typographical corrections absolutely required. 
 
 Those who may read this attempt to contribute something to 
 the general store of philological facts and inductions, will pass 
 lightly over such imperfections as must necessarily be found 
 under the circumstances. 
 
 J. S. M. 
 
 & Urban, Natal, 
 
 1st December, 1862.
 
 CHAPTER I, 
 
 PRINCIPLES OF CONSONANTAL CLASSIFICATIONS. 
 
 I. OF CLASSIFICATIONS AT PRESENT IN USE. 
 IT is not my purpose to discuss at any length the propriety of 
 the distinction usually made between vowels and consonants, as it 
 would suffice for me to assume that they are distinct, in accord- 
 ance with the opinions of the majority of writers on the subject. 
 The following remarks, in a quotation from an antiquated work, 
 will perhaps be sufficiently distinctive to prepare the reader for 
 the sequel : 
 
 " WHAT thefe Vocal Organs precifely are, is not in all refpefts agreed by 
 Philofophers and Anatomilts. Be this as it will, it is certain that the mere 
 primary andjimple Voice is completely formed, before e*ver it reach the Mouth, and 
 can therefore (as well as Breathing) find a Paflage through the Nofe, when 
 the Mouth is fo far ftopt, as to prevent the leaft utterance. 
 
 " Now pure and fimple VOICE, being thus produced, is (as before was 
 obferved) tranfmitted to the Mouth. HERE, then, by means of certain different 
 Organs, which do not change its primary qualities, but only fuperadd others, it 
 receives the form or Character of ARTICULATION. For ARTICULATION is in 
 raft nothing elfe, than that Form or Character, acquired to Jimple Voice, by 
 means of the Mouth and its federal Organs, the Teeth, the Tongue, the Lips, &c. 
 The Voice is not by Articulation made more grave or acute, more loud or foft 
 (which are its primary Qualities), but it acquires to thefe Charafters certain 
 others additional, which are perfeftly adapted to exift along with them. 
 
 "THE fimplefl of thefe new Chara&ers are thofe acquired through the mere 
 Openings of the Mouth, as thefe Openings differ in giving the Voice a Paflage. 
 It is the Variety of Configurations in thefe Openings only, which gives birth 
 and origin to the feveral VOWELS ; and hence it is they derive their Name, by 
 being thus eminently Vocal, and eafy to be founded of themfelves alone. 
 
 "THERE are other articulate Forms, which the Mouth makes, not by mere 
 Openings, but by different ContaEls of its different parts ; fuch for inftance, as it 
 makes by the Junftion of the two Lips, of the Tongue with the Teeth, of the 
 Tongue with the Palate, and the like. 
 
 B
 
 2 
 
 " Now as all thefe feveral Contacts, unlefs fome Opening of the Mouth 
 either immediately precede, or immediately follow, would rather occafiort 
 Silence than to produce a Voice, hence it is, that with some fuch Opening, 
 either previous or fubfequent, they are always connected. Hence alfo it is, 
 that the Articulations fo produced are called CONSONANTS, becaufe they found 
 not of rhemfelves, and from their own powers, but at all times in company with 
 fome auxiliary Vowel. 
 
 " THERE are other fubordinate Diftinftions of thefe primary Articulations. 
 ****** 
 
 " IT is enough to obferve, that they are all denoted by the common Name 
 of ELEMENT, inafmuch as every Articulation is from them derived, and into 
 them refolved." Hermes, by lames Harris, Efq., p. 318. (1771 .) 
 
 The above general description of the fundamental distinction 
 between the two main classes of the Elements of Articulation, 
 though written nearly a century ago, and founded upon the 
 opinion of one of the ancients,* is perhaps as clear as, if not clearer 
 than, anything I have met with. 
 
 According to it, the VOWELS are pure sounds, the variations 
 in which are caused by different configurations of the aperture of 
 the mouth ; and the CONSONANTS are elements resulting from 
 interruptions of the breath by the contact of different organs ; 
 and though the vowels can be pronounced without them, they 
 cannot be completely uttered without accompanying vowels. 
 It is, therefore, incorrect to speak of consonants as sounds, inas- 
 much as they require the apposition of these to render them 
 audible. In speaking of them I therefore retain their common 
 name, or otherwise call them " explodents?\ but only in reference 
 to the necessary separation of the organs after contact in every 
 case ; and in the same sense may be understood the word " sound" 
 when it occurs applicably to consonants in all my quotations, 
 without distorting the meaning of their authors. 
 
 True, some consonants have been called semi-vowels, 
 
 * Ammonius. 
 
 fin this restricted sense T place the word in inverted commas throughout 
 the analyses. The word dividual, used synonymously by Dr. Lepsius, would 
 have done just as well, but occurred to me too late.
 
 liquids, &c., because though such arc formed by a contact, and 
 are therefore " explodent" there is only a partial interruption of the 
 breath, part of which escapes, giving to the otherwise mute 
 element a liquid or continuous nature. There is, however, so 
 much uncertainty attached to the subject of these peculiar 
 consonants, and the most able writers differ so in classifying 
 them, that it is not well to anticipate a proper analysis by any 
 conjectures; and I prefer to base my conclusions respecting them 
 upon a thorough generalization of facts which will come under 
 consideration in the order of this Essay. 
 
 Though M. Majendie writes,* " Grammarians distinguish 
 letters into Vowels and Consonants, but this distinction cannot 
 suit physiologists," his division of the elements of sound into 
 " those which are truly modifications of the voice, and those which 
 (as he thinks) may be formed independently of the voice," does 
 not differ materially from that of Harris. Nor does the system 
 of Girard and Beauz(3e,f who " confine the term 'articulation' to 
 the Consonants, and designate the Yowels by that of 'sons,' 
 (sounds)," differ in anything but terminology from the distinction 
 made above. For the Vowels, the term Sonants, in contradis- 
 tinction from Consonants, would be as suitable as any, were it 
 not also applicable to certain elements which may, perhaps, be 
 proved to be vocalized Consonants. More satisfactory terms than 
 those employed by Harris, and still in common use, could 
 scarcely be found. 
 
 Among the ancient grammarians, as well as some moderns 
 who have taken it upon them to interpret Grecian and Roman 
 authors, the consonants appear to have been classified upon one 
 or two principles, which have since been introduced into other 
 highly developed living languages, and remained long in vogue 
 among the learned. For a suitable example, it is only necessary 
 
 * El. Sum. Physiol., vol. i., p. 154. Cited by Sir J. Stoddart. 
 t- Gram. Geu., vol. i., p. 5. Cited by Stoddart. 
 B 2
 
 to refer to a grammar of the Greek. Its fourteen consonants 
 were arranged according to three organs e.g., 
 
 Mutes. 
 
 Tenues. Mediae. Aspirate. 
 
 Labials p b ph 
 
 Linguals t d th* 
 
 Semivowels. 
 Liquids. 
 771 
 
 n I r 8 
 
 Palatals k g kh 
 
 Of these consonants, nine (viz., those of each organ) were 
 found capable of another ternary arrangement, according to their 
 properties or gradations of breathing, into tenues, medics, and 
 aspirates ; and a certain relation was thus established as existing 
 among them. These were all denominated mutes, in contra- 
 distinction from the vowels. 
 
 Again, " the ancients found, in the humming and hissing of 
 the letters I, m, n, r, ," which did not fall under this second 
 ternary arrangement, " a transition to the vowels, and therefore 
 called them semi-vowels ; and the first four were named liquids, 
 en account of their mobility, and easily combining with other 
 letters."! The sibilant s appears not to have admitted of any 
 specific description. 
 
 This classification still obtains among some men of learning, 
 who maintain the distinction between "tenues (p, k, t} i.e., 
 slender, weak consonants ; medics (b, g, d,} or consonants re- 
 quiring a medial quantity of air for their articulation; and 
 aspirates (p7i, kh, th,) or strong consonants." J The partiality of 
 many to it has of course been strengthened by their attachment 
 to the classic tongues, as well as by long prescription. Among 
 
 * The nature of the articulation of the ancient letter 9, has not yet been 
 satisfactorily decided; it may have been either t, combined with the spiritus 
 asper, or equivalent to th, in the English thin. I have preferred to assume 
 the former, in accordance with the opinion of Dr. Lepsius. See " Standard 
 Alphabet," p. 37, note 2. 
 
 f Buttmann's " Larger Greek Grammar," p. 11. 
 
 * "Egypt's Place in Universal History." Bunsen, p. 278.
 
 many modern systems which have sought to supplant it, that 
 which retains the same division of the organs, but divides the 
 gradations of breathing into explosive and continuous, is beginning 
 to obtain among some eminent linguists, and probably owes its 
 introduction to a certain peculiar law of correlation existing 
 between several consonants ; but it is difficult to say whether 
 the discovery of this law is to be traced to any deductions from the 
 physiology of the human voice, or to the frequent interchange 
 and approximation of those consonants, which must have been 
 apparent to any observer. 
 
 At all events, I must for the present content myself by placing 
 before the reader such explanations of it as have been given by 
 writers upon a physiological basis. 
 
 "All the oral consonantal sounds, except I and? 1 ," says Sir John Stoddart, 
 " are produced in pairs, each pair having the same position of the organs, 
 
 but with a certain difference of effect The difference of effect 
 
 in each pair is produced in the same manner throughout the whole." 
 Glossology, p. 127. 
 
 This principle is elsewhere explained by Volney, thus: "Each contact 
 (or near approximation) of two organs forms two consonants, which differ 
 only by the degree of intensity of that contact, and which, under the names 
 of strong and weak (or the like), are absolutely of the same family." 
 Alfab. Europ., p. 71, cited by Stoddart. 
 
 Again, Dr. Richardson, in assuring his readers that Hofne Tooke 
 was guided by some general views of the " interchange of letters," writes 
 as follows : 
 
 " The perpetual change of t into d is familiar to all, and there is an 
 organical cause for these and other changes of B into P ; V into F ; G into 
 K ; Z into S ; J into SH ; and the Anglo-Saxon -D, that is, TH, as pro- 
 nounced in that, into their Q, that is, TH, as pronounced in thing. The first 
 of each pair ^including D into T) differs from its partner by no variation 
 whatever of articulation, but simply by a certain unnoticed and almost im- 
 perceptible motion or compression of or near the larynx, which causes what 
 Wilkins calls some kind of murmur." TJie Study of Language ; an Expo- 
 sition of the Diversions of Purley, p. 31. He then describes how Home 
 Tooke, by illustrating " the whole series of these organic changes," viz., 
 Of w&GdBJZZZ 
 Into / p C t 9 sh s ss 
 
 in two parallel (but not very elegant) lines, as they would be repeated by 
 an Englishman and Welshman respectively, shows that a Welshman, by
 
 " failing in the compression," changes seven of the English consonants ; 
 " to which compression," he adds, " we owe seven additional letters." 
 Ibid. p. 32.* 
 
 Having never seen an exposition of (> Grimm's Law,"f of which Dr. 
 Kichardson seems to think the above " general remarks" of Home Tooke 
 " evidently lay the foundation," I am, of course, unable to judge of the light 
 which it may have shed on this subject. 
 
 This correspondency, or correlation^: of certain consonants, has 
 given rise to a variety of terms, which differ according to the 
 views which the writers seemed to entertain of its nature. The 
 following are a few which I have encountered : 
 
 (Latham.^ 
 '[SirJ. HerscM. 
 
 soft ' 
 
 lenis 
 
 vocal Walker. 
 
 spoken ... Pitman. 
 
 soft } T _ 
 
 . Volney.% 
 
 weak J 
 
 'Article, " Stammer" Penny 
 
 Sharp 
 
 Hard 
 
 Fortis 
 
 Breathing 
 
 Whispered 
 
 Firm and dry 
 
 Strong 
 
 Voiceless 
 
 flat. 
 
 " \LepsiuSy and others. 
 us j 
 
 Hard 
 Atonic 
 Mute 
 Surd 
 
 voice 
 
 weak 
 
 subtonic ... 
 semi-mute, 
 sonant . 
 
 Cyclopedia. 
 Adclung. 
 
 J3ishop, 
 
 Sanscrit Grammarians.^ 
 
 * The fact of such crude remarks on this important subject making their 
 appearance in an able work, so recently as 1854, leads to the suspicion that 
 the laws of phonics must still be based on imperfect conjecture. 
 
 f A writer in an able Review thus speaks of " Grimm's Law :" 
 " It consists in a permutation, or, if you will, a play of letters, whereby 
 
 almost any word may be made gerrnain to any other Not, 
 
 however, that the said law, with its machinery of ' nine equations,' is 
 without a real foundation in the history of language. We only mean that 
 it is exaggerated, and exactly in the manner of all hypothesis, all analysis, 
 by being run out into a vicious circle." North British Review, Feb., 1859. 
 
 1 This is called, by Sir John Herschel, " a constant relationship or 
 parallelism to each other." Richardson's Dictionary, 8vo., p. 19. 
 
 These are cited by Stoddart.
 
 The two series of consonants, which are generally supposea 
 to have this correlation, may thus be represented in parallel 
 lines : 
 
 k p t 
 g b d 
 
 ill (thin) s sh ch (-M) / ch (-fofc) 
 t/i (this) z zh gh v j 
 
 By means of a vertical line, I have separated from the rest the 
 first three pairs, each answering to the tenues and mediae of the 
 ancient mutes, to which the furies and lenea explodents of the 
 modern system are identical. Among the remaining instances 
 we find, of the ancient alphabet 1, the consonant s and its cor- 
 relative z, which latter was considered to be a double consonant ; 
 2, the hard guttural aspirate ch (-M). A corresponding soft form, 
 gh (pronounced like ch in loch by a Scotchman, or in buch by a 
 German), of this aspirate, and four other pairs, were thus left to 
 be included in the second division of a more comprehensive 
 classification. This appears to have been suggested as I 
 have before hinted, and as may be gathered from the tenor of 
 the preceding remarks by the above explained principle of 
 binary quantities. 
 
 I leave the intelligent reader to compare with the above two 
 parallel series of interchanges, obvious to the most superficial 
 observer, the following tableau of the " Simple Consonants in 
 the European Alphabets ;"* and have no doubt he will concur as 
 to the probability of this classification being based as much on a 
 vulgar view of the correspondency of sounds, as on any deduc- 
 
 * The same, on the graphic system of Dr. Lepsius : 
 
 
 Explosivae or dividuce. 
 
 Fricatives or continues. 
 
 Ancipites. 
 
 
 fortis. lenis. nasalis. 
 
 fnrlis. lenis. seniiruc. 
 
 
 Gutturalet 
 
 k g n 
 
 x'(x) h x'(r) y 
 
 r 
 
 Dentalcs 
 
 t d n 
 
 $ 
 
 r I 
 
 
 
 (0'(G) 0' (S) 
 
 
 La^i nl' -a 
 
 p b m 
 
 f v w 
 
 
 Standard Alphabet, p. 38
 
 tions of the phono-physiologist with the exception of, perhaps, 
 the two gutturals above noticed. 
 
 Ancipites. 
 
 Gutturalea ... 
 Dentales 
 lAibiales ... 
 
 Explosives or dividuce 
 fort, lenis. nasal. 
 
 A Ger. g Ger. ng 
 
 t d n 
 p b m 
 
 Fricatives or continues. 
 
 fortis. lenis. semivoc. 
 
 Ger. ch h Danish g Ger. j 
 !Fr. ch Fr. j 
 Sharp s Fr. z 
 En. th (-in) En. th (-ine) 
 / Fr. v Eng. w 
 
 gutt. r 
 
 r I 
 
 Under the explosives, the only element not in the ancient phonetic 
 tableau is ng ;* thus completing the set of nasals m and n, which 
 were semi-vowels of the old arrangement. The remainder of 
 these viz , r and I, are excluded, as they anciently were ; and 
 left doubtful as to whether they belong to the first or second 
 division. The letter s, formerly considered peculiar, and more 
 recently called by a distinguished authority! " the last vowel 
 and the first consonant," but to this day still rather inexplicable, 
 sits the basis (phonically) of a formidable array of sibilants. The 
 elements w and y, sometimes called consonants, at other times 
 vowels, are introduced as fricative or continuous consonants, 
 guttural and labial respectively.! 
 
 Again, the unfortunate aspirates, which, Volney would say, re- 
 quire efforts of the lungs compatible with the vehement passions 
 and strong desires of the savage or rustic, are excluded from 
 this general tableau ; and only preserved from nonentity by the 
 fact that they occur in such highly important languages as the 
 Sanscrit, Bengali, and Chinese, &c., in the phonetic tables of 
 which Dr. Lepsius has inserted them. One of these, before 
 
 * Its omission was a mere oversight, as it occurred in the living pro- 
 nunciation in the first syllable of such words as ay-icos, ty-xos. 
 
 f Sir John Herschel, in Richardson's Dictionary, 8vo., p. xix. This 
 quotation does not occur in the synoptical table of sounds, in a later volume 
 of " Essays, &c.," by Sir John Herschel. 
 
 J These, of course, occurred in the ancient living-pronunciation, in the 
 diphthongs vi and ta of such words as veK.vi-a and Ov-ias, though not in the 
 phonetic tableau of the grammarian.
 
 referred to viz., a soft form of cA(-M), viz.,^7t, the most common 
 instance of a rough guttural in the European alphabet, has by 
 some mode of analysis been divided into two forms of a gentler 
 and a harsher degree, and, under the letters ^ an( i 7> mar- 
 shalled in common with the sibilants, under the head of 
 fricatives, as if because swallowed up by the majority, or " de- 
 mocratic test of number" in which the latter exceed them! 
 Nevertheless, we find h, the letter equivalent to the spiritus asper, 
 huddled up between them, as if tacitly to imply that they are 
 aspirates. If we seek an explanation of this apparent anomaly, 
 we find the latest writer on this system saying 
 
 " The essential distinction of the three fricative formations, s, s, and 0, 
 together with the corresponding soft sounds z, z and Q', from the guttural 
 . . . x consists in the friction of the breath being formed and heard 
 at the teeth." Standard Alphabet, p. 45. 
 
 But, to add to the confusion of nomenclature, at p. 33 of the 
 same work, h, which I have described as being huddled up between 
 the two gutturals in the above general tableau, is called a " frica- 
 tive basis." 
 
 The principle of this classification is thus explained by Dr. 
 Lepsius, its recent and most able expounder, before referred to. 
 After disposing of the subject of the common and generally 
 admitted organic divisions, he adds 
 
 " There is another essential difference in the pronunciation, in as far as 
 either the mouth at the above-mentioned places* is completely closed and 
 re-opened, or the passage of the breath is only narrowed, without its stream 
 being entirely interrupted by closing the organs. The consonants formed 
 by the first process we call explosive or divisible (dividuce), because the 
 moment of contact divides the sound into two parts ; the others fricative, 
 from their sound being -determined by friction, or continuous (continue), 
 because this friction is not interrupted by any closing of the organs." 
 S tmid ml Alphabet, p. 30. 
 
 Before placing before the reader some of the elements of 
 another classification founded on incontrovertible natural facts, it 
 
 * " In the throat, at the teeth, or with the lips." Ibid.
 
 10 
 
 may perhaps not be regarded as presumptuous if I endeavour 
 to show, on physiological grounds, where the system just de- 
 scribed is probably at fault. 
 
 As the consonants k, t, p, and g, d, b, respectively, fortes and 
 lenes of the division of explodents, differ in no respect except 
 terminology from the tenues and mediae of the more ancient 
 arrangement of mutes, I shall make no reference to them ; for 
 whether viewed in the above binary order, or the ternary one, 
 according to the organs, they are, so far as they go, intact 
 and indisputable. I have mainly to do with the group of " pairs ;" 
 which, while they bear an organical relation to the three series 
 above, are all supposed to differ from them in the gradations of 
 breathing, and have been denominated continues or fricativa. 
 
 NOTE. As the gutturals which are included in these terms have only 
 apparently a different phonical basis from the rest, and it is chiefly in relation 
 to them that the terms fricative and aspirate have been confounded, they 
 will require another line of argument ; I, therefore, reserve a further con- 
 sideration of them for the section on gutturals in the following chapter. 
 
 By the former term is meant the non -interruption of a sound; 
 by the latter, that the sound is determined by friction. From the 
 fact of both terms serving to describe the same instances, it is 
 evident that partial interruption of the breath is implied in all. 
 More definiteness ought to be expected in the treatment of 
 philological subjects ; and, till we succeed in arriving at that, we 
 may as usual grope in the mazes of sophistication, and be tan- 
 talized by a play of words. One would think that, of all the 
 natural sciences, none ought to demand more accuracy in its 
 rudimental nomenclature than that of language, whether phonetic 
 or grammatic. 
 
 The word continues includes several elements not classed under 
 it by those who make use of the term. " Vowels," which I have 
 assumed to be entirely distinct in their nature from consonants, 
 " are," in the strictest sense of the word, t{ continued sounds, pro- 
 duced when the passage of the air through the fauces is unin-
 
 11 
 
 terrupted, the fauces being only more or less narrowed"* Not 
 only the four " pairs" of sibilants i.e., s, z ; /*(-in), th(ls) ; sh, 
 zh ; and /, u; the principal examples classed under this term 
 (in the letters s, z ; 6, 2; s, z; f, v) but also I and r, which 
 have been placed under the head of ancipites, because they 
 appear to betray a little of the nature of explodents and even 
 the nasals m, n, and n (-ng) in certain modified forms can all 
 be proved to be continuous consonants. There can be little 
 doubt that it is the " indistinct vowel" element (whether by the 
 term be understood action of breath alone or voice j, easily assumed 
 by them all which renders them so, and has led to their being 
 frequently called semi-vowels ; at all events, it is very probable 
 that it is nothing else than their peculiar nature in this respect 
 which renders them liquid with all other consonants. 
 
 The term fricatives conveys the idea of the breath being par- 
 tially confined, as well as, that it may be almost wholly inter- 
 rupted ; but, like the above, it includes elements not admitted by 
 those who apply it exclusively to some consonants. " Each vowel 
 requires a different elevation of the tongue, or contraction of 
 the lips/'f by which different degrees of frication, however appa- 
 rently imperceptible, are produced. And it follows that all the 
 above consonants, which easily assume the "indistinct vowel" 
 element, must, where so modified, also be fricatives ; with (but 
 only apparently) the sole exception of the nasals, in the enun- 
 ciation of which the breath is withheld, and there is no faucal 
 passage to cause a frication. 
 
 The two terms are thus strictly compatible in respect to the 
 instances I have shown can be included under them both. The 
 nasals are apparently the only exceptions, being continuous and 
 fricative in their modified forms, but not faucally. 
 
 * Encyc. Britann., 7th Ed., article Physiology, p. 683. The italics arc 
 my own. 
 
 f Ibid.
 
 12 
 
 I shall now endeavour to illustrate this position by confronting 
 the two following quotations, which will show where contradiction 
 and confusion exist in the application of these terms. Dr. 
 Lepsius, treating of the "indistinct vowel-sound" attached to 
 some consonants, writes as follows : 
 
 " This vowel is inherent in all soft* fricative consonants, as well as in 
 
 the first part of the nasal explosive sounds It assumes the 
 
 strongest resonance, as may be easily explained on physiological grounds, 
 in comhination with r and I, which, as is well known, appear in Sanscrit as 
 r and I, with all the qualities of the other vowels." Standard Alphabet, p. 27. 
 
 Again, as follows : 
 
 " It is a decided mistake to reckon m and n among the consonantes con- 
 tiniKB ; for in m and n it is only tVie VOwel element* inherent in the 
 first half, which may be continued at pleasure, whilst in all the continuous 
 consonants it is the consonantal element (the friction*) which must he 
 continued, as in/, v, s, z." Standard Alphabet, p. 30, note. 
 
 In what precedes, I have implied that the vowel-element and some 
 amount of friction are inseparable in all articulations partaking 
 of the former, inasmuch as the breath is the medium of the voice. 
 The learned Professor seems to have forgotten, (1) that the 
 consonants v and z in the latter paragraph were some of the 
 soft fricatives of his classification, alluded to in the former as 
 partaking of the "indistinct vowel sound;" (2) that it is as 
 much the "indistinct vowel" element in v, and z, which is con- 
 tinued, as in any forms of m and n ; (3) a fact amounting to a 
 postulate in the science of phonics, that the consonantal element 
 does not consist in the friction but in the contact, whether partial 
 or complete, of two organs. In short, the important principle 
 appears to have been lost of, that if we are to regard the teeth 
 and the palate as organs indispensable to the action of the lips 
 or the tongue, in forming articulations by interrupting the emission 
 of the breath by their contact, it follows the elements produced 
 by them are also " explodent," because the moment of contact (of 
 the tongue with either of them, or the lips with one of them) 
 
 * The bold letters are substituted by me, as italics already occur.
 
 13 
 
 divides the sound into two parts : that they differ from the other 
 mutes or " explodents," in that the contact is partial, thus causing 
 a gentle frication between them, and prolonged if necessary, 
 whether in the form of breath or voice, therefore continuous; 
 but these are not reasons sufficient to warrant their exclusion 
 from the division of " explodents." Dr. Richardson, treating 
 of the consonants b, p,f, v ; c (k), g (y), d, t; I, m, n, r, x ; s, z ; 
 very concisely says 
 
 "Each and every of them requires, however, for its complete utterance, 
 a breathing (precedent), a closure or collision of some of the organs of 
 speech, and an apertion or separation of them, with a breathing (subse- 
 quent)." Richardson's Dictionary, 8vo., p. xiv. 
 
 Moreover, granting, what is implied in the preceding quo- 
 tation, that " the complete consonant is best perceived when 
 placed between two vowels,"* and that "the full pronunciation 
 of an explosive letter requires the closing and opening of 
 the organ,"f which are both very plain statements on the 
 part of those who sanction this classification, and tantamount 
 to saying that the formative process of all consonants is the same, 
 it follows that those which easily assume the "vowel-element" 
 are also " explodents ;" this accessory " element" having its 
 origin in the pliability and mobility of the tongue an organ 
 indispensable even in the formation of the pure vowels. 
 
 The above train of reasoning suggests that there is something 
 very unsatisfactory in this classification of elements ; and, con- 
 sequently, that any graphic system founded upon it must 
 also be liable to objection. In referring to the two terms 
 continuous and fricative, I have endeavoured to show, (1) that 
 they include a large number of instances (vowels) having no 
 essential or generic resemblance to those within the scope of 
 induction (consonants) ; (2) that though consonants may possess 
 a secondary attribute (semivocal), this ought not to exclude 
 them from classification under a more general attribute (" explo- 
 
 * Standard Alphabet, p. 30, note. f Ibid.
 
 14 
 
 dent"), definitive of the nature of the generalizations arrived at 
 by a survey of all the points in which they differ from or re- 
 semble each other. 
 
 In conclusion, granting, what is generally admitted, that both 
 the vowels and the pure " explodent" consonants (k, t, p ; g, d, b } ) 
 may be aspirated, it follows that the other " explodent" con- 
 sonants, which easily assume the " vowel-element," may also be 
 aspirated i.e., those usually called fricativce or continues. 
 
 I thus show that the aspirate "explodents" include some 
 fricatives, the rest of which, therefore, fall under the simple 
 " explodents." A very important question then arises, as to 
 whether the correspondency existing between s and z, th(m) 
 and f/((is), sh and zh, and / and v, (s, z ; 6, $ ; I, z ; and /, v, 
 of Lepsius,) is analogous to that between the mute ex- 
 plodents k and g, t and d, p and b. If I have succeeded in 
 raising a doubt in the mind of the reader, I only leave him in 
 a prepared state for the impartial consideration of a few simple 
 facts, the analysis of which, in the following chapter, will perhaps 
 result in a synthetic view of a far more satisfactory nature. 
 
 II. GENERAL PRINCIPLES OF A CLASSIFICATION SUGGESTED BY THE 
 MUTATION OF CONSONANTS IN THE SECHWANA* LANGUAGE. 
 
 " The transformation of sounds," says Dr. Bleek, " is the main 
 
 * There has been a good deal of speculation at work on the origin of the 
 name of the people speaking this interesting language. The common 
 opinion among Missionaries is, that the name is derived from tshudna (be 
 like each other). Another holds that it is derived from tshudna, "a little 
 white, or inclining to white, light coloured i.e., not black (probably in 
 opposition to the more dark-coloured tribes of the north), a diminutive form, 
 from tshueu, white." Sir O. Grey's Library, S. A. Lang., p. 184. Mr. 
 Fredoux, of the Paris Missionary Society, writes : " For our part, we are 
 inclined to give it another origin. In the idiom of the people of whom we 
 are speaking, we find the word Mochuana (plural, Bachuana) employed as a 
 kind of diminutive of Monchu, black, and signifying blackish, or inclining
 
 15 
 
 characteristic of the Setshuana,"* and it is probable that in no 
 other existing language is this principle carried to such an ex- 
 tent. It appears surprising that, though so long before the 
 public, it should not have suggested to the attention of philologers 
 the probable existence of some fundamental phonical laws. 
 
 This peculiar commutationf of consonants occurs chiefly in 
 certain instances viz., the formation of verbal nouns, e.g., seeing, 
 &c.,and those cases in which the verb is immediately preceded by the 
 " object, -particles" self and me, as in the following examples: 
 
 Verb. 
 
 Verbal Noun. 
 
 Verb, with t: 
 \=self. 
 
 ^ "^n'nT^m! 
 
 I 3 '" Mutation. 
 
 1. Bona 
 
 Ponot 
 
 Ipona 
 
 Mpona 
 
 b top 
 
 2. Cola 
 
 Cold 
 
 Icola 
 
 Ncola 
 
 c immutable 
 
 3. Ndaea 
 
 Nteo 
 
 
 
 dtot 
 
 4. Gorisa 
 
 Khorisho 
 
 Ikhorisa 
 
 Nkhorisa 
 
 g-kh 
 
 5. Heta 
 
 Pheto 
 
 Ipheta 
 
 Mpheta 
 
 h ph 
 
 6. Kana 
 
 Kano 
 
 Ikana 
 
 Nkana 
 
 k immutable 
 
 7. Khatla 
 
 Khatlo 
 
 Ikhatla 
 
 Nkhatla 
 
 kh 
 
 to black." Bulletin de la Societe de Geographic, de Paris, 4 Serie, t. xiv., 
 p. 371. 
 
 The probability is, that Mr. F. has hit upon the correct derivation, upon 
 the following grounds. A black cow is called chwana, from nchu, black ; 
 in the same .manner as a red or black cow, with white back, is called 
 khwana, from nkliwe. Any little black thing would be called nchunyana ; a 
 little black person, monchunyana ; but the word being also used as a 
 diminutive of colour, a person with a dark brown complexion is invariably 
 called mochivana. Had the name been derived from chweu, or shweu, 
 white, it would have become bashdicdna, in the same manner as chdwdna, 
 a white cow, from chweu ; or kbchwdna, a grey cow, from Jcu-ebu, grey, in 
 which examples we becomes o. (In the above examples, tsk and ch are 
 homophones.) 
 
 Sir G. Grey's Library, S. A. L., p. 116. 
 
 f The language also contains other instances of interchanging consonants 
 which may appear to be irregular forms, but allow of classification under 
 euphonical or dialectical laws affecting the relations between the different 
 languages of the Bantu family. These will be noticed in the sequel. 
 
 I Used by the Missionaries as equivalent to ng. 
 
 The diacritical mark attached to o as o, will in every instance, for the 
 purposes of this work, indicate that vowel in the Italian perb, or the English 
 a in all. 
 
 C of the Missionaries=to&, or ch in Charles.
 
 16 
 
 
 Verb. 
 
 Verbal Noun. 
 
 8. 
 
 Loma 
 
 Tomo 
 
 9. 
 
 Metsa 
 
 Meed 
 
 10. 
 
 Nama 
 
 Numb 
 
 LI. 
 
 $apa 
 
 Napd 
 
 19. 
 
 Pitla 
 
 Pitlb 
 
 ]'!. 
 
 Phala 
 
 Phalo 
 
 14. 
 
 Eisa 
 
 Tisho 
 
 15. 
 
 Eata 
 
 Thato 
 
 16. 
 
 Sila 
 
 Tsilo 
 
 17. 
 
 Shbka 
 
 Cbkb 
 
 18. 
 
 Tena 
 
 Tend 
 
 1'J. 
 
 Thiba 
 
 Thibo 
 
 20. 
 
 Tlotla 
 
 Tlottt 
 
 21. 
 
 Tlhaba 
 
 Tlhabo 
 
 22. 
 
 Tsenya 
 
 Tsenyo 
 
 23. 
 
 lla 
 
 Kilo 
 
 "Object-particles," Mutation. 
 
 m, n, n = ?n. 
 
 
 Ntoma 
 
 1 to t 
 
 Mmetaa 
 
 m immutable 
 
 Nnama 
 
 n 
 
 Nnapa 
 
 n 
 
 Mpitla 
 
 P 
 
 Mphala 
 
 ph 
 
 Ntisa 
 
 r to t 
 
 Nthata 
 
 r to th 
 
 Ntsila 
 
 s to ts 
 
 Ncbka 
 
 sh to c 
 
 Ntena 
 
 t immutable 
 
 Nthiba 
 
 th 
 
 NtloOa 
 
 tl 
 
 Ntlhaba 
 
 tlh 
 
 Ntsenya 
 
 ts 
 
 Nkila 
 
 tok 
 
 Verb, with the 
 
 Itoma 
 
 Imetsa 
 
 Inama 
 
 Tnapa 
 
 Ipitla 
 
 Iphala 
 
 Itisa 
 
 Ithata 
 
 Itsila 
 
 Icbka 
 
 Itena 
 
 Ithiba 
 
 Itlotla 
 
 Itllutba 
 
 Itsenya 
 
 IkUa 
 
 The above are all the consonants found in the phonetic systems of the 
 Missionaries of different Societies. Additions could be made ; but I prefer 
 to reserve such for the analysis in the sequel, as they are based on my own 
 researches. 
 
 In the above list of twenty-three initials, ten are mutable, and 
 thirteen immutable. If there are excluded from it, for the pre- 
 sent, those words with the nasal initials m, n, n, and those 
 with compound letters, all of which are in italics, it will be ob- 
 served that the remaining instances* may be classified upon a few 
 apparent principles: 
 
 1. That the immutable elements t and p are those which have 
 generally been denominated fortes, and the mutable elements b 
 and d, lenes ; and that the language so far confirms the fact of the 
 existence of each in binary quantities, to which I have before 
 alluded. The reverse mutation in the above examples, from 
 fortis to lenis t never takes place. This holds good in all the 
 remaining instances; therefore the presumption upon which 
 I start, in proceeding to the analysis, is that the commutable 
 consonants are respectively fortes and lenes in all these other 
 cases not commonly admitted. 
 
 * All these are indicated in bold type.
 
 17 
 
 2. It may be distinctly observed that some are aspvvite, and 
 the rest simple " explodents ;" that the aspirates have binary 
 quantities corresponding with those of the simple " explodents," 
 and that instances of " fricativae or condnuse" fall under both 
 divisions. This decides my presumptive arrangement into 
 simple and aspirate " explodents," instead of into explosicce and 
 continues. It must be evident that we have thus suggested to us 
 the practicability of arriving at some of the fundamental laws of 
 a general phonic system, without having recourse exclusively to 
 either the physiology of the human voice, or to any " written 
 system fixed by literature," however elaborate and ancient. 
 
 The whole of these elements, though gathered from one bar- 
 barous language by strict attention to the " living traditional 
 pronunciation," will be found in the following analysis to admit 
 of a simple classification, corroborating partially, but in a striking 
 manner, the views now obtaining, and in other respects entirely 
 upsetting them. In the Sechwana language we have two series 
 of consonants, both possessing binary quantities,* each of which 
 is only in certain circumstances changeable to the other; but the 
 reverse mutation never takes place. Such normal facts are 
 of great importance, and where constancy is thus attributed to 
 their laws, these are rendered the more worthy of being regarded 
 as a basis upon which to plant further investigations. 
 
 * The reader, if dissatisfied with the above term, is at liberty to substitute 
 the word values, or characters, or natures, provided the same be used 
 throughout
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 ANALYSIS OF SECHWANA CONSONANTS. 
 
 IN accordance with the views stated in the preceding chapter, 
 I have, in the following table, removed from the " European 
 Consonantal System" of Dr. Lepsius, the consonants to which I, 
 for the present, take exception, as not all belonging to the set 
 corresponding with the Simple " Explodents /' but have included 
 the few under the head of Ancipites. 
 
 TABLE OF COINCIDENT CONSONANTS. 
 
 1st Division. 
 
 2nd Division. 
 
 
 fortis. lenis. 
 
 fortis. lenis. 
 
 Nasals. 
 
 k 
 
 - 9(-9V 
 
 u(-ng) 
 
 t d 
 
 
 n 
 
 p b 
 
 
 m 
 
 Ancipites. 
 
 I. Gutturals . 
 
 II. Linguals... 
 
 III. Labials ... 
 
 Thus are presented the points of coincidence between a phonic 
 system based upon the physiology of the human voice, and 
 another arrived at by induction from particulars in the languag 
 of a barbarous people, " in a manner wholly concerning the ear." 
 It is now my purpose to explain and develops this natural system, 
 by treating of each horizontal (or organic) series separately, filling 
 it up according to the principles assumed, and thus completing 
 the vertical sets. 
 
 NOTE. By doing so, I am apparently admitting a division according to 
 the organs ; but my use of it is arbitrary, in order to make myself better 
 understood, by adhering as much as possible to the prevailing nomenclature 
 where no dispute exists. So far as regards the classification of the elements 
 of articulation, the views started in this treatise are discordant with those 
 C 2
 
 20 
 
 generally held, principally upon tlie subject of the vertical divisions into 
 simple and aspirate " explodents" instead of mlo explodents and. fricatives ; 
 and the distinction of each of these into binary quantities, fortis and Ictiis, 
 in certain instances not usually admitted. On this account, I speak of 1st 
 and 2nd divisions at the commencement of the section in each series, to 
 avoid confusion in the above terms. At the close of each section, I give 
 the series as developed according to the Sechwana, in the most simple 
 characters that can be suggested. 
 
 I. THE GUTTURAL SERIES. 
 
 1st Division. 
 
 fortis. lenis. 
 
 k 
 
 2nd Ziitision. 
 
 fortis. lenis. 
 
 Nasals. 
 
 n(-ng) 
 
 The above Sechwana consonants, so far, happen to coincide, 
 as I have said, with the organic order generally admitted. 
 
 Under the First Division of the GUTTURAL SERIES, it will 
 be seen that the only exception is g, which is usually considered 
 the lenis form of k } and improperly called in English <l hard g." 
 This consonant does not exist in Sechwana, which thus affords 
 another instance of a language possessing an element of articu- 
 lation in one quantity, without its correlative form. 
 
 NOTE, But an apparent anomaly presents itself at the outsat, in the case 
 of Sechwana verbs with vowel initials, e.y. : The verb ila (hate), in the noun 
 expressing the action, becomes kilo; and with the object-particles, ikila, 
 nkila. This does not, however, contradict the piinciple which I wish to 
 maintain regarding the fixed correlation of the instances in every pair ; for 
 the above is merely an example of the substitution of a positive consonant 
 where none exists. It is, perhaps, " a mere contrivance for euphony's sake;" 
 something like that in Greek, in the case of the particle ov (not, no,) which 
 takes final e before vowels, as in the example OVK iveariv* A reason why 
 A is naturally preferred to either t or p in such a case, may perhaps be 
 alleged, upon a physiological basis, that in the articulation of it the mouth 
 is in a position best suited for the pronunciation of a vowel. 
 
 In Sechwana, all verbs with initial k, as kaiia (fix together), 
 retain this consonant in the initial of the noun expressing the action 
 kano, and in the verb itself with the object-particles prefixed 
 * Buttmann.
 
 21 
 
 ikana, iikana. It thus remains immutable, and its quantity 
 is, therefore, upon the principle I have shown to exist in the 
 phonic system of the language fortis. It is probable that had 
 the Sechwana contained the simple " explodent" g (lenis), as 
 an initial, this would, in the inflection, have become k. Though 
 I have not the opportunity of thus testing, by this language, the 
 correlation which is universally admitted to exist between &and g, 
 a collateral, and perhaps sufficiently satisfactory confirmation 
 of it may be found in the two aspirate forms &h and g (-$/) 
 corresponding with them in the series, so far as regards quantity, 
 and which I shall presently notice. (Vide Section ii., Ch. iv.) 
 
 Like the rest of consonants, in the confusion of so many ortho- 
 graphic schemes, the instances in this pair, k and g, have been 
 separately the subject of " nice distinctions," especially among 
 authors reasoning upon a physiological basis, e.g. : 
 
 NOTE. "Adelung declares that tlie German AT has a double sound;" 
 that in kaum (scarcely), and stick (a bag), it is different from k in klein (little) , 
 and ha ken (a hook) ; " and on the letter g lie makes somewhat similar obser- 
 vations." Glossology: Sir J. Stoddart, p. 132. Again, Mr. Bell observes 
 " that in k, before the close lingual vowel ee, the tongue strikes the palate 
 much further forward than before ah or aw, and that the same will apply to 
 g."lbUJ. 
 
 I shall not presume to question the utility of such phonical 
 divarications, believing that consonants, as well as vowels, are 
 apparently modified, but only slightly influenced, according to 
 their different combinations, their position in the collocation of 
 syllables,* and the capacity of the voice: that is, either ihefortia 
 or lenis form of any consonant may be enunciated with different 
 degrees of distinctness,! but its quantity, relatively to that of 
 the other instance of the pair, remains constant. The importance 
 of adhering to this principle, in order to arrive at a classification 
 
 * Or, more correctly: their position with respect to-the syllabic accent. 
 
 f Or, in the words of Sir J. Stoddart : " It is not to be understood that 
 either the one or the other articulation in each pair does not admit of nice 
 shades and discriminatory touches as it wre, perceptible to some ears, and 
 not to others." Glossology, p. 132.
 
 22 
 
 of the normal elements of articulation, and so as to account for 
 the nature of all variable instances, cannot be estimated. To 
 the philologer, the desideratum of the day is a phonic standard, 
 with which to compare undefined sounds; a phonetic formula, or 
 analytic means of explaining apparent exceptions, and bringing 
 them within a synthetic view, as a further means of evolving the 
 principles of the science of etymology. 
 
 Under the Second Division of the GUTTURAL SERIES, the Sech- 
 wana presents probably the normal instances of what are generally 
 considered the most questionable elements in universal phonics ; 
 that is, upon which the opinions of linguists have been most divided. 
 
 The data are as follows : 
 
 1. All verbs with initial g* (-gh), as gata (tread), commute 
 this consonant into kh (or aspirate k) in the inflected noun ex- 
 pressing the action, khato ; also in the verbs with the object- 
 particles ikhata, iikhata. 
 
 2. Again : All verbs with initial kh,f as khwetsa (drive), 
 retain this consonant in the inflected forms khweco, 
 ikhwetsa, nkhwetsa. 
 
 In the former instance, the articulation of g (-gh) is changed 
 to kh ; in the latter, kh remains immutable. Both instances 
 are constant i.e., without exceptions; therefore g is a lenis 
 form, and kh the fortis of the same pair, and consequently 
 they are both aspirates corresponding to the simple " explodents " 
 k and g. Such laconic inferences may lay me open to a charge 
 of presumption ; but in the sequel I shall have recourse to col- 
 lateral evidence, and the testimony of able authorities. 
 
 * Called by Dr. Bleek " a soft kind of guttural .... denoted by 
 g, as in. Dmtch." Sir G. Grey's Library, South African Languages, p. 113. 
 
 It ! the g in Dutch dag = eh in German buch. 
 
 f This digraph = fch in milk-h^use, with mil elided, the accent on khouac, 
 and the h distinctly enunciated.
 
 23 
 
 Confusion in Nomenclature and Orthography, in the u*ual 
 Classification of the Guttural Consonants.* 
 
 [Sir John Stoddart, in speaking of a pair of gutturals, 
 very correctly says " They are evidently susceptible of modi- 
 fication by slight differences in the position or action of the 
 organs."f I have already had occasion to refer to them ; and 
 shall do so again in the details of this section, in order to show 
 that the circumstance of their partaking of the nature of fricatives 
 as well as aspirates has hitherto led to a classification which, how- 
 ever elaborate, is unsatisfactory to some like myself engaged in 
 local researches into a language till recently unwritten, and to 
 this day without a proper grammar or vocabulary. 
 
 Indeed, it may truly be said of all the gutturals, but especially 
 of their aspirate forms, that they are of a nature to deceive the 
 ear more than any other simple consonants, especially on account 
 of the difficulty of distinguishing them accurately from purely 
 " palatal ''} utterances, or other sounds resulting from a combination 
 of these with gutturals. 
 
 NOTE (). In German, Adelung distinguishes the articulation cli into 
 
 * The reader is at liberty to pass on to page 40, in order to follow the 
 analysis ; or to read this parenthetical section separately, as from its nature 
 it is treated in a desultory manner. 
 
 f Glossology, p. 130. 
 
 \ Whenever this word palatal occurs within inverted commas, it is ill- 
 tended to represent a more general term (to which I shall have recourse in 
 the sequel, Part III.), of which the above word includes only one of the 
 special meanings. 
 
 Gutturals are by some writers also called palatals, perhaps from this 
 very circumstance ; and by others are made to include h, or the sfiritus 
 nsper.
 
 24 
 
 two degree 3 , a stronger and a weaker; and Muller reckons. the three 
 following modifications of the same : 
 1. In Ueblicli, sellg, &c. 
 y. In tag,suehen, aud, 
 8. As uttered by the Swiss, Tyrolese, aud Dutch. 
 
 NOTE (1). Volney has two pairs of sounds approximating to those under 
 consideration viz., (l),his twelfth class, distinguished by the French 'term 
 q rasseyement (thickening of utterance), which has also a strong and a weak 
 pronunciation : 
 
 The stronger (grasseyement dur}, which he compares to the 19th Arabic 
 letter "," and is " common among the Parisians and Provengals, and pre' 
 dominates among the Berbers." Glossology, Sir John Stoddart, p. 130. 
 This is the letter,' the power of which Dr. Lepsius considers equivalent 
 to the modern Greek y. Standard Alph tbet, p. 48. 
 
 Tlie weaker (grasseyement doux), in this "the position of the organs ia 
 very similar to that which produces the vowel i." Glossology, Sir John 
 Stoddart, p. 130. Dr. Lepsius appears again to consider the sound 
 meant here as equivalent to " the modern Greek 7." Standard Alphabet, 
 p. 13, note 3. 
 
 " A transition often takes place from the one to the other of these articu- 
 lations, in like manner as we find the Hellenic ylXav . . . become in 
 Romaic yelan." 
 
 (2) His thirteenth class, containing The stronger, as in bitch ; the 
 weaker, as in Metternich. Glossology, Sir J. Stoddart, p. 130. Otherwise 
 expressed by Dr. Lepsius thus: " The German ch in ich, lie (Volney) 
 places as a soft sound by the hard sound in buck." Stand. Alph., p. 13, note 3. 
 
 NOTE (c) Dr. Lepsius (at page 43, " Standard Alphabet"), in describing 
 the difference between guttural k and a palatal &', adds: "In most lan- 
 guages A- aud g before the vowels e, i, a, ,* approach the palatal pro- 
 nunciation, whilst before a, o, u, they remain more guttural, owing to the 
 formation of these vowels In the- Sanscrit, the gtittural and palatal pro- 
 nunciation were distinguished before all vowels." 
 
 Again : (p. 48.) We find the same two sounds alluded to by Volney 
 (1 3th class) thus classified : 
 
 " x g- Such, ach ; pol. chata. 
 
 X' Sansc. TSfj Ger. ich, recht." 
 
 The former as a guttural, the latter as a palatal-guttural, if the diacritical 
 mark has any value. 
 
 Again: (Note I, p. 43.) The Germans " pronounce, for instance, the ch 
 in all diminutives, even after a, o, and u, not guttural as in Aachen, rauchen, 
 
 * Of his graphic system. 
 
 f This Sanscrit (?) and German sound is again called a palatal sibilant. 
 Stand. Alph., p. 42, note 1.
 
 &uoA#A,bat palatal, as in Mamaeken, fr'rauuhen, Uhuchen, from Mantn, Frau, 
 Uhu. The guttural e/t is pronounced after all vowels in the most southern 
 parts of Germany." 
 
 The indistinctness of the above remarks arises from this learned philologer 
 not being sufficiently specific in describing what he means by the " palatal 
 pronunciation," or an ' approach to the palatal pronunciation." It may 
 mean either, that of the " pure and simple palatal" y and its aspirate form 
 7), or that of h or y, " easily assuming a shade of ?/."* If the former, it must 
 fall without the guttural series ; if the latter, it becomes a palatal-guttural.-|- 
 But if the pointed letter A 1 is intended for the sound of ch in choice, 
 as Dr. Lepsius seems to intimate (p. 41), it is then quite as likely to 
 indicate the "palatal" form of some other compound consonant. It 
 is first necessary to arrive at the nature of elementary sounds, in order 
 to comprehend the manner in which they are transformed or modified by 
 usage. 
 
 The matter is rendered still more indistinct by the following (Note 1, 
 p. 37) : " The modern Greek y passes at least before e, i, v, into the cor- 
 responding fricative sound." See above example of yeXav. The terms 
 palatal and fricative, intended by the learned writer to differ in meaning, 
 are thus confounded in reference to the gutturals. The writer elsewhere 
 speaks of a i: palatal sibilant," and it is easy to comprehend the nature of a 
 palatal-lingual ; but when (p. 43) he speaks of cases in which " the friction 
 connected with the palatals" is "so inherent, that in the organic structure 
 of the language it may be considered as still forming a simple sound"\ it is 
 difficult to conceive of what is meant. I think much confusion would be 
 avoided by a distinction being first made between simple or compound 
 consonants, and the modifications in either by the superaddition of the pure 
 " palatals" a plan I intend to pursue by the assistance of the Sechwana. 
 In the sequel I shall attempt to prove that an element of articulation, 
 exactly equivalent to ch in the German ich (above alluded to by all these 
 distinguished authors), and wbich exists in Sechwana, is simply the pure 
 "palatal" y, with the spiritus aspet: A careful perusal of the above 
 quotations and remarks will no doubt suggest the probability that the 
 other few sounds referred to are either different gradations of the soft 
 consonant ch in Inchen, or in some instances combinations of the pure 
 "palatals" with them. 
 
 Dr. Lepsius, in his elaborate work, under the series of gut- 
 
 * Or, as Dr. Bleek more happily expresses it, " being influenced by a 
 superadded y." 
 
 f Vide " Standard Alphabet," p. 41, in which both are confounded in 
 " the series of pure palatal sounds," which cannot surely include compounds 
 of simple consonants with pure palatals. See Part III. of this work. 
 
 t The italics are mv own.
 
 2t> 
 
 turals, gives, besides his e.rplodents, two distinct sets of pairs, 
 Avhich he denominates fricatives and aspirates ;* but between 
 these divisions T must confess myself utterly at a loss to com- 
 prehend the difference in reference to the gutturals. I have, in 
 the preceding chapter, stated wherein it appears the classification 
 which he sanctions is at fault. It becomes me to bear out the 
 truth of my remarks on the details of each organic (or horizontal) 
 series. As this learned philologer has given a synoptical and 
 comparative view of the phonetic systems of several languages, 
 as reduced to his own graphic system, and also as represented 
 by the authors from whom he gathered his particulars, I cannot 
 do better than subjoin a compendious abstract of the gutturals 
 under those heads of fricative and aspirate, in order to enable 
 the reader to follow my inferences. 
 
 AFRICAN LANGUAGES. 
 
 1. Hottentot: 
 Wuras . .. 
 
 Fricat 
 fortis. 
 
 Ml 
 c 
 ch 
 
 - 
 
 r, r 
 kh 
 h 
 c 
 h 
 
 ive. 
 lenis. 
 
 ch 
 
 r 
 r 
 
 f j 
 
 h 
 
 Aspirate. 
 fortis. lenis. 
 
 Knudsen 
 
 
 2. Kafir: 
 Appleyard 
 
 3. Zulu: 
 Grout 
 
 4. Tsuana : 
 AppleyarA 
 
 5. Kua: 
 Prof. W. Peters 
 
 6. Swahili: 
 Krapf .. . 
 
 7. Herero : 
 C. Hugo Hahn ... 
 
 8. Mpougwe : 
 Am. Board on the Gabun. 
 
 * The latter, it must be remembered, are not included in his " general 
 tableau," but only in phonetic tables of the few languages in which they 
 are supposed to occur.
 
 L'7 
 
 Fricative. 
 fortis. lenis. 
 
 Aspirate. 
 fortis. lenis. 
 
 0. Fernando Po : 
 
 John Clurkf h 
 
 10. Yorfiba: 
 
 S. Crowllicr h 
 
 11. Ofi: 
 
 H.N.Kiis 
 
 1:2. Susu: 
 
 /. W. G., Am. Board Mi 
 
 13. Maude : 
 
 Mucbruir ' h 
 
 14. Vei: 
 
 S. W. Koelle h r 
 
 15. O'lof: 
 
 Roger kh hr h 
 
 1C. Housa: 
 
 Sohon h y 
 
 17. Kanuri : 
 
 S. W. Koelle h 
 
 18. Nubisch: 
 
 Lepsius h 
 
 19. Koiigara: 
 
 Lepsius (h) 
 
 20. Galla: 
 
 Ch.Tutscheli 
 
 21. Hieroglyphic : 
 
 Lepsius x 
 
 22. Koptic : 
 
 Lepsius x 
 
 23. Bega: 
 
 Lepsiua 
 
 24. Abyssinian, Ge;ex . 
 
 Ludolph i k 
 
 25. Abyssinian, Amhara : 
 
 Isenberg ..' h ch 
 
 NOTE. By the above list it appears that of twenty-five African lan- 
 guages, nine are represented as having both quantities of fricatives, i.e., 
 fortis and lenis; thirteen contain fricatives of only one quantity, and the 
 remaining three, neither fricatives nor aspirates ; but, among the whole 
 number, only three are said to contain aspirates, viz., the two Abyssinian 
 dialects, and the Koptic. 
 
 From the above, a rather sweeping inference may be drawn,
 
 28 
 
 viz., that about seven-eighths of the African dialects have no 
 aspirated gutturals. 
 
 Fortunately for my purpose, the list contains, at the outset, 
 three or four South African languages, with the nature of which 
 I happen to be more or less acquainted viz., the Hottentot or 
 Naman, the Kafir and Zulu, and the Sechwana ; the phonic 
 system of the latter being the subject of my particular attention, 
 I have made it the basis of these investigations. To test the 
 propriety of the distinction between the terms fricative and 
 aspirate in the case of the gutturals, as well as to show the 
 confusion arising from a mere comparison of alphabets, 1 shall 
 consider each of these languages in succession. 
 
 (a) SECHWANA. 
 
 The pair of consonants in this language, which I have already 
 indicated by the letters kh and g (in use among the mission- 
 aries), and proved, upon a certain principle, to be aspirate- 
 " explodent" gutturals, are indicated in the list by the same 
 letters,* but without a knowledge of their nature, both pla'ced 
 under the head of fricatives by Dr. Lepsius, and, moreover, re- 
 presented by the ancient Greek letters ^ an( i 7> m his corres- 
 ponding graphic system. To say that the consonant thus 
 intended to be indicated by the Greek x and called a fricative, 
 is anything but a slight modification by a gentler aspiration 
 that is, differing only in an insignifioant degree, if at all, from 
 lenis aspirate g (-#/<) is, I think, carrying the habit of phonical 
 "hair-splitting" to an excess. The appropriateness of the letter 
 X, in any new graphic system, would consist in its being intro- 
 duced to indicate an element of articulation which bears the 
 closest approximation, if not absolute identity, to that which it 
 anciently indicated. In lexicons, x is represented as having been 
 " a strong guttural aspirate." Its former identity to k aspirate 
 
 * Mi-. Apployard. the authority cited, probably procured Ids informaliou 
 on the subject at second-hand, from Mr. Arch-bell.
 
 29 
 
 seems to be generally admitted ;* at all events, I may avail 
 myself of an independent proof of this (especially as it will serve 
 to illustrate the Sechwana.), in the fact that the same Greek 
 particle ov, previously noticed as taking final K before initial 
 vowels, took x before the same vowels with the spiritus asper, 
 e.g., ov% vtrtfjTir, which could not of course mean the doubling 
 of an aspirate, but the coalescence of final K with the spiritus 
 asper of the following vowel. This is more distinctly shown in 
 the case of ^t/ca, combined with tiptpa, forming lf\i]p-^og. Whereas, 
 X is intended by Dr. Lepsius to indicate a continuous consonant 
 viz., ch in the German lachen, differing only in degree, if at all, 
 from that I am about to notice (g, -gh}- 
 
 This reference to the orthography of a dead language enables 
 me to explain exactly the nature of the consonant in Sechwana, 
 which I, for the present, call an aspirate " explodent." In this 
 language it is at times gently enunciated ; at others, forcibly ; 
 but the fact of an aspiration accompanying the simple " explodent" 
 k, is unmistakeable. 
 
 The other consonant g (-#A), which the genius of the Sechwana 
 proves to be a corresponding lenis form of the fortis kh, and 
 therefore also an aspirate, is more difficult of illustration. An 
 evidently very close approximation to it is that intended to be 
 indicated in Dr. Lepsius's system by the above letter ^ > and 
 classed as a fortis fricative. That the Greek letter y, adopted 
 by him, anciently indicated the same lenis consonant as that now 
 under consideration, is not at all borne out by Greek lexico- 
 graphers. In fact, the supposed identity of y, in the traditional 
 Greek pronunciation, with the Arabic , satisfies me that it 
 would only be applicable to a vocalised form of the German ch 
 in the above example, or to the Cape-Dutch g] in dagen (days). 
 
 * See " Standard Alphabet" note 2, p. 37. 
 
 f An articulation approximating to what is improperly called the 
 " guttural r" but only more gentle.
 
 30 
 
 It must now be evident to the reader that the two letters 
 X and x' (y)j which the able linguist has adopted to represent 
 the elements ch in Germ, lachen, and the Arabic respectively, 
 are by him erroneously applied in the Sechwana to other two 
 elements, which, in his graphic system, ought to be written k' (or 
 M), and ^, respectively ; so that only one of the two is correctly 
 regarded as an equivalent, but merely misplaced as to quantity 
 viz., the latter. 
 
 These two consonants in the Sechwana are thus described by Dr. 
 Livingstone, in his " Analysis of the Language of the Bechuanas," 
 (Section 1.) 
 
 " kh is the k strongly aspirated, as in khakala (far) ; <j guttural as ch, in 
 locli (Scottice), dag (Dutch)." 
 
 At the end of the section, he calls kh,ph, &c., " aspirated explosive sounds," 
 which agrees with the nomenclature I have preferred for explanatory pur- 
 poses, and, indeed, with the definition of Dr. Lepsius.* 
 
 Whereas, Dr. Lepsius's guttural letters ^ and ^' (y) are well 
 illustrated in the Cape- Dutch examples dag 1 , dag'en, in which 
 g l and g* are to each other as s to z, and as th (in thin) to tli (in 
 thine}. 
 
 (I) HOTTENTOT (OR NAMAN). 
 In this language there are two consonants thus indicated by 
 
 Mr. Appleyard, or rather \Vuras M ch 
 
 Mr. Knudsenf c 
 
 Mr. Wahlmann .. ch 
 
 * "Aspirates are those explosive sounds which are pronounced with a 
 simple hut audible hreath." Standard Alphabet, p. 49. The word forcible 
 in place of "audible" would convey a more correct definition. The word 
 " explosive'' omitted, or the words elements of articulation substituted for 
 " explosive sounds," would include the vowels. 
 
 f By reference to the " Correspondence of the S. A A. Bible Society," 
 p. 6, containing a letter from Mr. Knudsen, this missionary, in speaking of 
 an orthography, writes thus : " It would also be better to use for ch the 
 Dutch g, or something else, and for kh another single letter." So that it 
 would appear he admits two forms of this consonant. As to Mr. 
 Wahlmanii, I believe his observations were based on data furnished by 
 Mr. Knudsen.
 
 31 
 
 These are also both placed under the head of fricatives by Dr. 
 Lepsius in the above list, and thus regarded by him as identical 
 to kh and g of the Sechwana. From my own personal observa- 
 tions, in frequent intercourse with both Koranas and Namaqua 
 Hottentots, as well as the Bechwana, I am able confidently to 
 confirm the fact that this language has two aspirated gutturals 
 exactly equivalent to those just described under the Sechwana. 
 These, Mr. Wuras's* digraphs are, no doubt, intended to indicate ; 
 but I prefer to add the authority of an individual who, by reasno 
 of intercourse with natives during his youth, is perhaps not sur- 
 passed by any other missionary in a knowledge of the Naman 
 language, whether practical or critical viz., the Rev. H. Tindall, 
 of the Wesleyan Society. Mr. Tindall, in describing the two 
 gutturals of this language, which he indicates by kh and<jr/i, says : 
 
 ' Qh is a soft guttural, as in the Dutch word yaan. 
 
 " Kh represents a much deeper and harsher guttural than gh. We have 
 no corresponding sound, either in English or Dutch, by which to illustrate 
 its power. 
 
 " These two letters are simple sounds, though represented by compound 
 (onsonants. In spelling they are pronounced at a single articulation, 
 without separating the combined characters ; thus ghun is spelt gh-it-n, and 
 not g-h-u-n. Khnp is spelt kh-a-p, not l:-h-a-p."\ 
 
 The error of the Professor, detected in his Sechwana examples, 
 is here repeated in the application of his graphic system to the 
 Naman gutturals ; and not only are the terms to which I have 
 alluded confounded, but also the consonants misrepresented. 
 These two gutturals are identical in the two languages ; but in 
 both it is only the lenis form that coincides with one of Dr. 
 Lepsius's consonants, viz., his fortis ^. 
 
 * See Sir George Grey's Library, South African Languages, p. 19, note, 
 for some additional information by Mr. Wuras himself, in a letter to Sir 
 G. Grey. 
 
 f " Grammar, &c." See also Correspondence of 8. A. A. B. Society, p. 8, for 
 further remarks bv Mr. Tindall on these consonants.
 
 32 
 
 (c) KAFIR AND ZULU. 
 
 In these dialects, two guttural consonants are arbitrarily repre- 
 sented in the graphic systems of the missionaries, by 
 Mr. Appleyard*.,. r r (Kafir) 
 
 Mr. L. Groutf ... r or r r (Zulu) 
 
 These are also denominated fricatives in the above list, and are 
 thus regarded by Dr. Lepsius as identical to the Sechwana 
 kh and g, and the Naman kh and ch, in his arrangement. I 
 now proceed to add the testimony of a third very able authority, 
 the Rev. J. L. Dohne, in his elaborate and valuable dictionary, 
 published two years later than the " Standard Alphabet," as to 
 their nature : 
 
 " The two gutturals are both harsher than the gutturals in any European 
 tongue. The one, called the softer, is exactly like to the compound sound 
 of the Dutch gr in groot , groet ; Zulu-Kafir rola, rauka, &c." 
 
 " The other is a hard, ringing, harsh sound, which it is very difficult to 
 describe, and still more so to utter, but by no means impossible for a 
 foreigner to pronounce. It is made by contracting the aperture of the 
 throat, and expelling, as it were, the breath forcibly, so as to produce a harsh 
 rustling of the epiglottis."]; 
 
 (1) From this it would appear that the former, which is de- 
 scribed as a lenis, answers exactly to the Dutch g, with a super- 
 added r, and therefore to the Sechwana g, similarly compounded. 
 But, according to the testimony, not only of all missionaries, but 
 also of Mr. Charles Brownlee, a high authority in the Kafir, "no 
 such sound (as r ) exists in the language ;" therefore it would 
 
 * See Mr. Appleyard's later remarks, p. 107, Correspondence S. A. A. B. 
 Society, suggesting k and g, with points over them, to represent them. 
 
 f Now indicated in the graphic system of the " Zulu Grammar and 
 Dictionary Commission," as follows : 
 
 The softer, by h barred. 
 The harder, by k barred. 
 
 See p. 83, Correspondence S. A. A. B. Society. 
 
 I See " Zulu-Kafir Dictionary" Letter R (1), p. 306. Also Letter G, 
 p. 90, under which are some remarks on another soft guttural, apparently 
 rather difficult to describe, but referred to in the sequel. 
 
 Correspondence S. A. A. B. Society, p. 78.
 
 33 
 
 perhaps be nearer the mark to liken it to a rough form of the Dutch 
 or Sechwana g, (Germ, ch gutt.) Mr. Grout, in his Grammar of 
 the Zulu, published ?ince Mr. Dohne's work, describes it thus : 
 
 A soft guttural sound, somewhat broader than the German ch, in "macht;" 
 and corresponding more to the guttural sound of . . . g in the Dutch 
 words, "God," "yoed;" thus " \ola" " %a \a'," p. 16. (In this Grammar 
 he has adopted Lepiuis's orthography.) 
 
 I have since had an excellent opportunity of testing several 
 Zulu consonants by my own ears, and have ascertained this 
 element (x of Lepsius, r of the missionaries) in the Zulu to be 
 strictly identical to the Sechwana (lenis) g of the missionaries. 
 I subsequently met with the abridged Zulu Grammar of the 
 Bishop of Natal, who thus alludes to the same consonant : 
 
 " The . . . letter r is taken to represent the guttural which sounds 
 like the strong German ch, as heard in aiich, noch." (P. 2.) 
 
 So that there can be little doubt as to the strict equivalence of 
 this Zulu consonant to the Sechwana g, and the Naman gh; but, 
 as in those instances, Dr. Lepsius, by making it his " lenis" 1 of ch 
 in lachen, has erroneously supposed it to be another example of 
 the vocalised form, or the Arabic element . Mr. Grout, again, 
 by making it the lenis of the two (meaning it to be the equiva- 
 lent to ch in lachen), has evidently not apprehended the nature 
 of the element intended by Dr. Lepsius to be the *' lenis." Such 
 is, consequently, the present confusion in Zulu phonography. 
 
 (2) In the pronunciation of the other instance of the pair, the 
 breath is said by Mr. Dohne to be "forcibly" expelled, and 
 would thus appear to answer to a harsher form of the Sechwana 
 and Naman kh ; for, even among the Bechwana, both Teh (k' ) and 
 g are at times very coarsely enunciated by natives possessing 
 stentorian voices ; just as we fancy the German guttural ch to be 
 pronounced more forcibly in the Scotch loch, or the Dutch daft, 
 though the same in quantity with them. However, the fol- 
 lowing is Mr. Grout's own description of the same element, which 
 he now indicates by x': 
 
 D
 
 34 
 
 "The letter x represents a peculiar, hard, rough guttural sound, which 
 seems to be made by contracting the throat, and giving the breath a forcible 
 expulsion, at the same time modifying the sound with a tremulous motion 
 of the epiglottis, as in ultu%eza, uliu\eba, um^ezo^ P. 16, Zulu Grammar. 
 
 On my own examination of a native I was disposed to think 
 that this element ^' ( r r ) was not > as supposed by Dr. Lepsius, 
 equivalent to the Sechwana and Hottentot kh (A"), but simply the 
 former (lenis of Grout, Germ, ch, Sech. g), accompanied by a 
 decided lateral click, and that it was actually neither of the two 
 guttural elements of Dr. Lepsius, but a double consonant. 
 
 As in the preceding instance, I was gratified to observe that 
 my view of this articulation was in a measure corroborated by 
 Bishop Colenso's description of it. 
 
 " There is another sound occurring in a few Zulu words, which may be 
 pronounced either as a guttural from the bottom of the throat, or as a click 
 in a peculiar way. But the sound must be heard in order to be imitated. 
 We shall denote it by x ; and the student may get a native to sound it for 
 him." First Steps in Zulu Kafir, p. 2. 
 
 My own description differs from this only in being more de- 
 finitive. It is decidedly not a simple consonant, and Dr. Lepsius 
 has erred in classifying it as the equivalent of both the Sechwana 
 or Naman kh (k "), and the German ch, under the delusion that 
 the two latter digraphs indicated identical elements. Mr. Grout, 
 again, with the " living traditional pronunciation" of the Zulu 
 at his ear, has evidently never taken the trouble to ascertain the 
 real nature of both elements intended to be indicated by Dr. 
 Lepsius's letters x an ^ x' the former of which he has in fact 
 reversed as to quantity, and applied that with a diacritical mark 
 to a compound though cognate consonant. 
 
 I do not know whether the vocalised form of ch in lachen (that 
 is, the ^/izs-fricative-guttural ^' of Lepsius, Arabic ), which he 
 has confounded with the Sechwana g\ is to be found in Zulu ; 
 but have ascertained beyond a doubt that this language neverthe- 
 less contains the Sechwana or Naman kh (&}, which he has con- 
 founded with his x> and I have endeavoured to prove is properly
 
 35 
 
 the fortis form of this ck (gutt.) At page 16 of his Grammar, Mr. 
 Grout says : " There is also a sound intermediate between that ofy 
 and k" On trying, by my own ear, so accustomed to Sechwana 
 aspirates, the two examples he refers to viz., ukuganda or kanda, 
 and utukela or utugela, I distinctly perceived that the former was 
 pronounced uku khanda, and the latter utukhela,* with k" in both. 
 I am afraid I have brought my reader into a phonetic labyrinth, 
 and would rather it had fallen to the lot of some other writer to 
 make an exposure of any imperfections in the graphic systems 
 of men labouring to arrive at uniformity ; but conceive it to be 
 
 * Lest, in the above statements, I should lay myself open to a charge of 
 obsequiousness and party-spirit, I append the following facts : In the course 
 of a short visit to Natal (August, 1861), I took the opportunity of riding 
 out about twenty miles or more from Durban, to the mission station of the 
 Rev. Mr. Rood (who was at the time absent). My object was to become 
 satisfied, before committing myself to print, of the true nature of the two 
 gutturals r~ and r of the American missionaries, or % an< i X f Lepsius. As 
 Mr. Grout's Grammar had just been published, I carefully went through his 
 letters of the alphabet with an intelligent native ; especially as I had my 
 doubts of the correctness of his descriptions of the Zulu elements ; for I had 
 on one occasion observed the written words isipingo and tina distinctly pro- 
 nounced by some gossiping natives isipingo and 'tina. The result of my 
 observations respecting the two gutturals is stated above. As also shown 
 above, I found that Mr. Grout's " sound intermediate between h and </" 
 was kh (k'). In addition to these facts, I observed (2) that his " sound 
 intermediate between the genuine p and b" was ph (p'), e.g., his word 
 
 popoza was what I should write in Sechwana pho-phoza (p'op^oza) ; (3) that 
 tina was really pronounced thina (t'ina), and utixo really uthixo (uftixo) ; in 
 fact, that not only the simple mutes k, t, &nAp, existed in the language, bujt 
 
 also their unmistakeable aspirate forms, the equivalents of those in the Sech- 
 wana viz., Jc' t t~ p~ I not only stated these facts to my relative, Mr. 
 Laurence Platt, my companion on the jaunt, but the morning after to Dr. 
 Mann, the able superintendent of education, while riding a short distance 
 with him from the Isipingo, in the direction of Durban. A day or two 
 
 corroborative quotations, of which I have already made use (at p. 2), con 
 tained the following paragraph : 
 
 " There is a slight aspiration heard in very many words (as in Hebrew) 
 after either of the letters b, g, d, k,p, t. This will account for some roots, 
 which in the dictionaries appear identical, having a difference of meaning, 
 which a native would distinguish by his enunciation, though it will require 
 a fine ear to detect it. 
 
 Ex. kona, it; but kona (pronounced khona), these. 
 
 kirako, its; but kwako (pronounced kunklio), thine." 
 D 2
 
 36 
 
 my duty to divest this important subject of a confusion 
 worse confounded by an obsequious attachment, on the part of 
 those who have the living speech within hearing, to " written 
 systems fixed by literature," and the authority of great names. 
 I do not, however, flatter myself that any will wade through all 
 my remarks, but shall attempt to give as synoptical a view of 
 the subject as possible, employing the letters of Dr. Lepsius's 
 system, and in brackets those of the missionaries, &c. : 
 
 
 
 fortis. 
 
 X 
 lenis. 
 
 lenis. 
 X (>") 
 
 lenis. 
 
 x'(y) 
 
 of Lepsius. 
 
 of the Sechwana. 
 of the Nainan. 
 
 of Wr Grout. W the 
 hopColenso, Zuku 
 
 
 fortis. 
 
 *< (M) 
 & c (kh) 
 
 
 
 compound. 
 
 
 :::*:: . ... 
 
 k\kh) 
 
 Observed by Bis 
 
 
 and more recently by myself. 
 
 The instances which I have observed for myself are quite as strong as 
 the aspirated mutes in the Sechwana, though I have no doubt slighter 
 aspirations would be found to occur in unaccented syllables. I am not 
 sufficiently acquainted with the Zulu to be able to give an opinion as to 
 whether the lenes mutes g, d, b, occur, but I need not say I was most agreeably 
 surprised to find my views respecting the fortes corroborated by the autho- 
 rity of an able scholar. 
 
 This will perhaps be the fittest place for me to express an opinion which 
 I have long entertained. It is much to be regretted that, in the compilation 
 of his elaborate and interesting Dictionary, the Rev. Mr. Db'lme has not, by 
 means of diacritical marks, or other ^expedients, shown, in the case of every 
 word in which they occur, the variations of the following letters : e, g, m, o, r 
 (gutt.), hi, &c., &c., to each of which he attributes two or more powers. 
 The importance of such distinctive marks in the search after roots cannot 
 be estimated ; and is moreover enforced by a reference to precedents, in 
 which phonetic distinctions in such a language as the Arabic are shown 
 to clear up apparent difficulties in several cases of the Hebrew having one 
 word with entirely different meanings. Unless Zulu scholars look to their 
 phonography, the cognate Sechwana will doubtless, ere long, have the 
 advantage, like the Arabic; simply because of greater attention having been 
 paid to phonetic distinctions. 
 
 All the confusion consists in the instances of the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th pairs 
 being reckoned by Dr. Lepsius the equivalents of those of the 1st pair re. 
 spectively, and in &' having entirely escaped the notice of the American 
 missionaries ; whereas, the vertical columns show the real phonical equivalents.
 
 37 
 
 There can now be very little doubt as to the strict equivalence 
 in quantity of certain pairs of rough guttural consonants in the 
 three species of languages I have just examined. I have shown 
 those in the Sechwana to be combinations of the simple " explodent* 
 gutturals k and g (gli) with the sjriritus asper ; personal inter- 
 course with the natives, and the authority of Mr. Tindall, enable 
 me to identify with them the two harsh gutturals of the Nam an 
 language ; and the descriptions of able linguists among the mis- 
 sionaries, added to my own observation, lead me to conclude that 
 the " Kafir species" also contains them both.* Therefore I have 
 considered myself justified in concluding that they are, in every 
 case, formed by a combination of the spiritus asper with the simple 
 "explodents" k and (a form of) g. But in no case are they the exact 
 equivalents in quantity of the pair under which Dr. Lepsius has 
 classified them in his tables, except that hisfortis form x answers 
 to their lenes forms, though differently indicated (g, gh, or r.) It 
 will no doubt have been observed that all the authors quoted speak 
 of the softer form of the two, i.e. } g (-gli) being simply a guttural, or 
 a soft guttural ; the proof of its being a lenis form of the aspirated 
 guttural, kh, and therefore also an aspirate, is alleged by me solely 
 on the principle existing in the Sechwana phonic system, and 
 which I hope to maintain throughout this treatise. 
 
 As to the remaining African languages in the list, I must of 
 course plead absolute ignorance, in the absence of the living 
 pronunciation, which would enable one to compare for himself; 
 but, so far as regards the absence of authentic facts, my dis- 
 advantages are surely not greater than were those of Dr. Lepsius, 
 when compelled to base his conclusions on second-hand data, 
 contributed, of necessity, by different and various authors, at 
 several intervals, and of course without a preconcerted plan. 
 
 * Since the above was in type, I have met with Dr. Van der Kemp's list 
 of Kaffir gutturals viz., " G, g, (like ye Dutch g in groot) ; Q, q, (like ye 
 English g in great); x , X. (like ye English ch in chlorosis, being ye same as 
 the Greek x) ; and K, k." Sir G. Greys Library, S. A. Lang., p. 47.
 
 38 
 
 If out of his list of these languages I have shown him to have 
 fallen into egregious errors in regard to the four first, there is 
 surely some probability that his remaining ex am pies, based on the 
 researches of others, will also be erroneous. However, having 
 endeavoured to prove that these two consonants, distinguished by 
 him as fricatives in twenty-five African languages, are aspirates 
 in about one-sixth of the number, I am left to surmise that 
 they are so in all or most of the remaining instances, and that the 
 difference between the two terms is, in the case of the gutturals, 
 merely imaginary. 
 
 I have thought proper to subjoin also a compendious abstract, 
 similar to that preceding, of the gutturals in the Asiatic languages, 
 as arranged, by the same learned author, under the two heads of 
 fricative and aspirate, in order to place the matter in another light. 
 
 ASIATIC LANGUAGES. 
 
 I Fricative. Aspirate. 
 
 1. Hebrew: I fortis. lenis. fortis. lenis. 
 
 Without points j H 
 
 Withpoints i H 3 
 
 2. Arabic: 
 
 Ancient Literature 
 
 Smith and Robinson ..."I ^ ^ 
 
 Act. pronunciation J 
 
 8. Persian: 
 
 Mirza M.Ibrahim * 9 
 
 i Sanscrit : 
 
 Oriental Literature 
 
 Bopp, 1833 k 
 
 H.H.Wilson j c h fj h 
 
 5. Bengali : 
 
 G.C.Haughton M </h 
 
 6. Zend: 
 
 Oriental Literature cV , 
 
 Burnovf ** y h 
 
 Bopp,\mz c yh 
 
 Broclcliaus kh gh 
 
 7 . Armenian : 
 
 Ancient Pronunciation ... fr* 1_ 
 
 Actual Pronunciation...] , ' t 
 
 Petermann J 
 
 8. Georgian : 
 
 Rosen ch gh
 
 39 
 
 9. Albanian : 
 J. Q v Hah i 
 
 Fricative. 
 fortis. lenis. 
 
 X 7 
 
 kh gh 
 kh gh 
 kh gh 
 
 x g 
 
 kh yh 
 ch gh 
 
 X 
 
 Asplr<itf. 
 fortis. leiiia 
 
 10. Hindustani: 
 
 W Yales . 
 
 Oilchrist 
 
 H. H Wilson 
 
 11. Malayan: 
 
 12. Javanese: 
 J Crawfurd 
 
 IS. Turkish: 
 
 14. Mongolian : 
 j j Schmidt 
 
 15. Chinese: 
 Rev. J. Oough \ 
 Rev. T. McClatchie J 
 Stenhen Endlicher ... 
 
 NOTE. Of fifteen Asiatic languages, one is represented as containing 
 . neither fricative nor aspirate gutturals; eleven as having fricatives of both 
 quantities, i.e., lenis and fortis; one as having a fricative of one quantity. 
 Again, two are represented as having aspirated gutturals of both quantities ; 
 three, aspirates of one quantity. The inference from this is, that two- 
 thirds of the Asiatic languages have no guttural aspirates. 
 
 Counting single instances, the proportion of aspirates to "fricatives" is 
 as seven to twenty-three In the fifteen Asiatic languages. In the twenty-five 
 African languages they are as three to thirty-one. The inference must then 
 be, that more than four-fifths of the rough guttural consonants in all 
 these languages are fricatives, and less than one-fifth, aspirates ! I admit 
 the possibility, but not the probability of its truth. 
 
 It must strike any one at all given to generalising, that, with 
 the exception of the Armenian, Georgian, Chinese, the two 
 Abyssinian dialects, and the Koptic, which are represented as 
 having one guttural aspirate each, besides the one or two frica- 
 tives, those languages which are stated as having fricatives, have 
 no aspirates, and vice versa; an inference which has all the appear- 
 ance of being based upon a spurious arrangement of instances. 
 It appears the more evident, from these comparative lists taken
 
 40 
 
 together, that confusion exists in the use of the terms fricative 
 and aspirate, in regard to the gutturals. It may be gathered 
 from what preceded them, that the terms fricative and palatal 
 are also at times used synonymously when applied to that series. 
 For my own part, I should feel myself lost in a maze of con- 
 flicting terms of fricatives., aspirates, and palatals, were it not for 
 the light which appears to me to be thrown upon the subject by 
 the simple and primitive nature of the phonic system suggested 
 by the Sechwana.] 
 
 Under the Nasals in the guttural series, the Sechwana has 
 the same element as we find indicated by ng in English in the 
 word sing, and in German in the word enge. It is indicated in 
 the literature of the missionaries by n. It may be said to occur 
 more frequently than any other consonant in this language. 
 
 The whole series of simple gutturals, according to the arrange- 
 ment suggested by the Sechwana, will now be as follows : 
 
 Gutturals k 
 
 Simple"JExplodents." Aspirate "Explodents." 
 fortis. lenis. fortis. lenis, 
 
 k" 
 
 n (-ng) 
 
 II. THE LINGUAL SEKIES. 
 
 1st Division. 
 fortis. lenis. 
 
 t d 
 
 2nd Division. 
 
 fortis. lenis. 
 
 Nasals. 
 
 n 
 
 Ancipit 
 
 r 
 
 To the extent above represented, the Sechwana gives the 
 same linguals, but, as will be seen, contains the elements of a 
 more consistent and satisfactory series. These consonants have 
 been variously classified. J"and d have as frequently been called 
 
 * It may be observed I have called this consonant a lenis form of k". In 
 order not to confound it with the mute lenis form g, and till enabled in the 
 sequel to explain its real nature, T shall indicate it by '</. (Sechwana 17; 
 German ch, gutt.)
 
 41 
 
 dentals as linguals. In the words of Sir John Stoddart, " the 
 sound expressed by t throughout Europe is unvaried, and the 
 same may be said of that expressed by d." L and r have usuallv 
 been called linguals ; though they are included in the " Standard 
 Alphabet" under the series of dentals. 
 
 The following quotations, from the same distinguished author, 
 will show that there are few consonantal elements so little under- 
 stood as the linguals r and 1: 
 
 " All the oral consonantal sounds, except I and r, are produced in pairs, 
 each pair having the same position of the organs, but with a certain difference 
 of effect." Glossology, p. 127. 
 
 The lingual "letters I and r; which, however, do not form a pair, the 
 articulating action in the one being very different from the action in the 
 other." Hid. p. 138. In the same page, "That articulations so close aa 
 those of I and r should pass into each other is not surprising." 
 
 " Although all the European languages employ this articulation, and 
 generally express it by a single letter (either the Latin r or the Greek p), 
 they vaiy much in the smoothness or roughness of the sound, &c." Ibid. 
 p. 139. 
 
 " It is sometimes difficult to decide whether the sound is to be considered 
 as a modification of r, or a combination of it with a guttural articulation." 
 Page 140. 
 
 "But though the smoothness of the sound I contrasts remarkably with 
 the roughness of the sound r, yet the relation of both to the peculiar action 
 of the tongue renders the substitution of one for the other most frequent- 
 Hence Molly from Mary, Hal from Harry ; hence the practice called in 
 Germany lallen ; . . . . and hence, too, the common habit of children, when 
 they find a difficulty in pronouncing the harsher sound, of recurring to the 
 softer as a substitute." Page 141. 
 
 Ben Jonson, according to Walker, made a distinction between 
 " the rough and a smooth r ;" however, in English, the phonic 
 difference is not indicated in the graphic system e.g., r in roll, 
 and r in directly.* 
 
 Two are to be found in French, in the words diriger and 
 beurre ; in the latter word, a distinction is made by doubling the 
 letter. It would appear that the Armenian alphabet " has two 
 different characters, rra and re; the former expressing the 
 
 * We often hear children say didectly, and dilectly.
 
 42 
 
 rougher, the latter the smoother sound of this articulation."* 
 From the tables of Dr. Lepsius we learn that one African lan- 
 guage, the Susu, has both r and rh ; and that among Asiatic 
 languages only the Albanian and Hindustani have both a rough 
 and a smooth r.f No doubt, numerous other instances could be 
 found, as, for example, the Sechwana, which I have yet to show 
 contains both forms of r, is represented in the same tables as 
 having only one. The fact of its relative position among other 
 consonants, in a universal classification of the elements of arti- 
 culation, never yet having been decided, will perhaps account for 
 one form being overlooked in a few languages by some students. 
 I have preferred to call the whole series linguals.J 
 
 NOTE. It will be observed that I have for the present excluded from.the 
 tecond division of this series all the consonants *, * ; 9, S ; /, v ; sh and zh ; \\ 
 which have usually been called fricative or continuous, and always been dis- 
 posed into pairs of correlative quantities, fortis and lenis, on the supposition 
 that the affinity between the instances of each pair is analogous to that 
 between t and d, or k and g. It will, however, be found in the sequel, that 
 they are nevertheless included in the lingual series (with the exception off 
 and v), but by a very different classification, based upon the phonology of this 
 "barbarous" language. It is worthy of remark, that these several " pairs f 'f of 
 consonants called fricatives " from their sound being determined by 
 friction," or continuous " because this friction is not interrupted by any 
 closing of the organs;" and again, by others, sibilants have also been deno- 
 minated semi-vowels, " as agreeing .... in presenting only a partial 
 obstruction to the passage of the vocalised breath ;" but this lias never, till 
 recently, been tlie case with the gutturals, of tvhich tie have, in the last section, 
 
 * Glossology, Sir J. Stoddart, p. 139. In Lepsius's Tables, indicated by 
 r and r' 
 
 f In Hindustani there are three r's, viz., r, rh, and r; the third, from 
 descriptions, would appear to be a vocalised form of the second. 
 
 | 8, T, 5, v, X, p, ff, are called linguals by Buttmann. 
 
 As to 9 and 8 of Lepsius, = t h in thin and thine respectively, these elements 
 do not exist in Sechwana, but are referred to in Section v., Ch. iii. 
 
 || For the positions of * and z in the series, see Chapter v. ; for those 
 of tli and zh, see Part III. of this work. 
 
 1[ As they are usually supposed to be.
 
 43 
 
 treated.* L, r, and n, were also, as before stated, formerly included among 
 the semi-vowels, by those who found in their " humming and hissing" "a 
 transition to the vowels; and, in a quotation in the sequel, it will be seen 
 that the two former are regarded by Dr. Lepsius as partaking of the nature 
 of fricatives. From the above remarks it would appear that even the terms 
 fricative and linyual are, in accordance with the views stated in the preceding 
 chapter, but synonymes in most of the instancesin this series of consonants. 
 
 In the above table, t and d form the only pair of correlative 
 consonants ; their correlation is universally admitted and proved, 
 as will be seen by an appeal to some of the usual facts in 
 Sechwana. I shall now attempt to show from these facts that 
 an entirely different arrangement of the other members of the 
 lingual series than that in vogue, is required by the inferences 
 one feels compelled to draw from them. There may be an 
 appearance of presumption in this ; but when a man takes his 
 stand upon the firm ground of induction, he ventures less than 
 by expressing any bold anticipation. Moreover, I may have 
 something to dread in a charge of hasty generalisation. Be this 
 as it may, I shall have the satisfaction of having attempted to 
 supply some of the materials of a natural phonic system, to 
 which some more comprehensive and discerning mind may be 
 enabled, by my humble example, to add much that is new, and 
 to construct a better whole. 
 
 Under the First Division of the LINGUAL SERIES the data 
 of the Sechwana present a slight irregularity in respect to the 
 pair t and d, but the mutation of the latter to the former is 
 sufficiently distinct and in keeping with all the instances of 
 other consonants. 
 
 * According to a preceding quotation frorc Dr. Lepsius, the essential 
 distinction between these gutturals and the above three fricative pairs 
 " consists in the friction of the breath being formed and heard at the teeth" 
 in the latter. See Standard Alphabet, p. 45. The only other pair also 
 considered to be fricatives namely, / and v, could have been included 
 with the three pairs, so that the gutturals are exceptions to them all, and 
 their classification together, on this ground, is perfectly anomalous.
 
 44 
 
 Almost the only verb with initial d or lid, as daea, com- 
 mutes this consonant into t or nt in the examples : 
 
 nDaea, (strike,) nteo.*t 
 
 But we find also that initial I, and a faintly tremulous r,f are 
 similarly commutable with the same letter t, in every similar in- 
 stance of inflection, but t itself remains immutable. The examples 
 are 
 
 Rila, (smear) tilo, itila, ntila. 
 Leta, (watch) teto, iteta, nteta. 
 *Tena, (disgust) tend, itena, ntena. 
 
 The inference from these particulars is, that the two elements 
 indicated by 1, r are, as well as d, lenes forms of t, and the latter 
 their corresponding jforft's ; therefore, both are simple " explodents." 
 If the mutative process in the Sechwana has any principle in 
 it at all, the element I, and one of the two forms of r which Dr. 
 Lepsius has included under the heading ancipites, are thus referred 
 to their proper places in a phonetic table as both " explodent" 
 linguals, and both lenes. There can be very little doubt that the 
 three lenes consonants I, r\ and d, are strictly allied. In the 
 earliest publications of the missionaries, we find them using d, 
 dl, where they now use I and r,\\ so that they appear to have 
 
 * This diacritical mark, attached to the e as e, is arbitrary, in order to 
 indicate the equivalent of the French e in Mere. 
 
 f The examples in which the verh is preceded by the object-particles are 
 irregular with, respect to ndaea viz., ititaea and ntitaea. They are, how- 
 ever, regular with respect to ritaea (strike), which is most common in the 
 Serolon. 
 
 I In the absence of a settled letter, T shall, for the purposes of this 
 section, indicate this consonant by r 1 . 
 
 See Sir Oeorge Greys Library, South African Languages p. 137. 
 
 |J Some missionaries, though aware of the peculiarity of the consonant, give 
 it, in pronouncing the word, the decidedly tremulous articulation of a rough r.
 
 45 
 
 hesitated between four ways of indicating it in the new literature 
 of the same people. 
 
 Molimo (God, impersonal). Liyo (food). 
 
 Morimo Dliyo 
 
 Modimo 
 
 To those arguing on a physiological basis, this fact ought to 
 savour of a proof that the articulation of the said three consonants 
 is effected by the same organs of the voice.* 
 
 The distinct articulation of d, as I have implied, rarely occurs 
 in the language. Daea is the only instance in which it takes 
 any other vowel than t after it, and, in this case, it is generally 
 enunciated with a faint sound of n preceding it. lit the other 
 few instances, as well as certain pronouns, it occurs in the form 
 of a " palatal " ; that is, with a superadded y or i, as Dya (eat), 
 Dyalia (cleanse), Dyala (sow).f 
 
 The well-known consonant I is constant before any other 
 vowel than i and u, and frequently it is perceptible even before 
 these ; but that which I have for the present indicated by r 1 , as 
 above described, seems peculiar to these two vowels, and forms 
 only one of two elements which have been indicated in the 
 literature of some missionaries by the common letter r. This con- 
 sonant (r 1 ) almost defies description. To say that it is an 
 indistinctly tremulous r, or something between a rough r 
 and a d, would convey only a slight approximation to the nature 
 of it. The Greek p, in Kpifiavoq and rapw, which were also written 
 K\ifiavos and KO\W, the Latin r in meridies, for medidies, and 
 the Sanskrit r in roman for Ionian, indicated, no doubt, the 
 identical consonant. If it occurs before other vowels than i and w, 
 
 * I cannot divest myself of the idea that, in the Sechwana, the set of 
 lenes forms of t is incomplete ; that the elemontary forms of the consonants 
 th in thin (0), and also s in the words parts, par Jcs, harps, also pertain to it. 
 I shall revert to the subject in Section v., Ch. iii. 
 
 f All written by the missionaries without a d, but this element preceding 
 the y cannot be mistaken.
 
 46 
 
 it will require the ear of a native well practised in observing 
 differences of articulation to detect it. I am not aware that any 
 European has hitherto been able to do so in the Sechwana, in 
 which it must surely exist. 
 
 Dr. Bleek, in speaking of the Sechwana " dialects," says of 
 this consonant 
 
 " There is frequently r found in one dialect where the other has I, and 
 vice versa; and, in general, one is justified to consider r in these dialects as 
 a sort of floating letter, and rather intermediate between I and r, than a 
 decided r sound." Sir George Greys Library, South African Languages, 
 p. 135. 
 
 Now, as to either of these consonants being peculiar to different 
 dialects in certain instances, I rather think this is a mistake ; fyr 
 both are found in most, if not all, dialects, and are convertible, 
 as in the particle ri (or li), which is repeatedly pronounced both 
 ways in the same sentence ; but in many cases they appear to 
 be constant, as in mocweri (a spiking of water), from cwela and 
 in the analogous forms.* The value of the above remark further 
 depends upon what Dr. Bleek considers " a decided r sound" 
 That r is decidedly" a floating letter" the places of the two gene- 
 rally acknowledged forms of which have never hitherto been 
 found in a phonetic scale, is unquestionable, or they would not 
 be included by Dr. Lepsius under the head of ancipites ! I shall 
 avail myself of another quotation from the latter distinguished 
 authority, corroborating these remarks : 
 
 " The sounds I and r t participate of both qualities (explosive and fricative), 
 
 * Some remarks on the convertible nature of r and I, in Kaffir, may be 
 seen in " Corr. 8. A. A. B. Society," -p. 104. Mr. Appleyard evidently writes 
 without any allusion to two r's, and it may be as well to state the probability 
 that that which the Kaffir substitutes for Z is equivalent to r 1 described in 
 the text. It is nevertheless possible that the Kaffirs substitute the aspirate 
 r 3 (described in. the sequel), for even among the Bechwana the children 
 educated by the missionaries are actually changing the pronunciation of r 1 
 in morimo to the aspirate r 2 , or its vocalised form, by imitating their teachers. 
 
 f There being no diacritical mark, the reader is in doubt which r is 
 meant, though it is probably intended for the smooth consonant.
 
 47 
 
 being continuous, and at the same time formed 1>y a contact which is 
 vibrating in r, and partial in /." Standard Alphabet, p. 30. 
 
 If we take the Sechwana as a guide, this dubiousness will be 
 removed. These two consonants are admitted by Dr. Lepsius to be 
 ' explodents] as well as fricatives. I have already shown, in the 
 preceding chapter, that some fricatives, or, as they have been 
 otherwise called, semi-vowels, may be simple " explodents," and 
 others aspirate " explodents." The Sechwana goes still further : it 
 points to their position in the former set, and gives us their 
 quantity in the pair viz., that they are both (together with d) 
 lenes forms of the consonant t. I hope to show, in the sequel, that 
 the lingual series has also a corresponding aspirate form. 
 
 I cannot here forego the following valuable remarks on the 
 subject of certain forms of articulation, supposed to be peculiar 
 to the Sanscrit; for, when resolved into their elements, one of 
 these coincides remarkably with another I have just attempted 
 to describe as occurring in this "barbarous" but extraordinary 
 language : 
 
 " In the Sanscrit system there are several sounds reckoned among simple 
 vowels which should rather, perhaps, be considered as combinations of one or 
 more liquid consonants with a vowel. Thus, Sir W. Jones describes r'i, the 
 seventh letter of the vowel series, as ' a sound peculiar to the Sanscrit lan- 
 guage, formed by a (jentle vibration of the tongue preceding our third vowel i, 
 pronounced very short,' as ' in the second syllable of merrily.' The next to 
 this is ' the same complex sound considerably lengthened (ree),' and then 
 follow two others, Iri and Iri, which he describes as ' short and long triph- 
 thongs, peculiar to the Sanscrit language.' " Glossology, by Sir John Stoddart, 
 p. 80. 
 
 If we regard these articulations properly that is, the lingual 
 consonants, independently of the vowels affixed to them the 
 former will be found to resemble very closely the element above 
 described, which I have indicated by r 1 . Indeed, the r "in the 
 second syllable of merrily 1 " is perhaps the fittest which could be 
 chosen to represent as exactly as possible the Sechwana consonant. 
 It will not be surprising if it should be proved that two such
 
 48 
 
 closely allied lingual consonants as r and / have thus been 
 reckoned among the vowel sounds by the Sanscrit grammarians, 
 inasmuch as they have frequently been classed as semi-vowels 
 by some of our own grammarians, and by Dr. Lepsius, in a pre- 
 ceding quotation, as partaking of the nature of fricatives ; for, as 
 I have proved, this cannot be denied of any vowels, all of 
 which are in the strictest sense of the word also continuous. 
 
 Under the Second Division of the LINGUAL SERIES, we find 
 the Sechwana presents the following data : 
 
 Initial r (as indicated in the literature of the missionaries) is also 
 commuted into aspirate t ( or t-Ji) in the inflected forms; e.g. : 
 
 Roga (curse), thogo, ithoga, nthoga. 
 
 Again, Initial aspirate t (t\ written by the missionaries th} re- 
 mains immutable ; e.g. : 
 
 Thiba (prevent), thibb, ithiba, nthiba. 
 
 The inference which follows is, that the r in this case, which 
 is a rustling or strongly tremulous consonant* (and which I shall, 
 for the purposes of this section, indicate by r 2 in contradistinction 
 from the other), is one of the lenes forms of aspirate t or til, and 
 that this (th) is the correlative fords ; that, therefore, they form 
 the pair of aspirate " explpdents" corresponding with the simple 
 "explodents" just described. 
 
 Of this same element, Dr. Bleek (at page 135), in allusion to the 
 
 * Dr. Bleek, on the Sechwana, writes: "It has a sound, r, which 
 is of peculiar harshness, being pronounced deep in the mouth." Sir O. 
 Grey's Library, South African Languages, p. 1J3. This definition conveys 
 the idea of a guttural r, whereas that evidently meant is an r accompanied 
 with an aspirate by which (the physiologist would say) a greater rustling 
 of the tip of the tongue is produced.
 
 49 
 
 differences between the Serolofi and Setlhapifi* dialects, writes : " As 
 regards the pronunciation of the words, the main difference between the two 
 dialects appears to be that, in certain words, a kind of soft r sound is peculiar 
 to the Serolong, instead of the h found in the Sehlapi. E.g., the Barolong 
 say tiro (work), for the Sehlapi tiho"SirO. Grey's Library, South African 
 Languages, p. 135. 
 
 It is well known that all the Sechwana dialects (if such they are to be 
 called) have both h and r 2 . In the example given by this able linguist, of 
 one tribe having tiro, and the other tihd, the former is derived from lira, or 
 ri/'a (to work), and the latter from riha (same meaning). In both cases the 
 initial consonant is pronounced as I at one time, and as r 1 at another, by 
 the same person in every tribe, whether indicated as I or r in the literature 
 of the missionaries in any tribe. The Barolofi say both rira and lira. 
 As to tiho and tiro, it is to be questioned whether the difference is dialectical. 
 I have shown that, according to the genius of the language, I and r are 
 both lenes, and hope yet to show that h and r 8 are also both convertible 
 in the set of lenes aspirates, according to a rule which obtains in the lan- 
 guage ; so that the difference between the latter couple is, in one respect, 
 precisely analogous to that of the former. It is a very common thing 
 for one to hear the Batlhwaro say go, re itse (we do not know), as well 
 as ga he tits. 
 
 The fact of the letter r representing both the smooth and the 
 rough "explodent,"not only in the writings of the missionaries, but 
 also in the English graphic system itself, has somewhat interfered 
 with the formation of correct notions as to its real nature. As 
 
 * Some writers treating on South African dialects are prone to a most 
 inveterate mistake viz., that the publications of the London Missionary 
 Society at Kuruman are in the Setlhapin dialect. It will perhaps suffice to 
 say, that this (if intentional on the part of some who, undoubtedly, have dis- 
 played a little rivalry towards this Society See Standard Alphabet, p. 6, 
 and Carres. S. A. A. B. Society, pp. 9, 118) is equivalent to a slur upon the 
 genuineness of the standard its missionaries have produced of a sacred lite- 
 rature of the Sechwana language, which they have spent some forty years 
 in acquiring, among the people of several tribes, far in advance of the 
 Batlhapin, not only in traditional seniority, but also in purity of diction 
 not omitting the Barolofi. Surely it must be known to such writers, that the 
 Batlhapui are a people whose language has been deteriorating, by reason 
 of their close intercourse with Koranna Hottentots, for a century or more ; 
 and is utterly disregarded by even such missionaries as have resided in their 
 territory for the last forty years. A large portion of this is occupied by 
 two sections of the Bahurutse, the most ancient tribe in the nation viz., 
 the Batlhwaro and Bachweh.
 
 50 
 
 I have said, the rule which generally obtains is that before the 
 vowels i and u; the consonants I and r are convertible.* Both 
 I and an r may be found (in the missionary literature) before 
 all the other vowels without any interchange that is, in situations 
 in which we cannot replace one by means of the other ; the only 
 exception really appears to be before i and M. 
 
 It is therefore a matter of importance that, though writers 
 upon a physiological basis have failed to specify the difference 
 between the two forms of r in such a way as to leave no doubt as 
 to their position in a phonetic table, the simple commutation of r 
 into ih in the Sechwana language, not only before the vowels a, e, 
 and o, but also before * and u (as in Rita, thito; Rima, thimd'), 
 should have led to the conclusion that r has a form separate 
 and distinguishable by the ear from that in Rila, tilo ; Riba, tibo, 
 and above indicated by r 1 . Practice has further enabled some per- 
 sons to detect the difference at first hearing.f The result is, that 
 we are satisfied as to the existence of r inconvertible to I before 
 the vowels i and u ; and this I have attempted to show is one of 
 the lenes forms of aspirate t (f or th). As an example among 
 many of the proficiency which may be arrived at, I give the fol- 
 lowing words with identical vowel sounds, but different meanings: 
 
 Moriri ( a worker), from lira (tiro),] containing both simple and 
 (Or Morihi) riha(tih&)J aspirate r. 
 
 Moriri (a smearer), rila (tilo) containing two simple r's. 
 Moriri (hair) ? containing two aspirate r's. 
 
 * Among others, under the head of Modifications of Initial Consonants, 
 Dr. Bleek has the following : 
 
 I becomes t. 
 
 r (before i and u) t. 
 
 r (before a, e, o) ih. 
 
 In which cases the two letters are intended to indicate the same consonant. 
 Sir George Greys Library, South African Languages, p. 1 04. 
 
 f The two words ruta (teach), and ruta (conceal), are additional examples ; 
 the latter, which I detected only a few months ago, is as little known to 
 some missionaries as the former is frequently used by them.
 
 51 
 
 I trust that this beautiful example of the nice shades or differ- 
 ences of articulation, which I have thus shown may be discovered 
 by another mode of investigation than a recourse to the phy- 
 siology of the human voice, will be satisfactory to those interested 
 in the study of universal phonetics. 
 
 The fact of both r's being lenes in different divisions, will per- 
 haps account for the failure of physiology in helping us out of 
 our difficulties, as it would scarcely have been practicable to 
 arrive at the difference between the two forms by any experiments 
 on the action of the vocal organs. This could not be otherwise 
 in the absence of unmistakeable rudimentary principles, such as 
 I believe I have proved the phonic system of this language to 
 contain. 
 
 Under the Nasals, the n corresponding with these consonants is 
 all that requires to be added to this series, and I am thus enabled 
 to present the following classification of the linguals, as suggested 
 by the Sechwanai 
 
 Simple "Explodents." Aspirate "jExplodents." 
 
 Linguals 
 
 n 
 
 1st Division, 
 forth. lenis. 
 
 b 
 
 III. THE LABIAL SERIES. 
 
 Nasals. 
 
 m 
 
 2nd Division, 
 fortis. lenis. 
 
 In respect to the labials, the Sechwana proves the correctness 
 of the views generally held as to the nature of the affinity existing 
 between the smooth " explodents" p and b, the former being un- 
 changeable in the initial inflexions of the verb, and the latter 
 E 2
 
 52 
 
 changeable to p. The following examples will suffice in illus- 
 
 tration : 
 
 Pitla, (rub) pitlo, ipitla, mpitla. 
 Bala, (count) paid, ipala, mpala. 
 
 Upon the principle assumed at the outset, p is thus decided to 
 befortis, and b its corresponding lenia form. 
 
 Under the Second Division of this Series, the facts afforded by 
 the language present something anomalous to that principle. Ph 
 (p), which remains immutable in such examples as 
 
 Phunya, (pierce) phunyo, iphunya, mphunya. 
 instead of following the analogy of the other aspirated consonants, 
 is commuted from h in those of 
 
 Hisa, (burn, T*) phisho, iphisa, mphisa. 
 and is therefore fortis. 
 
 But to infer from this, upon that principle, that h. is the lenis 
 form of aspirate p (pK), would immediately suggest the existence 
 of a flaw in the system, and invalidate preceding inferences. 
 
 It is, however, remarkable, and for my purpose rather oppor- 
 tune, that this is the only case among the simple consonants 
 which is not strictly constant. The changes of g* to k] of /to <) 
 of d, I, and r, to t, and of b to p, are exceptionless ; but this 
 cannot be said of that of h to p] for we occasionally find h also 
 commutable to k\ 
 
 NOTE. It is worthy of remark, that the latter commutation occurs only 
 in some of those cases in which h precedes the vowel u, and not also before 
 t, as in the case of the lenis (smooth explodent) r. 
 
 1. Sometimes both forms are found, but with different meanings ; e.g 
 
 huma (become rich) 
 
 ' \khumo (wealth) 
 
 2. Sometimes both forms with the same meanings ; e.g.
 
 53 
 
 8. In the case of the object-particle preceding, we find : 
 humisa becoming ikhumisa. 
 hurisa iphurisa. 
 
 Though there are a few instances of h being commutable into Je] I am not 
 as yet aware of any instance of initial h being changed to .' The subject 
 of the commutation of the three simple aspirates may thus be explained 
 at one view : 
 
 Initial h changing to th (?) in no instance. 
 
 1th (Ar')in a very few instances before . 
 
 ,, p h (p") in the great majority of instances. 
 
 I make no allusion to/ (even though it is an analogous instance) which 
 prevails in the Sesuto. This is, in a strict sense of the word, a mongrel 
 dialect, which owes the incongruous position it maintains as a kading 
 dialect of the Sechwana very much to the circumstance of its having been 
 reduced to writing and critically cultivated by the " accomplished French 
 missionaries," and perhaps also to the notoriety of the Basuto nation. 
 My illustrations of a phonic system, however imperfect, if only correct 
 so far as they go, are intended to be gathered from the pure Sechwana 
 dialects alone. The following quotation will serve to show that some 
 examples from Sesuto are likely to be decidedly foreign to the scope of 
 my inductions. " The Kaffir/ is generally retained in the Sesuto, and the 
 Kaffir p becomes / in the Sesuto ; whilst the more western dialects, in which 
 / is lost,* have commuted this letter in both cases into h" (Seep. 116, 
 Sir Qeorge Grey's Library, African Languages.) The remarks about to be 
 adduced in the text will show that " the western dialects" probably never 
 had an / to lose, and that h has rather been altered by usage from bh, 
 both these forms existing in the pure dialects. This is, moreover, proved 
 by the existence of the initial inflexions ph , iph , mph . 
 
 If it should be shown that the change to kh is merely euphonic, inasmuch 
 as it precedes the vowel u, it will then be practicable to explain the diversity 
 in the following instances: Mahura (Sehurutse), Mabhura (Sekwena), 
 MaJehura (Seganano), Mafura (Sesuto. Jf 
 
 I have already shown that the lenis form of the aspirate lingual 
 th ( ^), viz., r] is also convertible to h, the latter being used 
 
 * The italics are my own. 
 
 f Since the above was in type, it has been suggested to me, by the Rev. 
 J. FREDOUX, of the Paris Missionary Society, that the euphonical modifi- 
 cation may be produced analogously to that of ila, kilo, by the apposition 
 of Jf to the spiritus asper, as in huma, Jchumo, which appears to me to be the 
 best mode of accounting for the exceptions. The ancient example, oi/x 
 vTriffTiv, is a precedent, for it would have amounted to the same if the x had 
 been attached to the v, instead of x to the particle 06 in the Greek graphic 
 system.
 
 54 
 
 frequently for the former by people of the same tribe. This is 
 the same with g] the lenis form of kh, for we often hear hae for gae, 
 fyc. This tendency to pronounce the pure aspirate as if there were 
 no simple "explodent" lenis attached, in the cases of both /and 
 gl would suggest the probability that some form analogous to 
 these two consonants may be found corresponding to the simple 
 " explodent" b ; and, to conclude that this must be aspirate b would 
 only be natural. But inference is anticipated by a legitimate fact 
 which comes to my assistance, in maintaining the consistency of 
 the peculiar phonic principles of the language. Among some 
 tribes viz., the Barolon. and the Bakwena, the h is generally* 
 pronounced like bh in the word hobhouse, with the ho dropped ; 
 e.g.., sebhuba for sehuba, mabhura for mahura, bhtila for hla, which 
 has been mistaken by some writers for/f and u.J Whether one 
 native pronounce it bh&la, and another hela, and a third wela, 
 the corresponding noun is always pronounced phUd, and the 
 verb with the object particles iphcla, mphla.. 
 
 I can only account for the fact of h in some dialects being 
 almost identified in general use with the consonant bh, in others 
 by the conclusion above stated, that the tendency is to use the pure 
 aspirate in place of the lenis form of the aspirate " explodent ;'' 
 but the difficulty is to show why this should be the case with bh 
 especially, and to such an extent as nearly to lead to the inference 
 
 * I say generally, for it has only just occurred tome to set on foot an 
 examination as to whether natives using bh ever employ the aspirate h 
 alone in certain cases as a normal form. 
 
 f Mr. Archbell. See Sir George Grey's Library, S. A. Languages, 
 p. 137, &c. 
 
 I Mr. Pelissier. Ibid, p. 116, Note. 
 
 The apparent commutation of h to tsh (-ckj, e.g., gauhe to gauchwanyane 
 (or, as the missionaries write it, gaucuanyane), referred to at page 115 of the 
 same Work, will thus be accounted for by the fact of this adverb being 
 pronounced gaublie by some tribes. I have heard an individual of the 
 Banwaketse tribe pronounce this consonant iv* in the same word gauhe, or 
 gaubhe, i.e., yauitfe, in which the aspirate is retained, and the labial con- 
 sonant is altered to the labial " semivowel."
 
 55 
 
 that h is absolutely the lenis form of ph(p). But for the exception 
 of A becoming kh (jfc'}, I should have been inclined to doubt 
 the stability of the principle assumed ; as it is, the occurrence 
 of b h, in the form of a legitimate instance, really seems to add 
 confirmation to it. Though I am not sure that a physiologist 
 would be able to set one right on being asked to account for the 
 fact, it is possible the following, suggested by the perusal of 
 an able author, will amount to an explanation viz., that in pro- 
 nouncing b, its consonantal element cannot be perceived till the 
 lips have been re-opened,* and that to pronounce h it is necessary 
 to open the lips more or less, especially in the case of its occurring 
 as an initial without any preceding utterance ; so that there appears 
 to be an organic connexion between the two. 
 
 NOTE. It may be as well to append a corollary to the above, that as the 
 tendency in the Sechwana is to use the pure aspirate for the lenis form of 
 the aspirated " explodent," viz., h for either g* r or I', a degree of uncertainty 
 may in some cases present itself on the student meeting roots with initials 
 in h, inasmuch as the normal form of the initial may be either of the above 
 three consonants (lenes aspirates) e.g., huma, which is commuted into khumo, 
 as well as phumo, may possibly be found to have an allied form in guma and 
 r'uma, as well as bhuma (b'uma), with the same signification. 
 
 Including the Nasal consonant m which the language contains, 
 the following is the classification of labials resulting from the 
 above analysis : 
 
 Labials 
 
 Simple "Explodents." 
 fortis. leni 
 
 P * 
 
 Aspirate "Explodents."\ 
 
 lenis. Nasals. 
 
 I m 
 
 NOTE. So far as I am aware, b" is the only instance of a lenis aspirate- 
 mute in the language ; d and g, so prevalent in Oriental tongues, have not 
 as yet occurred to me, though the Bishop of Natal appears to think they 
 are in the Zulu. The occurrence of at least one form is nevertheless highly 
 satisfactory ; as the reasoning employed on it may be applicable to the rest. 
 
 * Glotsology. Sir John Stoddart, p. 136.
 
 CHAPTER III, 
 
 ANALYSIS OF OTHER CONSONANTS. 
 
 EXAMINATION INTO THE POWERS OF THE REMAINING LETTERS IN THE 
 GENERAL ALPHABET OF DR. LEPSIUS. THE CLASSIFICATION 
 OF SUCH AS ARE REALLY ELEMENTS, AND OF OTHERS THAT MAY 
 BE SUGGESTED BY THEM UPON PRINCIPLES RESULTING FROM 
 ANALYSIS IN PRECEDING CHAPTER. 
 
 THE train of facts in the Sechwana, in respect of the simple 
 consonants, having been brought to a close, it now devolves upon 
 me to deduce from other sources such conclusions as may be of 
 assistance in arriving at the probable position, in a synthetic 
 view, of the few foreign to that language. This will involve an 
 examination into the real nature of the spiritus asper, and also of 
 what are sometimes called vocalized forms of consonants. It is first 
 necessary for me to satisfy the reader, as well as myself, of 
 what, among the large number of remaining letters, are really 
 consonantal elements or simple articulations ; and, in order to 
 do so the more effectually, I have, for his convenience, extracted 
 from Dr. Lepsius's work the Table of 
 
 CONSONANTS OF THE GENERAL ALPHABET. 
 
 
 Explosive or I 
 fortis. lenis. 
 
 KvidutB. 
 
 nasalis. 
 
 Fricati 
 fortis. 
 h'h 
 
 vce or Continues 
 lenis. semiyoc. 
 
 Ancipitet 
 
 
 k q g 
 
 n 
 
 Y 
 
 Y fv) 
 
 f 
 
 
 k' g 1 
 
 n f 
 
 ' 
 
 x y 
 
 1' 
 
 IV. Cerebrates (Indicae)... 
 V. Linguales (Arabic).. 
 
 t ^ 
 t d 
 
 t d 
 
 n 
 n 
 
 8 
 
 S 
 
 I 
 
 z 
 z 
 
 2 
 
 r 1 
 r 1 
 
 VII. Labiales 
 
 P D 
 
 m 
 
 U' 
 
 U W 
 
 
 NOTE. The letter s, though in the language, is included in this section on 
 account of its doubtful nature; and the spiritus, also, on account of their 
 tailing under the " faucales" of Dr. Lepsius.
 
 58 
 
 The letters in bold type are those I have been able to account 
 for by the analysis in the three preceding sections ; all the rest 
 will now be considered, in the descending order of the several 
 series, in the form of interpolated notes. Those in italics (including 
 (f and 0') are what I attempt, in this section, to prove to have 
 elementary forms. 
 
 I. THE " FAUCALES " OF LEPSIUS. 
 
 Explosives. I Fricatives. 
 
 fortis. lenis. fortis. lenis. 
 
 ', h< h 
 
 I cannot do better than give the reader, who will, I trust, have the 
 patience to accompany me in what may appear to be a long digression, 
 a table of these so-called consonants, as variously indicated by the different 
 grammarians of the several languages in which they are said to occur.* 
 
 The confusion in which the subject of these elements is involved is so 
 great, that he will require to follow the writer with almost as much attention 
 as the latter has bestowed in attempting to reconcile^the conflicting opinions 
 of different authors. Scarcely one cf these has entered upon this intricate 
 subject without confounding the pure (pectoral) breathings with their con- 
 sonantal modifications (especially the gutturals, or " tongue-root " letters), 
 or, in other words, the functions of the " upper or articulating " organs with 
 those of the " lower organs," the careful distinction between which we owe 
 to Sir John Stoddart, and which it is necessary to maintain in order to 
 reason at all clearly upon the subject. 
 
 * These I have abstracted, as in other instances, from Dr. Lepsius's 
 comparative alphabets. 
 
 The members of the whole Arabic series are indicated in the " Missionary 
 Alphabet," of Professor Max Miiller. (See Tableaux, p. xci.) as follows: 
 'h, ('h); h, h' I , 
 
 1 2 3 4 I 5 
 
 But he calls the second (not the spiritus lenis, as does Dr. Lepsius, but) 
 " the primitive and unmodified breathing," or simple " liquid semi-vowel." He 
 gives a fifth element, viz., the " primitive breathing," marked by the Hamzeh 
 " and makes this the equivalent to the spiritus lenis. 
 
 Moreover, he makes the 1st and 3rd (viz., and ) both guttural 
 breathings. 
 
 According to Dr. Lepsius, the two pairs are respectively explodent and 
 fricative. According to Professor Miiller, both pairs &re flatus (i.e., fricatives) 
 and none are explodents. 
 
 When philological Doctors are compelled to differ so much as to the powers 
 of archaic letters, it seems rather an unfair mode of inquiry to drag in
 
 59 
 
 ASIATIC LANGUAGES. 
 Hebrew 
 
 Explosives. 
 T3 N 
 
 J 
 
 q g 
 
 kh 
 
 Fricatives. 
 
 C., 
 -o 
 
 h h 
 
 h h 
 
 h h- 
 h h 
 
 h 
 b 
 h 
 
 h' h 
 
 h 
 h 
 
 h h 
 nh h 
 h h 
 
 REMARKS. 
 
 An h is placed among 
 the fricative gutturals. 
 The fortis explodent is 
 stated, in Lepsius's con- 
 fronting alphabet, to be 
 equivalent to his q. 
 
 Arabic 
 Ancient Graph. ... 
 Smith <& Robinson. 
 Actual Pronune.... 
 Persian 
 M. M. Ibrahim ... 
 
 Sanscrit, anc. gr. ... 
 Bopp 
 
 H. H. Wilson 
 Bengali 
 G. O. Haughton ... 
 Zend, anc. gr 
 Burnouf 
 
 
 BrocTthaus 
 
 q ... 
 <1 
 
 Armenian, anc. gr ... 
 Petermann 
 
 Actual Pronune..., 
 Georgian 
 Rosen 
 
 Albanian 
 J. G. v. Hahn 
 Hindustani 
 W Yates 
 
 Gilchrist 
 
 
 H. H. Wilson 
 
 ai a 
 
 these at all from such tongues as Arabic, Hebrew, &c., as equivalents, in 
 illustration of existing articulations ; and only serves to bewilder. The 
 confusion which perplexes a student, in examining Professor Muller's 
 system, consists : 
 
 1st. In his making no distinction between the spiritus and their guttural 
 modifications, e.g., \ and , are called in his Tables a liquida and flatus 
 lenis respectively, and placed under the gutturals. Elsewhere, the former 
 is called simply the " liquid semi-vowel," or " an " unmodified flatus," or 
 " a primitive and unmodified breathing," or " a pure breathing without 
 even a guttural modification " (!) terms very suitable and definitive ; and 
 the latter, a similar element, " differing in definition, but identical in pro- 
 nunciation." 
 
 2nd. In his adding another term, viz., flatus, inclusive of all the instances 
 which are classed under both Dr. Lepsius'a fricatives and explodent- 
 faucals.
 
 60 
 
 Malayan 
 J. Crawfurd 
 Javanese 
 J. Craufard 
 Turkish 
 
 Explosives. 
 (a) (a) 
 a 
 
 Fricatives, 
 (h) h 
 
 h h 
 
 Chinese 
 Rev. J. Oough ...) 
 Rev.T.M'Clatchie] 
 8. Endlicher 
 AFRICAN LANGUAGES. 
 Hottentot 
 
 
 h fc h 
 h h 
 
 x h 
 
 Galla 
 TutscheJt 
 
 
 h 
 
 Bega 
 
 
 h 
 
 Abyssinian, Ge.ez 
 Ludolph ....!.' 
 
 
 h h 
 
 Ditto, Amhara 
 Isenbera ... 
 
 
 h h 
 
 REMARKS. 
 
 Mr. Tindall tells us no- 
 thing about two forms. 
 Both he and Mr. Knudsen 
 have an h. 
 
 Five other African al- 
 phabets are represented as 
 having one h; in twelve 
 additional cases the h is 
 included in the guttural 
 .series. 
 
 The above is certainly a most formidable array of instances and autho- 
 rities. In the case of 
 
 8 languages, 11 authorities give 4 members of the series. 
 
 1. Explosives. But if the reader will take the trouble to cast his eye 
 over the various signs intended to indicate these so-called faucal elements, 
 he will feel bound to come to the conclusion that, at least under the ex- 
 plosives, they are of a very heterogeneous character. In some cases, 
 the members of each pair are represented by the vowels M, a; a, a; in 
 others, by letters usually employed for gutturals Jeh, g ; in several instances 
 by the mark of the spiritus lenis ; in two by the spiritus asper ; and in others 
 by signs approximating to a hyphen. In three cases, the fortis explodent is 
 represented by the letter q, which we otherwise find suspended by the 
 learned philologer in a rather doubtful position between the gutturals and 
 these faucals. Of course, without a reference to the works of the authorities 
 themselves, as to the nature of the elements their letters are intended to 
 indicate or what would be more valuable, access to the actual pronun- 
 ciation it is a most difficult matter to enter into a proper analysis of their
 
 61 
 
 relations. At all events, the dissimilarity of the signs employed hy them 
 must be regarded as an index to the fact of a want of unanimity on the 
 subject of their real nature. 
 
 In the absence of such desiderata, I append the following descriptions of 
 the " explodent faucals" by Dr. Lepsius, confronted with those of some of 
 their equivalents by another able authority. 
 
 (1) Arabic f, Hebrew N, Greek spiritus "lenis. 
 ~Lmis-explodent-faucal (of Lepsius.) (,) 
 
 " By closing the throat, and then 
 opening it, to pronounce a vowel, 
 we produce the slight explosive 
 sound which, in the Eastern lan- 
 guages, is marked separately, but 
 not in the European, except in the 
 Greek. We perceive it distinctly 
 between two vowels which, following 
 each other, are pronounced sepa- 
 rately, as in the Italian sard 'a casa, 
 the English go 'over, the German 
 see'adler ; or even after consonants, 
 when trying to distinguish, in Ger- 
 man, mein 'eid (my oath), from 
 meineid (perjury), or Fisch-'art (fish 
 species), from Fischart (a name). 
 We indicate this sound, when neces- 
 sary, by the mark , like the Greeks." 
 Standard Alphabet, Lepsius, p. 59. 
 
 "Among the gutturals, M is the 
 lightest, a scarcely audible breathing 
 from the lungs, the spiritus lenis of 
 the Greeks ; similar to H, but softer. 
 Even before a vowel it is almost 
 lost upon the ear PPW, a/to/u), like 
 the h in the French habit, homme (or 
 Eng. hour). After a vowel it is often 
 not heard at all, except in connexion 
 with the preceding vowel sound, with 
 which it combines its own (W3?D, 
 matsa)."* Gesenius's Hebrew Gram- 
 mar (I4tth Edition) by Rodiger, trans- 
 lated by Davies. 1846. p. 15. 
 
 At the end of a word * * * * 
 long a was represented by H, and 
 sometimes by . These two letters 
 stood also for long e and o." 
 
 * " Dr. Lee gives to the Hebrew alif the consonantal power of our un- 
 aspirated h, as in humble, hour, &c." Glossology, Sir J. Stoddart, p. 128. 
 
 Dr. Latham describes alef as equivalent to " a vowel or a breathing." 
 English Language, vol. ii., p. 88. 
 
 Dr. Duff writes: " \ Alif, when beginning a word or syllable, is reckoned 
 by Oriental grammarians a very slight aspirate, like h in hour. But its 
 chief purpose is to subserve the expression of short or long vowels." App. 
 of the Rom. Alph. to the Languages of India, by Monier Williams, M.A., 
 p. 88. 
 
 Dr. Forbes, in reference to the law of the Arabian grammarians " that 
 no word or syllable can begin with a vowel," writes, " therefore to represent 
 what we call an initial vowel . . . they employ the letter \, Alif, as a fulcrum 
 for the vowel. We have already stated that they consider the I as a very 
 weak aspirate or spiritus lenis ; hence its presence supports the theory, at 
 least to the eye, if not to the ear.'' (Hindustani Grammar, p. 17.) " Alif,
 
 Arabic , Hebrew $, Fomis-explodent-faucal (of Lepsius). (?) 
 
 "27 is nearly related to S, and is 
 a sound peculiar to the organs of the 
 Shemitish race. Its hardest sound 
 is that of a g, slightly rattled in the 
 throat, as rnb?., LXX., T6pof>pa 
 . . . . ; it is elsewhere, like N, a 
 gentle breathing, as in v?, 'HXl . . . 
 In the mouth of the Arabian, the 
 first often strikes the ear like a soft 
 guttural r, the second as a sort of 
 vowel sound like a. The best repre- 
 sentation we could give of it in our 
 letters would be gTi or rg, as 
 something like arbaff jt , 
 mora." Ibid.* 
 
 " The soft sound just described can 
 be pronounced hard by a stronger 
 explosion at the same point of the 
 throat. Thus arises the sound which 
 the Arabs write . We find it ex- 
 pressed by scholars generally by 
 placing a diacritical sign over the 
 following vowels: a', a, a, a, a; 
 sometimes below, a. This method 
 would suppose, from the analogy of 
 all systems of writing, that the were 
 only an indication of a change in 
 the vowel. It is, however, a full 
 consonant, preceding the vowel. We 
 indicate it, therefore, with regard to 
 its affinity to the soft sound, by 
 doubling the spiritus lenis, ." Ibid. 
 
 The above quotations add confirmation to my supposition above expressed) 
 regarding the indefinite character of the elements intended to be repre- 
 sented by the signs ; of Dr. Lepsius, an( l * ne nos t of equivalents in the 
 form of other diverse signs and letters. The Hebrew S = to the former 
 of these new signs or the spiritus lenis) is generally regarded as a " hiatus 
 
 not beginning a word or syllable, forms a sound like our a in war, or au 
 in haul." (Ibid. p. 7.) 
 
 According to Wallin (cited by Max M tiller, " Proposals," &c., p. 29) the 
 Arabic grammarians look upon the \ as a liquid semi-vowel, distinct from the 
 \ . The latter writer adds (p. Ixviii.) " where the Arabic \ is used for this pur- 
 pose (the Greek spiritus lenis) it is marked by the Hamzeh 7 so that this 
 archaic letter, as stated by Max Miiller, really seems intended to represent 
 " the primitive and unmodified breathing '* of which the spiritus asper and 
 lenis in Greek are modifications. Again, " Arab grammarians . . . consider 
 that a long a consists of the short a ... the pectoral semi-vowel (\)" Ibid. 
 p. xlvi. 
 
 * Professor Miiller makes " the sonant representative" (p. xxviii.) of 
 (which we shall have to notice under the head of Dr. 'Lepsius'sfricativce ) ; 
 " but identical in pronunciation " to the liquid semi-vowel by which he 
 appears to mean either the Elif or the Elif Hamzatum (p. Ixiii.) but surely 
 the latter, as it is a lenis (spiritus) breathing ; for the former, according to 
 his own phraseology, is an " unmodified breathing." But he makes N an 
 element "more pectoral and less modified" than 2, thus reversing the 
 powers of the Hebrew letters which Dr. Lepsius makes the equivalents of 
 the Arabic | and respectively. Ibid.
 
 63 
 
 occasioned by tbe disappearance of a consonant." Again, by the above 
 writer, who would nevertheless call it a consonant, this is virtually described 
 (if one may judge by his examples), as the articulation or element which 
 always accompanies the lengthening of a vowel i.e., its long quantity.* 
 Again, it is described as equivalent to h in some French and English 
 words, homme, hour, &c., in which the letter is absolutely silent, and therefore 
 only another mark for the above hiatus. This "hiatus" does not designate 
 any known sound ; but, in another ancient dialect, the Greek, " under the 
 name of the spiritus lenis . . signified the absence of a letter, and 
 became a negative sign in grammatical algebra." An able writer in the 
 Encyclopedia Britannicaf says further respecting this superfluous letter 
 " We should wonder the more that a people so intelligent as the Greeks 
 should have fallen into such an error, if, as far as we know, Lanzi had not 
 been the first to expose it. His reductio ad absurdum of the spiritus lenis 
 has not hitherto received the attention which its acuteness merits." Again, 
 it " is only a mark that the E begins another word, as in the example 
 KAIEPQ, which is equivalent to KAI EFQ, the sign -/ being equal to the 
 space between the two words" . . . . If we consider the spiritus lenis 
 in this point of view, the inventors of it will be exculpated from the ab- 
 surdity of which Lanzi sought to convict them, and it will attach to those 
 grammarians only who retained the mark after the practice of leaving a 
 space at the end of each word became prevalent. In corroboration of this 
 view, I append another quotation from the learned Buttmann.1 " Both 
 spiritus are distinct letters in other languages ; the Unis is the alef or elif of 
 the Orientals. ... Every vowel uttered without a consonant, and, 
 
 * To .be satisfied of this, it is only necessary for the reader to examine 
 all the above examples " Italian sara 'a casa, English go 'over, &c., &c." 
 The same remark applies to the examples blacking and black ink of Professor 
 Miiller, of which he says: "In blacking, the voweli is introduced by the 
 second half of the preceding k ; in black ink, the i is ushered in by the 
 spiritus lenis." (Proposals, p. xxviii.) But can it be denied that in the former 
 case the i is without accent, or short in the latter with it, or long ? Had 
 he said the long i in ink consisted " of the short i + the palatal liquid (s)" 
 (p. xlvi.), it would have been more consistent with hisprinciple of explaining 
 the power of the English vowels by those of archaic letters like the spiritus 
 lenis. Does the learned Professor not rather mean that the power of i in 
 the English ink is to be explained by an abstract whispered element (call it 
 accent, the long quantity, or anything you please) of which the ancient 
 " pectoral semi-vowel " ( ), the " palatal liquid " (s), and the " labial liquid " 
 (,) are only analogous modifications in respect to the vowels a, i, and u 
 respectively ? See same page. 
 
 f Eighth Edit, vol. ii., p. 613. 
 
 J Larger Greek Grammar, p. 14.
 
 64 
 
 consequently, every vowel which is to be pronounced distinctly and sepa- 
 rately from the preceding letter, is actually introduced by a slight audible 
 aspiration, which the ancients had greater occasion to make in their writing, 
 a* they did not separate their words'' 
 
 Dr. Forbes, in speaking of "the Hamza," as it occurs in Hindustani, in 
 which it is a substitute for the Elif, writes : " Practically speaking, it may 
 be considered as our hyphen, which serves to separate two vowels, as in the 
 words co-ordinate and re-iterate." (Grammar, p. 17 .) 
 
 However, it is evident, from all the preceding quotations, in both the 
 text and the footnotes, that most of the writers to whom I have had access, 
 except Professor Max Miiller and Wallin, whom he cites, have 
 confounded the J Elif with the \ Elif Hamzatum, in calling the former the 
 spiritus lenis, whereas this is the equivalent of the latter element; the 
 former, according to them, indicating properly the primitive and unmodified 
 breathing which necessarily precedes an initial vowel, and the latter being 
 one of the two " modifications of that initial breathing." A little light is 
 shed on this fact by the remark of Dr. Forbes (Ibid. p. 17), that " the 
 sound of the mark Hamza, according to the Arabian grammarians, differs 
 in some degree from the letter |, . . . but in Hindustani this dis- 
 tinction is overlooked." According to Wallin (cited by Miiller), " \ is a 
 liquid semi-vowel, distinct from the \. " This " liquid semi-vowel," says Miiller, 
 " is heard at the end of a long a, as y and w are heard at the end of a long 
 t and u." In fact, as we may judge from preceding quotations, one of its 
 principal objects is to subserve the expression of long vowels. By enlarging 
 on the subject of this " unmodified breathing," it is evident I should be 
 encroaching on the materials which are to form the second part of this 
 work on the VOWELS; but, in order to approximate to some correct con- 
 clusion, it seems necessary to dispel the confusion occasioned by mis- 
 apprehension of the powers of the above two archaic letters. 
 
 Opportunely for my purpose, Dr. J. Miiller, the able physiologist, 
 most minutely describes the breathing inherent in vowels. He writes 
 "All vowels can be expressed in a whisper, without vocal tone." These 
 he calls mute vowels, and adds " But the sound of the vowels, even when 
 mute, has its source in the glottis, though the vocal chords are not thrown into 
 the vibrations necessary for the production of voice ; and seems to be pro- 
 duced by the passage of the air between the relaxed vocal chords." Elements 
 of Physiology, p. 1046. 
 
 Now an important question arises. Does the whispering cease imme- 
 diately the vocal chords are thrown into sonorous vibrations?* Whether 
 
 * At page 1051, he seems to think so of " the aspiration h ;" but this, 
 we must bear in mind, is one of the modifications of the breathing.
 
 65 
 
 it does or does not, does there not remain a breathing in the former case 
 only initial (? and terminal), in the latter both initial and continuous (? and 
 terminal) ? And are we by this breathing, or a lengthened form of it, in 
 each case to understand the Elif ?* If so, in what does its so called modi- 
 fication, the spiritus lenis, consist ? Professor Max Miiller gives up the 
 solution of this in apparent despair. He says (p. Ixviii.), " practically it 
 seems impossible to make a distinction between the liquid semi-vowel and 
 the spiritus lenis on any point of articulation anterior to the palatal." 
 Therefore it will not be presumptuous for me to suggest the query Is the 
 kamzeh not a symbol indicating the vocalisation of the " mute-vowel ?" It 
 is remarkable that all the lenes forms of the fricatives of Dr. Lepsius 
 (viz., x 2> #i 0' t>), and of the flatus of Professor Miiller (viz., z, z, 
 zh, v), are also considered sonants, or vocalised. Why not apply the same 
 analogy to the spiritus lenis, or Elif hamzatum, and call it a vocalised 
 modification of the Elif? Moreover, is called by Max Miiller a 
 sonant, and Dr. Forbes considers the hamseh " somewhat akin to , 
 which its shape (- ) would seem to warrant "f (p. 17); therefore it is also 
 probably a sonant. If, then, \ is the " unmodified breathing" lengthened, 
 and is a sonant, is not If = \ + ; viz., the same breathing + voice. 
 It is remarkable that these two letters were only applicable to vowels. The 
 probability then is, that both the \ and the were elements accessory to a 
 " mute vowel," one implying long quantity, the other voice. Apparently, a 
 ludicrous solution ; but that at which one is compelled to arrive by the 
 assistance of mere archaeological data. For me to say the Elif hamzatum 
 7' is equal to j + is only more unsophistical, but surely not more 
 paradoxical than the following indefinite conclusions of Professor Max 
 Miiller :- 
 
 (1). It " may be true in theory, but is of no practical importance," to 
 say that J is distinct from f . (P. xxix.) 
 
 (2). "The delicate sound of the guttural liquid semi-vowel [J] is in reality 
 the same as the guttural flatus lenis [~, and both categories may therefore 
 be represented by one sign." (P. Ixviii.) Again, " the flatus lenis cannot 
 
 * In either case we may also ask the question as to the terminal breath. 
 
 f Dr. Forbes says that , like the J, is " a weak aspirate, but the place of 
 utterance of is in the lower muscles of the throat ;" but are we to under- 
 stand that these are relaxed, or so extended as to allow of vibration ? "It 
 is," says Shakespear, cited by Dr. Duff, "one of the guttural letters, being 
 formed in the lower part of the throat. Its sound has been compared to 
 the voice of a calf for its mother, or to that of a person making some painful 
 exertion." Original Papers, do,, by Monier Williams, p. 83. 
 
 F
 
 66 
 
 be distinguished in pronunciation from the guttural liquid,* and there can 
 be no objection to marking both by the same sign." (P. xxix.) 
 
 If the " flatus lenis," and the " liquid semi-vowel," " require different 
 representative types" in these dental and labial modifications, which Pro- 
 fessor Milller admits (p. Ixviii.), why not also in their guttural modifica- 
 tions, and especially in their " unmodified," (or elementary) forms ? Why, in 
 the latter cases, should they be regarded as sounds " differing in definition, 
 but identical in pronunciation" (p. Ixviii.), and in the former different in 
 pronunciation ? for in all cases the modifications are consonantal, and two 
 different elements are modified. 
 
 Since archaic letters are inevitably dragged in by devotees to "historical 
 orthography " to illustrate supposed equivalents in living tongues, it seems 
 necessary that men should arrive at some understanding as to their specific 
 powers before venturing to classify them. Throughout this treatise I have 
 to do, fundamentally, with elements objectively true ; and to reduce these to 
 subjective principles, which are of course theoretical truths, but only 
 axiomatical in proportion to the copiousness of the inductions by which 
 they are evolved. The same process cannot be followed in the matter of 
 these archaeological instances, till they are known to be equivalents of 
 standard objective examples. 
 
 The preceding remarks all tend to show that the element intended to 
 be indicated by the latter of the above two signs , (or }), amounts to no more 
 than an ordinary breathing inseparable from the pronunciation of any initial 
 vowel (or it may indicate the lengthening of a " mute vowel"), and cannot 
 therefore be called a consonant. That which is called its fortis form (), 
 in the second couple of above confronting quotations, is scarcely dis- 
 tinguishable from a soft aspirate, and is probably only the elementary form, of 
 which the Arabic sonant is a guttural (consonantal) modification ; that 
 is. an approximation to the vocalised form of the pure aspirate (spiritut 
 asper) without the consonantal element of a guttural attached, and which 
 I think occurs in the Sechwana, in hae for gae, hona for gona, &c., examples 
 not unlike To^oppa and AjuaXec ; but it is considered by Dr. Lepsius a 
 harder form of the above " breathing," caused " by a stronger explosion 
 at the same point of the throat," and of this his digraph (>) is intended to 
 be the exponent with what propriety will be shown in the sequel. 
 
 2. Fricatives. It will be seen, in the preceding table, that, under the 
 so-called fricatives (\vhich I have previously shown, in respect of the 
 gatturals, to be aspirates), these members of the faucal series are more 
 uniformly indicated by the usual marks of the spiritus asper, or this letter 
 with a diacritical mark viz., hh, h] or h, h, h, &c. As in the preceding 
 
 * By this ia meant the " liquid semi- vowel."
 
 67 
 
 case, it will be as well to confront Dr. Lepsius's description of these 
 sounds with the opinions of other able writers. 
 
 Arabic ~, 8 ; Hebrew n; ! h, (of Lepsius.) 
 
 The Hebrewletter j-j is described by Gesenius to be, before a vowel,"exactly 
 equal to our h (spiritus asper)." The Arabic 8 , which the same able scholar 
 (and Professor Muller since) make the equivalent of this Hebrew letter, is 
 considered by Dr. Lepsius the same as the lenis h of his system, his de- 
 scription of which is anything but clear, but which we have a right to conclude 
 must also be intended for the spiritus asper,or " the common h,"* inasmuch as 
 " the effect of the Latin orthography upon this letter was to fix it as the sign 
 of the so-called aspirate.f Since, by all Dr. Lepsius's other lenes fricatives 
 (viz., x', ~z, z, z, 9\ and v), may be understood sonants, or vocalised con- 
 sonants, and the Arabic y (his h) is a lenis fricative, it must with him 
 consequently also be a vocalised element; but he elsewhere calls it an 
 " unvocalised strong fricative," an inconsistency arising from his con- 
 founding (like most writers) the " breathings" with " unmodified consonants." 
 
 The other fricative member of the faucal series viz., the fortis, or h of 
 Dr. Lepsius, is stated by him to be equivalent to the Arabic consonant ", 
 which, again, Gesenius makes equivalent to the softer of " the two grades 
 of sound" of n, while the Hebrew was a living language. This Hebrew 
 letter the latter author considers to have been " the hardest of the guttural 
 sounds." " It is," he adds, " a guttural ch, as uttered by the Swiss, re- 
 sembling the Spanish x and j." But the h* of Dr. Lepsius is distinctly 
 described by himself thus : " Not th.e common h, but a stronger aspiration, 
 which requires a greater contraction of the faucal point, and is distinguished 
 by the Arabs from the simple Ji."\ This element, which is indicated by 
 
 * It is remarkable that, in his detailed description of the faucals, any 
 distinctive remarks as to the position or nature of the asper appear to be 
 inadvertently avoided. First it is called an " unvocalised strong fricative," 
 as which it must only differ in degree, and not in quantity, from ; 
 in the general tableau (p. 46), it is placed midway between the position of 
 the lenis (which is vacant), and the fortis h^ () ; in the alphabetic series 
 (p. 48), it is distinctly classed as a "fortis fricative ;" again, in the tables 
 of the different languages, it is placed in the vertical series of "lenes 
 fricatives." 
 
 f " The English Language" vol. ii., p. 103. 4th Edition. 
 
 t " Standard Alphabet" p. 39. Professor Max Muller calls it () a 
 guttural-fiatus-asper. He says, the difference between it ().aud " arises 
 from the higher or lower position of the point of contact by which these con- 
 sonants are formed in a Semitic throat [the italics are substituted] (p. Ixx.), 
 forgetting Sir John Stoddart's rule, that consonantal articulations are 
 confined to the " upper organs." Elsewhere he says, " the is formed so 
 low in the throat, that here a contact and explosion would be impossible" 
 F2
 
 68 
 
 Smith and Robinson, as well as Gilchrist, by the letter h, is only 
 described by the latter able Orientalist as " rather a harsher aspiration" 
 than the other h, and " peculiar to the Arabic alphabet, but in Hindoostan 
 pronounced just as the simple breathing hu."* Again, it is usually laid 
 down as a postulate in orthoepy, that " no aspirate can be doubled." If 
 the h of Dr. Lepsius (lenis-fricative-faucal) is only another mark of 
 the spiritus asper ("), as I have shown, H in the Hebrew, and & in the 
 Arabic (which he himself regards as ancient equivalents of that mark), 
 to be, upon the authority of Gesenius and Rodiger, such a thing 
 as an aspirate aspirate, which If of course indicates, must be an absurdity ; 
 so that, if there be any peculiarity in the nature (or, I may say, quantity) 
 of the element he has attempted to describe, there must be wanting only 
 a more definitive description of it, and a more consistent letter to repre- 
 sent it. 
 
 In the above examination of the so-called faucals, it will be observed that 
 I have endeavoured to explain away the explosiva altogether, by attempting 
 to show that the lenls form , Cj*),f is only the well-known spiritus lenis, and 
 thefortis ()J probably a component part of that spiritus; in fact, that I 
 deny altogether to the series a division of explodents, in contradistinction 
 from another, whether called " fricatives" or aspirate. 
 
 I am aware that I have only proved my point by displaying to the reader 
 
 (p. xxviii.) ; therefore it cannot be a consonant. Again, " the is formed 
 higher in the throat (!), and occasions, it is said, a friction between the 
 root of the tongue and the lowest part of the palate." (Ibid.) The fact of 
 the matter is, the former is a " breathing" confined to the " lower organs," 
 the latter to the " upper organs;" the former a strong breathing unmodified 
 by any consonant the latter a strong breathing modified by a guttural 
 consonant, forming a "liquid aspirate," or "flatus," or "fricative" con- 
 sonant, as different writers may choose to call the same element; so that 
 Dr. Lepsius's definition of it is decidedly more concise and satisfactory. 
 
 * British Indian Monitor, vol. i., p. 47. 
 
 f The following is from Professor Miiller : " This spiritus lenis is the 
 Hamzeh of the Arabs. . . . The Hamzeh cannot be called an explosive 
 letter. Its sound is produced by the opening of the larynx ; but there is 
 no previous effort to close the larynx, which alone could be said to give 
 it an explosive character." Proposals, p. xxviii. 
 
 I According to Max Miiller, it () bears the same relation to , as the 
 spiritus lenis T [which I have above suggested includes it], does to the 
 spiritus asper (*). The same writer says, " there is no tenuis corresponding 
 to ^ as little as to (p xxviii.) ; therefore, if and } are not tenues, which 
 Dr. Lepsius decidedly makes them, what are they ?
 
 69 
 
 the confusion which exists on the subject among eminent scholars, who 
 have given their undivided attention to either ancient graphic systems 
 wanting in the "living traditional pronunciation,' or to the cumbrous 
 alphabets of Oriental literature, abounding in redundant letters ; but I hope 
 in the sequel to sustain this proof by an argument of a more tangible 
 character. 
 
 It will, moreover, be observed that I have, so far as regards the " frica- 
 tives, tacitly admitted that the strong aspirate which Dr. Lepsius has 
 attempted to describe may possibly prove to be only another quantitive 
 form of the spiritus asj>er, or letter h, which is classed by him as the lenis 
 form under hisfaucales. 
 
 Nature of the SPIRITUS. 
 
 It is evident that the whole of the above classification of the 
 so-called faucal series into four members, under the two general 
 divisions of explodent and fricative, is based upon the assumption 
 that h is a consonant ; for if a consonant, it must be one member 
 of a series of sounds which are " explodent ;" and to those who 
 are determined to maintain that it is one, it will be difficult 
 to present any plausible argument to the contrary. 
 
 I had previously shown, of all the other consonants (except 
 the two yet to be noticed in the sequel), that the so-called 
 fricatives, as w*ell as explodents, have aspirate forms ; and that, 
 in the case of the gutturals, the term fricative of later writers, and 
 the more common one, aspirate, are merely synonymes ; there- 
 fore there is a perfect right to assume, that if the faucal series, 
 with its four members, is a legitimate organical class of the 
 elements of articulation, it must, like all the rest, either have 
 a separate and additional aspirate division, or, as in the case of the 
 gutturals, what Dr. Lepsius calls its fricative forms are merely pure 
 aspirates. The above examination of the "faucales" has brought 
 me to the latter conclusion ; but, at the same time, I trust I 
 have succeeded in showing that, though Dr. Lepsius has not 
 alluded to the apiritua asper in his detailed description of the
 
 70 
 
 several members of this series, his -arrangement of them into two 
 divisions is resolvable into the expression thatthere is an"explodent" 
 form of the spiritus asper, from which I must dissent. 
 
 This brings me to perhaps the most conclusive of all arguments 
 on the subject. When we find such extraordinary consonants as 
 the four Naman clicks* performing an important part in the dis- 
 tinctions between the roots of a language e. g., ca (sharp), va 
 (to slaughter), qa (to spread), xa (to wash),f we need not be 
 surprised at elements as strange being discovered in other lan- 
 guages ; and, moreover, when the peculiar mobility of the tongue 
 is taken into account, it is immediately suggested that any un- 
 usual variety of them is more likely to be classed under the 
 lingual series than any other e. g., what are called Naman 
 clicks, or " Arabic linguals," or " Indian cerebrals," whatever 
 points in common they may possess to allow of a secondary 
 classification, could not be otherwise disposed of in an organical 
 arrangement of the consonants. One has heard of the / in the 
 language of a Mexican tribe being "purely labial, the teeth 
 taking no part in it," and of the same description applying to 
 its sonant form v in the language of Greenland. In all such 
 examples of labials, linguals, or gutturals, in their mute or 
 liquid forms, the consonantal element, or fact of a contact 
 between two organs, is immediately perceptible ; but when we 
 are told of a series of elements, such as the "faucales," formed 
 " behind the guttural point, immediately at the larynx," without 
 the pale of what Sir John Stoddart has distinguished as " the 
 
 * In place of any remarks of my own in corroboration, I prefer to quote 
 the following : " The clicks ought properly to be classed among the con- 
 sonants, for although they are by themselves distinct articulations, yet they 
 cannot l>e considered complete sounds without the aid of a vowel." 
 Grammar and Vocabulary of the Namaqua Hottentot Language, by il. 
 Tindall, p. 13. 
 
 f Ibid.
 
 71 
 
 upper or articulating organs,"* there is an inclination to doubt 
 the validity of the facts upon which it is established. 
 
 Taking for granted that no one will deny all simple con- 
 sonants to be formed by a contact, complete or partial, of two 
 organs, and, consequently, by a momentary stoppage of the 
 breath to the extent of that contact, it follows that the "faucal" 
 series, unless its members can be proved to be formed by a 
 contact of two organs, cannot be included among the consonants. 
 The " contraction of the fauces," to which the formation of these 
 elements is attributed, does not surely produce an effect similar 
 to that of a contact. 
 
 If, however, in the classification of this series, the gutturals 
 have been confounded with the ordinary breathings, or the 
 spiritus, or forcible breathings, of which the descriptions of the 
 " faucales" bear evident marks, it is only what might be expected 
 after the terms have been so often confounded. 
 
 It is now necessary to come to an understanding as to the real 
 nature of the spiritus asper. I have before stated, in an attempt 
 to improve upon the definition of Dr. Lepsius, that the " aspirates" 
 are those elements, either vowels or consonants, which are pro- 
 nounced with a simple but forcible emission of the breath ; and 
 the result of the preceding inquiry into the " faucal " series is, 
 that the spiritus asper, in apposition with these vocal or conso- 
 nantal elements, is not a consonant, but merely a forcible 
 breathing; and, moreover, that it is a distinct element by no 
 means " inherent in every consonant," and decidedly something 
 more independent in its nature than a mere "increase" of the 
 ordinary breath which accompanies the utterance of every 
 
 * " Sanscrit grammarians sometimes regard h as formed in the chest 
 (nrasya), while they distinguish the other gutturals hy the name of tougue- 
 root letters (^ihvamuliya)." " Proposals," <c., by Max Mutter, M.A., p. 
 xxx.iv. This amounts virtually to Sir John Stoddari's distinction, who, 
 had he made such a statement, would no doubt have omitted the word 
 " other."
 
 72 
 
 vowel or consonant e. g., the formulas t + A, d + h, h + a, 
 t + h + a, represent combinations of different elements, among 
 which that of h can be uttered independently of either of the 
 others, and the others independently of it. 
 
 At present, I have only to do with this element in its appli- 
 cation to consonants, both mute and liquid, as, for the purposes 
 of analysis, included under the head of " Explodents" 
 
 NOTE. I have employed this word (" explodents") throughout the work 
 as synonymous with consonants, particularly in reference to all elements 
 formed by a contact of two organs, and a necessary withdrawal of that 
 contact, principally because it is applied by most authors to only some con- 
 sonants, and not to others, which, besides the essential character just 
 described, have the peculiarity of being liquid. Not only Dr. Lepsius, 
 but Dr. Latham also, confines the term explosive to the former, and con- 
 tinuous to the latter ; but the words " valvular," and " imperfectly valvular" 
 are decidedly more satisfactory, and suggest that the terms explosive and 
 imperfectly explosive would convey similar meanings, but by no means 
 so definitive. Of the former he says" The action is perfectly valvular 
 i.e., the breath is absolutely or wholly arrested as long as the parts remain" 
 in contact. Of the latter, " The air escapes even while the parts .... 
 are iu contact. The action is valvular, but only imperfectly so." (The 
 Enylish Language, vol. i., p. Iviii.) It is, however, difficult to say why 
 the old terms " mute" and "liquid" should be superseded. See the quo- 
 tation from Dr. Lepsius, on "the sounds r and I," usually called liquids. 
 This learned writer's remarks on them, in a general sense, are surely 
 applicable to all imperfectly valvular elements.* 
 
 I am here glad to avail myself again of the opinions of Dr. J. 
 Miiller, the eminent physiologist, viz., his application of "the 
 mute f sound of the whisper," as he terms it, not only to the 
 vowels as we have noticed, but also to the consonants. He 
 writes 
 
 *'A main error in many of the attempts at classification of the articulate 
 
 * Dr J. Miiller also, I find, calls r and I, as well as s, sJi, ch, and /, 
 " sounds developed by the valve-like application of different parts of the 
 mouth to each other." Physiology, p. 1048. 
 
 f Here the sense of the word "mute" must be somewhat restricted, 
 meaning suppressed, silent. Whereas, when we apply the term generally 
 to a consonant, it means the momentary absence of either sound or breath, 
 caused by a complete closure of two organs.
 
 73 
 
 sounds, has been the failing to pay sufficient attention to the circumstance 
 of its being possible to form them without vocal tone, as in whispering; 
 while to recognise the essential properties of the articulate sounds, we must 
 first examine them as they are produced in whispering, and then investigate 
 which of them can also be uttered in a modified character, conjoined with 
 vocal tone." Physiology, p. 1045. (The italics are substituted.) 
 
 Now, the whole tenor of this work is intended to show that the 
 main error of classification has rather been the failing to detect the 
 essential property of all consonants, viz., that they are formed by a 
 contact, whether partial or complete, of two organs. True, some of 
 them (viz., k, p, t, g, &c.) are " only of momentary duration," and 
 others (viz., I, r, s,f, &c.) "can be prolonged ad libitum? according 
 to the complete or partial " occlusion of the faucal passage ;" but 
 the learned Doctor seems to have forgotten that the latter can 
 also be uttered so as to be of " momentary duration ;" in fact, 
 that, like the (ancient) tenues, the "sibilants," or "semi- vowels," 
 or " fricativse," or " flatus,'' (as they have been variously called,) 
 have also tenues forms, and can therefore all be uttered in a 
 whisper. 
 
 I am therefore justified in concluding that it is not only the 
 " absolutely mute consonants with strepitus explosions," viz., 
 k, g, t, d, &c., that " may, by aspiration, be completely changed 
 to other sounds," but also the tenues forms of the liquids r and I, 
 and such other elements as I hope to prove are their analogues. 
 It is only the ordinary breathing which accompanies articulation 
 in whispering ; and this is proved by the fact that it is quite 
 practicable to introduce or withdraw the spiritus, as a distinct 
 element, in whispering, just as in vocalised speech. In the 
 utterance of the tenues no more than the ordinary breath is 
 required ; but in order to aspirate them the spiritus is called 
 into operation. Both mutes and liquids can be uttered in a 
 whisper, that is, their tenues form ; but both will also allow a 
 distinct and forcible aspiration of any of these elements in
 
 74 
 
 whispering, viz., a spiritus additive to the ordinary breathing 
 required in the utterance of " whispered speech," e.g. : 
 
 Simple Explodents. Aspirate Explodents. 
 
 ORDINARY BREATHING (= whispering Same | 
 and CONTACT (partial or complete) elements) 
 
 Now in the classification of the simple consonants, as suggested 
 by the phonology of the Sechwana language, we have the binary 
 quantities of fortis and lenis, the general but unsatisfactory dis- 
 tinction between which terms has been touched upon in the first 
 Chapter. It is only necessary for the reader to conceive of the 
 organs being exactly in the position required for the enunciation 
 of any element, to enable him to apprehend the result of a forcible 
 aspiration of the breath in every instance. 
 
 In the case of the fortes, in which the contact of the organs is 
 simply perfect or complete, and the withdrawal of the contact (or 
 explosion) sudden, the application of the spiritus is simultaneous 
 and equally short and sudden with the withdrawal. 
 
 In the case of the lenes, the contact being more than complete, 
 in fact, amounting to a pressure,* and therefore proportionably 
 (though imperceptibly) longer, the amount of interrupted air 
 exploded on the withdrawal of the contact is necessarily greater 
 
 * It is supposed by some that by this greater compression of the organs, 
 and stronger interruption of the breath, a tension of the lower organs is 
 caused, and an utterance approaching to vocality, whence arises the term 
 sonant introduced by some authors, in contradistinction from surd (for the 
 fortes). Dr. Latham describes it thus : In the case of b, v, d, &c., " over 
 and above the action of the parts within the mouth, there has been an 
 action of the larynx, an action by means of which the column of air that, in 
 the case of p, f, t, &c., was ordinary breath, was thrown into certain vibra- 
 tions made sonant, so to say." (The English Language, vol. i., p. Iviii.) It 
 should, however, not be forgotten, that in the classification of consonants 
 we have nothing to do with vowels or sounds, but only with contacts and 
 their modifications, by the addition of either the spiritus or the element of 
 vocalisation, which latter I have yet to notice.
 
 75 
 
 and softer ;* the application of the spiritus is correspondingly less 
 sudden and softer. In the case of some lenes, however, this in- 
 terrupted breath or air has a tendency to escape, on account of 
 the contact, though complete at certain points, allowing of its 
 permeation at others; in such cases, the application of the 
 spiritus completely modifies the nature of the liquid, or " imper- 
 fectly valvular" element, and makes it an aspirated liquid, or 
 continuous consonant. 
 
 It is remarkable that the distinction drawn by Dr. Lepsius 
 between the common "aspirates' 5 and the so-called fricatives, is 
 exactly applicable to that above suggested as existing between 
 the aspirated forms of the " valvular" and " imperfectly valvular" 
 lenes consonants. He writes " The aspirate can follow the 
 explosion ; not accompany it through, as it does the friction of 
 the fricatives." He shortly after says, " the spiritus unites itself 
 more closely with the explosive letters than any other con- 
 sonants." f These "other consonants" are of course his "fri- 
 catives," or "imperfectly valvular" elements, some of which I 
 have already proved to have both liqiiid (or tenues) and con- 
 tinuous (or aspirate) forms. 
 
 Are there Binary or Quantitive Forms of the Spiritus ? 
 I have before remarked that the analysis of the Sechwana 
 consonants, in the second Chapter, afforded a legitimate proof 
 of all consonants being either simple or aspirate "explodents;" and 
 it must now be manifest to the reader, that the subsequent exa- 
 mination of the " faucales " contains no proof whatever that the 
 
 * _Z?.>/.,"The musclesof the tongue, aided perhaps by the co-operating action 
 of those of the pharynx, strike the palate more quickly, and on a narrower 
 point, in producing the articulation k ; but more slowly, and over a larger 
 space, in producing g." (Glossology, Sir J. Stoddart, p. 182.) According 
 to Professor Miiller, " a kind of breathing" continues " after the first con- 
 tact has taken place."' Proposals, p. xxv. 
 
 f Standard Alphabet, p. 4'J.
 
 76 
 
 more forcible breathing, or spiritus, is capable of subdivision 
 under similar heads ; but the train of the foregoing remarks 
 would seem to imply that it will, at all events, allow of binary 
 or quantitive forms, as distinct elements, additive to the strictly 
 simple consonants, fortes or lenes. However probable I may 
 consider this, it would be impossible to answer the question by 
 means of any data from the Sechwana. 
 
 NOTE. Tt may not be out of place here to remark that, in the event of a 
 proof being found of the propriety of applying the idea of binary quantities 
 to the spiritus itself, which we must bear in mind is additive to both 
 consonants and vowels, there would be verified the analogy I have already 
 supposed to exist, in its applicability (quantitively) to both the former and 
 the latter. 
 
 There is decidedly something apparently stronger in the 
 spiritus accompanying lc t f'p*than in g]c^l>* } but ihefortis nature 
 of the consonantal elements in the former example, and the lenis 
 in the latter, are likely to mislead. Still there can be no doubt 
 that in both cases the spiritus are produced by the same dis- 
 position of the lower organs. The following quotation seems to 
 shed some light on the subject. 
 
 " According to the Sanscrit grammarians, if we begin to pronounce the 
 tenuis, but, in place of stopping it abruptly, allow it to come out with what 
 they call the corresponding 'wind' (flatus, wrongly called sibilans), we 
 produce the aspirata, as a modified tenuis, not as a double consonant. 
 This, however, is admissible for the tenuis aspirata only, and not for the 
 media aspirata. Other grammarians, therefore, maintain that all mediae 
 aspiratae are formed by pronouncing the mediae with a final 'k, the flatus 
 lenis being considered identical with the spiritus; and they insist on this 
 principally because the aspirated mediae could not be said to merge into, 
 or terminate by, a hard sibilant."* Proposals, <tc., by Max Mutter, M.A., 
 p. xxxii. 
 
 Therefore, in the following page, Professor Miiller writes 
 
 " In Sanskrit no scholar could ever take M for Ji + h, because the latter 
 combination of sounds is grammatically! impossible." 
 
 * Or rather flatus (to be in keeping with his own nomenclature). 
 t Perhaps the word phonetically is here meant.
 
 77 
 
 In these quotations there seems implied the fact that the 
 spiritus accompanying the fortes k, t, p, is different in kind from 
 that in the lenes g, d, b; and therefore the conclusion that it 
 must exist in binary quantities. 
 
 If binary forms be found to exist, judging by analogy of the 
 combinations in which it occurs, the lenis form will not unlikely 
 prove to be our common h, as in house (the Arabic 8 , or ancient 
 "spiritus asper")] arid the fortis is as likely to be that (the 
 Arabic ) which is described by Dr. Lepsius as formed by a 
 sudden " contraction of the faucal point," and as a sudden 
 emission of the breath, of which it is easy to form an idea by a 
 little experimenting on the aspirate consonants. At all events, 
 the subject is one worthy of investigation. 
 
 NOTE. In the event of quantitation being admitted in the case of the 
 spiritus, and the above conjectures proving correct, of course this would lead to 
 the abrogation of a nomenclature which has been rendered sacredly con- 
 ventional and classical by long prescription e.g., 
 
 Old Nomenclature. 
 
 New 
 
 Spiritus. 1 
 
 Arabic ^ 
 fortis (h) 
 
 Asper. 
 lenis O 
 
 So that what has always been called the " spiritus asper" would really be 
 the spiritus lenis, and the Arabic the spiritus fortis. The 
 utterance of such paradoxical notions makes one inclined to wince under 
 the mere thought of the prospective lashes of some critic, which must 
 inevitably follow the literary temerity of any writer. At all events, I trust 
 that the unequivocal expression of my speculations will not subject me to 
 a castigation, any more than the high-sounding term explodent and fricative 
 faucales, indulged in by another infinitely more able author, in reference 
 to the spiritus. 
 
 * This does not include the ancient " spiritus lenis" which will be again 
 referred to in the sequel as a third form of the spiritus.
 
 78 
 
 The " Spiritus" influenced by the Position of the Long Quantity, 
 or Syllabic Accent. 
 
 After what has preceded on the nature of this element of 
 speech, the reader, who is disposed to consider the matter in an 
 impartial manner, will no doubt allow that it is of far more im- 
 portance than some able writers are willing to allow it. Dr. 
 Lepsius says of it 
 
 " It is of so little weight, that it does not make the preceding syllable 
 long." Standard Alphabet, p. 4 ( J. 
 
 Zumpt 
 
 " It is only an aspiration ; it is not considered as a vowel, and therefore, 
 when joined with a consonant, it does not lengthen the preceding syllable." 
 Latin Grammar. Trans, by Sehmitz, p. 4. 
 
 Professor Ramsay 
 
 " It exercises no influence whatever on the quantity of words, either taken 
 by themselves or when combined with others, in the formation of a verse." 
 Latin Prosody, p. 16. 
 
 Dr. Latham 
 
 " When air passes through both the mouth (or nostrils) and the larynx 
 simply as so much ordinary breath, the result is the sound expressed by 
 h. ... It is simply so much ordinary breath expired." The English 
 Language, vol. i., p. Ivii. 
 
 But it appears never to have entered into a part of the inquiries 
 of philologers as to whether the " spiritus asper" is influenced 
 by the position of the long quantity (or syllabic accent) ; there- 
 fore the important part it plays in the apparent modifications of 
 certain consonants, to which it is attached, has hitherto been 
 overlooked. I have already shown that the terms strong and 
 weak, in common with a host of others, have been applied by 
 different writers to distinguish the difference between the fortes 
 and lenes quantities of each element ; that such binary quantities 
 exist, and that of either of these there may be stronger and weaker 
 forms : but there is no doubt that these terms have often been 
 employed in the former signification, when they could really 
 only be explained in the latter e. g., 
 
 " In German, Adelung distinguishes a strong aspiration (hauch) at the
 
 79 
 
 beginning of a word, as in hdbe, have ; and a weaker in the middle of a 
 word, as in gehen, to go."* 
 
 He does not seem to have perceived that in the former case 
 the vowel to which the spiritus is attached is long, and in the 
 latter short. In the same manner we say uphold and shepherd, 
 or vehement and vehicle, but the spiritus is only weak in the 
 latter instance of either couple, because the accent is not on the 
 syllable to which it is attached as in the former.f In both cases 
 of the English examples the quantity of the consonants is the 
 same, but the forcible breathing, or spiritus, is modified. 
 
 I am not aware that any previous writer has taken this view 
 of the subject; but the Sechwana phonology, which abounds in 
 aspirates, and forms the basis of inquiry, bears out the truth 
 of my conclusions in innumerable examples, of which the 
 following are only a few : 
 
 Ldha (pay) Lehile (have paid) 
 
 P'ufa (gather) P*ut'ile (have gathered) 
 
 P-ap^dma (quiver) K*ok l ola (retail scandal), &c. 
 
 In all which cases the spiritus is undoubtedly stronger where 
 it occurs on the accented syllable.^ 
 
 NOTE. It is not unlikely it will yet be shown that it is not its position 
 relatively to certain combinations of consonants which makes a preceding 
 syllable long, but rather the position of the long quantity which affects such 
 combinations of consonants. This proved, it will be easy to ascertain the 
 primitive monosyllabic nature of all tongues. To refresh the memory of 
 the student who is prompted by this remark to reflect a moment upon the 
 
 * Worterb, vol. i., p. 1319, cited by Sir J. Stoddart. 
 
 \ The few cases such as honest, humble, &c., do not fall under con- 
 sideration, because in them the h is absolutely silent. 
 
 \ At the same time, it is not requisite to indicate this distinction by 
 means of any orthographical expedients ; it is only as well to know them, 
 to enable us to guard against a habit of " hair-splitting," and discriminating 
 too much. 
 
 In ancient prosody, this is especially to be noticed in the case of positio 
 debilis, where, except in the case of the preceding vowel being naturally 
 long, as salubris, or the muta cum liquida, belong to different syllables, as 
 abluo, the succeeding syllable, is as likely to be long as the preceding one.
 
 80 
 
 various ways in which, according to the modern rules of ancient prosody, a 
 position may be formed (as it is usual to express it), I append the rules: 
 1. " When a syllable ends in two or three consonants, as in ex, est, mens, 
 stirps. 2. When the first syllable ends in a consonant, and the second 
 begins with one, as in itte, arma, mentis, innova. 3. When the first syllable 
 of the same ivord ends in a vowel, and the one syllable following begins 
 with two consonants"* (excepting in the case of the positio debilis), as 
 aptus,factus 4. In the case of i and v, consonants (== y and w) when pre- 
 ceded by another consonant f alies, aries ; lingua, equus. 
 
 A proper examination of the point above suggested (as well as into 
 the nature of liquids and their continuous forms) will no doubt also shed 
 some light on " a subject of keen controversy among metrical scholars,"" 
 viz., the quantity of a short final vowel before a word beginning with 
 BC (=sk), sp, st. 
 
 Vocalisation of some Consonants, viz., r and \, fyc. Therefore, 
 of the Spiritus. Of the guttural provisionally indicated by 
 gs {German guttural ch). 
 
 There is another form of the spiritus, the consideration of 
 which suggests the examination of a separate element that plays an 
 important part in the modification of some simple consonants 
 viz., vocalisation. This element has been variously denominated 
 " the obscure vowel," " the indistinct vowel sound," and " the 
 slight and scarcely distinct vowel sound." 
 
 NOTE. These terms are sometimes applied to certain unaccented forms 
 of all the vowels, as in German, lichen ; English, velvet ; Italian, ventura ; 
 French, t<mir, &c. ; but I shall reserve the consideration of this view of the 
 subject for the second part of the present work, on the Vowels. 
 
 But the element to which I particularly refer is that concisely 
 described by Dr. J. Muller as follows : 
 
 " A peculiar murmuring sound accompanies several consonants, which 
 does not resemble any of the vowels. This kind of intonating can be 
 produced either with the mouth open or with it closed, the nasal passage 
 being in the latter case open." Physiology, p. 1050. 
 
 Zumpt'i Latin Grammar, by Dr. Schmitz, p. 20. f Ibid., note, p. 8.
 
 81 
 
 It is not a voioel, though invariably considered one. Till a 
 better term can be found, perhaps it may be called either the 
 (e indistinct vowel element" or the " element of vocalisation." 
 
 According to Dr. Lepsius, in a quotation of which I have 
 already availed myself 
 
 " This vowel is inherent in all soft fricative consonants, as well as in the 
 first part of the nasal explosive ; whence all these letters, as g, n, m, appear 
 sometimes as forming syllables. It assumes the strongest resonance, as 
 may be easily explained on physiological grounds, in combination with r 
 and I, which, as is well known, appear in Sanscrit as r and Z> with all the 
 qualities of the other vowels." Stand. Alph., p. 27. 
 
 Dr. Latham writes 
 
 " It is an essential condition in the formation of a vowel sound, that the 
 passage of the breath be parietal. In the sound of the Z'in lo (isolated from 
 its vowel), the sound is as continuous as it is with the in fate. Between, 
 however, the consonant I and the vowel a there is this difference with a, 
 the passage of the breath is wholly uninterrupted ; with I, the tongue is 
 applied to the palate, breaking, arresting, or partially interrupting the 
 passage of the breath." The English Language. 
 
 The generic nature of l t as a simple (unmodified) liquid, or 
 " pure explodent"* is, by both writers, entirely lost sight of; one 
 of its accessory or modified forms or specific natures, as a con- 
 tinuous consonant, is all that is attributed to it viz., that it is*a 
 vocalised consonant. It is decidedly a mistake to suppose that 
 I and" r, and their analogues, are essentially vocalised ; as well 
 might they be considered essentially aspirated consonants. It 
 is well to bear in mind that they are, like the other fates, g, d, 
 and 6, essentially simple " explodents ;" it is only from the fact 
 of their allowing a simultaneous and partial emission of the 
 breath that they are liquid, and may be continuous. Viewed 
 strictly as simple " explodents" (liquids), we have nothing to do 
 
 * Dr. J. Miiller says, " Kempelen classes the consonants I, m, n, and r, 
 among the vocalised sounds, but they are certainly not always so ; they are 
 heard distinctly as true mute sounds in the vocalised (intonated) speech." 
 Physiology, p. 1051. He uses the word mute here in the sense applicable 
 to k, g, &c. My word " exphdent" refers only to contact, partial as well as 
 complete, and includes liquids ; therefore more suitable. 
 
 G
 
 82 
 
 with their continuous nature i,e., the continuousness of the 
 ordinary breath required in their enunciation, but alone with the 
 operation of two organs, with the contact or articulation of 
 which its escape is simultaneous and equally momentary. Viewed 
 as continuous consonants, we have to do with the prolation of 
 the breath alone, (i.e. ' the spiritus) or the " vocal element," 
 whenever accompanying it. In the former case we have to do 
 with the contact so far as it is merely momentary, and from the 
 circumstance of the action of the organs being to a certain 
 extent "imperfectly valvular," also liquid; in the latter case, 
 with the contact so far as this is prolonged, by a continued exertion 
 of the breath in the form of a " fricative," or " flatus," or by 
 the vocal element, which implies continuity of breath. In 
 either case, the consonantal or '"' explodent," or unmodified liquid 
 nature is not perceived until the organs in contact have been 
 detached ; but it is only in the latter that the continuous element 
 is perceptible, for the passage of the escaping and continued 
 breath is as much as in the case of any vowel parietal i.e., " the 
 tongue" (in whatever position), " the cheeks, and the lips, are 
 the walls of the oral passage," and therefore the consonant is 
 capable of being vocalised. 
 
 But, in every instance, it is the breathing which may be 
 vocalised ; moreover, in order thereto, the breathing must be 
 continuous ; therefore, vocalisation would seem to imply an excess 
 of breath beyond the ordinary breathing required in the enun- 
 ciation of any simple " explodent ;" that is to say, an extra 
 exertion of the breath, which can be called by no other name 
 than aspirative.* This is tantamount to saying, that in regard 
 to some lenes " explodents," viz., the liquids, their continuous! and 
 aspirate forms are identical ; in fact, that the letters I and r, and 
 
 * In some letters this is more perceptible than in others ; e.g., in r and I, 
 more than in s, th, and/. 
 
 t In reference to breath alone.
 
 83 
 
 their analogues yet to be noticed, for example, as pure 
 1 ' explodents," are not accompanied by any extra exertion of the 
 breath, though they may be, if necessary ; but in this case they 
 would become aspirute liquids. 
 
 In order to test this conjecture, the nature of the rough 
 breathing, or fricative element, viz., the spiritus, alone must be 
 considered, as assumed by every consonant, independently of 
 voice. When this element is attached to the mutes k, g ; t, d; 
 p, b; its utterance is simultaneous with the separation of the 
 organs in contact, as in h] g\ &c. ; when attached to the liquids 
 (properly so called, viz., r and I, and their analogues), its duration 
 is simultaneous with that of the contact of the organs, as well as 
 their separation ; and the longer the duration, the greater the 
 exertion of the breath, amounting to an aspiration, which forms 
 a continuous element in the consonant, the " explodent" nature 
 of which latter is not perceived till the organs are detached. 
 
 But the spiritus is not the only continuous element which may be 
 assumed by a liquid consonant; therefore the term " continuous," 
 as at present used, is ambiguous. It may mean, also, the 
 " vowel element" above noticed ; so that, to be continuous, a 
 liquid consonant may be either aspirated or vocalised, and 
 vocalisation is probably only aspiration, modified by an accessory 
 element, viz., the " murmuriny sound" described by Dr. J. 
 Holler. 
 
 When this "vowel element" is attached to the simple "explodents," 
 it merely strengthens the explosion, while it occasions a slight 
 hiatus,* except that in the case of the lenes g, d, b, the intensity 
 and comparative prolongation of the contact causes, by the same 
 effort of the organs, only an approach to vocality. When 
 attached to the liquids r, I, and their analogues, vocalisation of 
 
 * It is not unreasonable to expect the occurrence of such a consonant ; 
 for, in the Hottentot language, a hiatus is sometimes perceptible between a 
 click and the succeeding vowel. 
 
 G 2
 
 84 
 
 these is the result : " the friction (of the breathing, however 
 strong*) ceases to be audible, and only the vowel element is 
 heard" in combination with the " explodent" element. The three 
 forms of r and I, according to which all their analogues can be 
 classified, are now as follows: 
 
 Lingual I 
 
 Simp. Exp. Asp. Exp. Vocalized JExp. 
 for Liquid.} (or Continuous.) 
 
 i r i 
 
 r r' rt 
 
 I trust that what precedes will amount to a proof that 
 aspiration is essential to vocalisation, or the utterance of the 
 " vowel element" (murmuring sound) attached to some consonants. 
 At all events, unless some proof be alleged, the necessity for two 
 scales of vocalised consonants (simple and aspirate) cannot be 
 obviated. The Sechwana language affords only one instance of 
 a proof, which may not, however, be considered satisfactory to 
 some of my readers. I have already thoroughly explained the 
 nature of the two r's in this language viz., the simple (not 
 continuous) " explodent" r 1 , and the aspirate (continuous) r 2 , or 
 otherwise r and r; but it is remarkable that it is only the latter 
 which becomes vocalised e.g., one sometimes hears rema (hew), 
 in which case continuous breath accompanies the contact of the 
 organs forming r, and at other times rbma, in which the breathing 
 is inaudible, and a buzzing sound, arising from vibration of the 
 tip of the tongue and the exertion of the voice, accompanies the 
 contact. The r is in this word aspirated, and in the verbal 
 noun is changed to aspirate t (t), which will perhaps, on the 
 ground stated above, account for the modification ; but I am not 
 
 * Part in parenthesis interpolated. The quotation is from Lepsius. 
 
 f Among European scholars, the vocalisation of a consonant is usually 
 indicated by means of a circular dot below the letter, thus I, r. I trust it 
 will not betray any desire to differ with those who have introduced it, to 
 suggest that it be placed at the top, as is usually the practice of pointing in 
 European graphic systems not formed upon Oriental models.
 
 85 
 
 aware of any instance in the language in which a liquid " simple 
 explodent" becomes vocalised, except in that of a word like 
 morimo, as pronounced by native children imitating their 
 European teachers, who invariably vocalise the letter. 
 
 NOTE. The above cited instances in the Sechwana would seem to suggest 
 that both aspiration and vocalisation are accessory elements, not in the 
 slightest degree affecting the quantity of the consonant which assumes 
 them. But as I have, under a preceding head, shown that the spiritus, or 
 any aspirated consonant, is affected by the syllabic accent, or quantity of 
 any particular vowel of a word, it may possibly be found to affect the 
 vocalisation also* 
 
 Inasmuch as the free emission of the breath is necessary to 
 the enunciation of a vowel, and those "explodent" consonants 
 which allow of a partial escape of the breath may be vocalised, 
 one would think that the spiritus, which is nothing more than a 
 forcible emission of the breath, and a continuous element e 'uttered 
 with the whole oral canal open," must also allow of being 
 vocalised; in fact, that it is just as possible to vocalise the 
 aspirate as it is to aspirate a vowel. 
 
 NOTE. There must, at this point, occur to the reader some glimmerings 
 of a proof of what I have above suggested viz., that the spiritus has two 
 quantities, and this will become more evident as I proceed ; for if it is only 
 some lenes consonants that can be vocalized, and also the spiritus, it may 
 be inferred that it is the lenis form of the latter. 
 
 Since the other " soft (lenes) fricatives" of Dr. Lepsius are all 
 vocalised forms, and in his classification A is a soft fricative, and 
 he admits (p. 39) that there is a vocalised faucal, why not have 
 inserted this at the head of its fricative analogues? In other 
 words, if " this vowel (element) is inherent in all soft fricative 
 consonants," and h (*) is a soft fricative, it must, to use his 
 own mystical phraseology, also be inherent in h. 
 
 NOTE. In coincidence with Professor Max Mliller, he admits the 
 guttural consonant i (his guttural knis-fricative) to be the vocalised form 
 of the guttural consonant (his guttural /ortu-Mcative) ; but again, the 
 former linguist calls the simple breathing the vocalised form (" sonant
 
 86 
 
 representative," p. xxviii.) of the simple but stronger breathing . Now 
 these are both "faucales" of Dr. Lepsius, and the is one of his 
 explodents ; therefore in his view it cannot be vocalised. If there is a 
 vocalised spiritus, and the simple semi- vowel of Professor Miiller is 
 nothing more" than a vocalised breathing, it is not improbable that , or 
 the Elif hamzatmn "^ may prove to be it ; in this case it would be the 
 " sonant representative," not of , but of . 
 The series would then stand thus : 
 
 Spiritus. 
 
 fortis. lenis ( : ). lenis ( 2 ), or vocal. 
 
 C (ft) * O "" O 
 
 The above is a conclusion rather different from that of Dr. T. 
 Miiller, who writes 
 
 " The only continuous consonant (?) which cannot be pronounced in 
 combination with a vocal sound is the aspirate h. The aspiration of the h 
 ceases immediately that the vocal chords are thrown into sonorous vibra- 
 tions." Physiology, p. 1051. 
 
 As to the former part of this quotation, I have already 
 endeavoured to show that h is neither a consonant nor a vowel 
 but a strong breathing modification of either. The latter part 
 is equivalent to Dr. Lepsius's words describing the " lenes fri- 
 catives," z, v, &c., of which he says " the breathing ceases to be 
 audible, and only the vowel element is heard." Dr. Miiller may 
 mean by h a forcible breathing, and Dr. Lepsius, by the word 
 breathing, the ordinary measure of breath required in the 
 utterance of any consonant ; so that they may refer to different 
 degrees of one element, to which their equivocal descriptions are 
 equally applicable. Dr. Miiller also classes z and v (and also 
 certain forms of r and f) as vocalised consonants, and it seems 
 difficult to conceive why he should not allow also that there is 
 a vocalised form of h. 
 
 NOTE. There is, for example, a striking difference between the three 
 opening monosyllables, o, L o, and o, in the line 
 0) 
 
 'O Levery one that thirsteth, &c. Itaiah Iv. 
 OJ
 
 87 
 
 The ordinary breathing is requisite to the enunciation of every 
 consonant or vowel (of which in the above line would, if cor- 
 rect, be an example) ; were it not, we should not be able to 
 whisper. The operation of the " wind-chest" or trachea, is steady 
 and without effort,. even during the intonated* speech, when the 
 breathing is inaudible till any, either mute or liquid, articulations 
 are modified by the spiritus, when it requires effort, and the 
 muscles are called into play. The spiritus, whatever the dis- 
 position of the articulating organs, is distinctly audible when 
 attached to either vowels or consonants, not only in the 
 "whispered" but also in the intonated speech, till it itself is 
 vocalised, when (I admit) the spiritus is apparently suppressed. 
 However, it is not really suppressed ; but, doubtless, before it 
 reaches the oral canal, part of its force is spent in keeping the 
 vocal ligaments in a state of vibration, and, before escaping with 
 the voice from the mouth, the two together probably cause a re- 
 sonance in the cavity of the mouth, formed by any particular 
 disposition of the organs, whether guttural, lingual, or labial. To 
 borrow the expression of Dr. Miiller in describing certain nasals, 
 " the cavity of the mouth forms a blind diverticulum" in the case 
 of every articulation when vocalised. A proof that the spiritus 
 still accompanies the voice is that, whatever the disposition of 
 the articulating organs, when vocalised, they undergo vibrations. 
 So that there may be some truth in my inference that the spiritus 
 is necessary to vocalisation ; but it must be distinctly understood 
 that by the latter term I do not mean intonation. 
 
 Dr. Lepsius regards z, v, 0' (in this), and z (zh\ as vocalised 
 consonants, since they are the lenes forms of s,f, (in think), and 
 5 (s/t). As will be seen in the sequel though it is to be shown 
 
 * I use this term instead of Dr. Miiller's, which unfortunately clashes 
 with the sense in which the word vocalise is here used.
 
 88 
 
 that they are not lenes* forms of s, &c. there is nothing in the 
 Sechwana to disprove that they are vocalised forms. 
 
 I shall proceed to notice the vocalised form of one of those 
 consonants that have already passed under analysis, which appears 
 to be the subject of unsettled notions. Inasmuch as the above- 
 mentioned vocalised elements are by Dr. Lepsius regarded as 
 analogues of the Danish g (=%' in his system, the softer form of 
 ch in lachen = x)j ^ must in his view also be the vocalised 
 element in the guttural series of liquids. As these kindred or 
 cognate elements, ch (^), and y (%), are by him regarded as the 
 equivalents, respectively, of those indicated by kh and gh in the 
 Hindustani of Gilchrist, I cannot do better than describe the 
 latter consonant in the words of this distinguished Orientalist : 
 
 " Kh is the rough guttural It, pronounced in the very act of hawking up 
 phlegm from the throat, which becomes tremulous and ruffled, while the 
 root of the tongue is with it forming the sound required. This letter is 
 familiar enough to the Scottish and other northern nations, but very 
 troublesome to the English, &c." British Indian Monitor, vol. i., p. 12. 
 
 There can be very little doubt that the consonant above 
 described () is the ch in the Scotch loch, that is, equivalent to 
 ch in German lachen viz., the of Lepsius.f Of the other 
 (), Dr. Gilchrist writes : 
 
 "Gh is * * * * the guttural Northumberland r, heard in the act 
 of gargling the throat with water." Ibid. p. 12. 
 
 In this description Dr. Duff coincides with him, 
 Elsewhere he writes of both elements : . r 
 
 " The true discriminative articulation of kh and gh depends on ruffling 
 the throat in a particular manner, while prolating k and g respectively." 
 Ibid. p. 20. 
 
 It must be evident to the reader that, in quantity, the articu^ 
 
 * I.e., related to s, as t to d. 
 
 \ Dr. Forbes says " ^ has a sound like ch in the word loch, as pro- 
 nounced by the Scotch and Irish, or the final ch in the German words 
 schach and buck." Hindust. Grammar, p. 5.
 
 89 
 
 lations are identical, but that the former is aspirated, and the 
 latter a vocalised liquid.* 
 
 Though Dr. Gilchrist has most distinctly stated that the 
 consonant indicated by his digraph gh is the Northumberland 
 burr, or r, the latter sound is separately included in Dr. Lepsius's 
 system as r, or the guttural r. Now Professor Max Miiller 
 writes : 
 
 " The English and the German r become mostly guttural, while on the 
 other hand the Semitic guttural flatus lenis fricatus . . (i) takes fre- 
 quently the sound of a guttural r. It might be advisable to distinguish 
 between a guttural and a lingual r ; but most organs can only pronounce 
 either the one or the other, and the two therefore seldom co-exist in the 
 same dialect." Proposals, p. xl. 
 
 But he elsewhere calls " the sonant representative" of 
 (p. xxviii). The majority of writers concur in making the 
 Oriental an element as nearly as possible equivalent to what 
 is often called " the guttural r" or burr of some dialects. Among 
 others, Silvestre de Sacy as cited by Garnett. The latter able 
 linguist himself says of it, " the sound meant for r has no lingual 
 vibration at all, but becomes a deep guttural . . . almost 
 exactly corresponding to the Arabic ghain"^ If so, it is not 
 only advisable but absolutely necessary to distinguish between 
 it as a guttural sonant (vocalised guttural) and any lingual sonant, 
 
 * Dr. Forbes says " e. has a sound somewhat like g in the German 
 word sagen. About the banks of the Tweed, the natives sound what they 
 fancy to be the letter r, very like the Eastern ." Hind. Gram. Professor 
 Miiller makes the g in German tage the sonant corresponding to the German 
 guttural ch in loch (which latter, however, he considers the equivalent of 
 the Arabic ^ already referred to as a different element from ) ; but 
 Germans, whom I have tried in this country, differ so in pronouncing the 
 g in tage, that it cannot fairly be taken as a type. If this letter, as known 
 to Professor Miiller, is equal to the g in sagen, and this again approximates 
 at all to the g in Cape Dutch dagen, which is only a very mild form of the 
 "guttural r," or Northumberland burr.it is very probable that these are 
 all examples of variations which " exist only in degree." 
 
 f Philological Essays, p. 253.
 
 90 
 
 viz., between r and what I shall provisionally indicate by </" in 
 my orthographical nomenclature a letter bearing the same relation 
 to cp as r to K 
 
 I have thus attempted to show the "guttural r" to be the 
 vocalised element in the guttural series; at all events, it is 
 requisite that I should account for the nature of the Danish g> 
 which I propose to attempt in the sequel. The Danish g (y or ^') 
 is in the same system, but I think erroneously, represented as 
 the equivalent of Dr. Gilchrist's digraph gh (Arabic ). 
 
 The Nasals and their Vocalisation. 
 
 It is under the head of vocalisation that it becomes me to take 
 into consideration the subject of the nasal consonants, properly 
 so called. M and n have always been regarded as analogues of 
 I and r that is, as liquid consonants or semi-vowels. Though to 
 this day schoolboys are so taught, and an authority like Dr. 
 Latham classes them as such, they are by linguists of the Con- 
 tinent, and others,* classed separately as nasal consonants, and 
 as analogues of ng in English king, or German enge. Again, 
 just as m and n have by long prescription been considered liquid 
 consonants, the element usually indicated by ng in the same two 
 examples has been exclusively pronounced the nasal n. So 
 recently as 1855, the above able writer gives the public the 
 following conclusive remarks on the subject of this element, 
 which he considers the " English representative" of a class, but 
 does not acquaint his reader with a single additional instance of 
 other members of this class : 
 
 " The nasal sounds are vowels, so far as the actions that form them are 
 parietal. 
 
 " They are also vowels in some of their other properties e.g., they can 
 form syllables by themselves. In the Chinese, such syllables actually 
 exist, constituting monosyllabic words. 
 
 * Among the rest, Sir J. Stoddart. " In Hebrew, Greek, &c., it [n] is (as 
 I think improperly) reckoned among the liquids." Glossology, p. 142,
 
 "They are not, however, vowels, in respect to their power of combining 
 with other sounds e.g., b-ng is not a syllable in the way that ba or bo is one. 
 
 " Nevertheless, the nasal sounds are essentially vowels, though whether it 
 may be convenient to call them so is another question. The details of their 
 mechanism and classification have yet to be studied, and, as they are rare 
 in our own language,* it is not likely that any Englishman will be the 
 successful investigator. The French and the Portuguese have the best 
 means of studying them. Neither have the muscles of the nares and soft 
 palate been examined, with any view towards the phonesis of what we have 
 called the nasal passage. 
 
 " Nevertheless, the ng in king is more of a vowel than aught else." 
 The English Language, 4th Ed., vol. i., p. Ivi. 
 
 The following abstract from the valuable tables of Dr. Lepsius 
 will show that what is properly called a class of nasal vowels has, 
 probably, been confounded with this imaginary plurality of nasal 
 sounds so called, of which the single example of ng in king is 
 considered by Dr. Latham the " English representative." 
 
 TABLE OF " NASALS." 
 
 Standard of Lepsius 
 
 Vowels. 
 a e i o u 
 
 Consonants Outt. 
 n 
 
 Hottentot 
 
 
 
 Wallmann 
 
 a e i 6 u 
 
 
 Sanscrit 
 
 an en, &c 
 
 
 Wilson .... 
 
 
 
 Bengali 
 
 onpf 
 
 
 Zend 
 
 a n 
 
 
 
 an, n 
 
 n 
 
 
 
 ii 
 
 Albanian 
 Hahn 
 
 u n 
 
 
 Hindustani 
 Yates 
 
 
 
 aiichrist {[HI ;;;;;; 
 
 Wilson 
 
 an 
 n 
 
 ng 
 
 Chinese 
 
 a.u 
 
 
 
 
 f 
 
 * This cannot, therefore, include m and n, which prevail in the English 
 language.
 
 92 
 
 Now, under the Hottentot, to my own knowledge, there can be 
 no mistake as to the existence of the nasal vowels, whether 
 written by Mr. Knudsen a, e, &c. ; by Mr. Wallmann, or, more 
 recently, Mr. Tindall, as a, e, &c. ; or by Dr. Lepsius as a, V, 
 &c. ; but whether the guttural consonant ng exists in the lan- 
 guage I think there is some doubt.* Mr. Knudsen and Mr. 
 Wallmann, on the statement of Dr. Lepsius, both write it, but 
 I have not succeeded in finding that this is supported by the 
 authority of Mr. Tindall. It is remarkable that in such an 
 example as \cangJia (smoky), where the lingual n occurs before 
 the liquid guttural gh (German ch), it remains a lingual ; that is, 
 it does not become cang-gh, or, as Dr. Lepsius would write it, 
 can^a. In his Grammar he speaks of " a final vowel, which 
 appears to have the ringing sound of ing, as in ring, sing, &c. ; 
 but which is not sounded with sufficient distinctness to warrant 
 our adopting the same orthography as in English." He, how- 
 ever, suggests that it will require Dr. Lepsius's " w" to meet this 
 case not, perhaps, aware that this pointed letter is intended to 
 be confined to the English or German articulation, as indicated 
 by the digraph ng in ing, or enge. 
 
 It is not improbable that the same confusion which exists as to 
 the fact of the consonantal articulation ng, and the nasalized 
 vowels a, e, &c., both being found in the Hottentot, also prevails 
 among some of the linguists quoted in the above table, in 
 respect to the nasals to which they allude. I have placed at 
 the head of this table Dr. Lepsius's standard nasal vowels, and 
 classed under them what he considers as their equivalents in 
 the writings of those linguists. With the same view the instances 
 
 * Since writing the above, I have heard it in the Grikwa (impure Hottentot) 
 sxpression, to eibe qong (don't go just yet), in which q represents the 
 ' cerebral" click. 
 
 | This letter here represents a click.
 
 93 
 
 are shown in which, according to them, the guttural nasal 
 consonant is found in some of the same languages. 
 
 Of these, the Hottentot is said to have that consonant ; but this 
 has just been questioned in the preceding remarks. Again, the 
 Hindustani is represented as not having it, whereas Dr. Gilchrist* 
 gives it in such words as hongeen (will be), Gunge (O Ganges !). 
 In fact, no better example could be produced of the manner in 
 which correct views of the phonical nature of elements have been 
 sacrificed to these graphic differences. But in the former word 
 occurs also his " nasal h ;" this he describes as equivalent to that 
 in the French word bon, which, of course, an Englishman, to be in 
 keeping with his own graphic system, would have to write ~bong.\ 
 Here we find a fresh source of confusion. It is evident that 
 Dr. Gilchrist's n (or n of 1796) is not the nasal vowel, as which 
 it is classed by Dr. Lepsius, but the proper nasal consonant ng in 
 king (n of the "Standard Alphabet"); for there is surely no 
 distinction between ng in king, and that in long or bong (Fr. bon). 
 
 To help myself, as well as the reader, out of this confusion, I 
 shall quote Dr. Gilchrist's description of the letter n in Hin- 
 dustani : 
 
 " n, as a nasal before j, k, g, and t, or d, requires no particular mark> 
 sounding exactly like our own letters nj, ng, nJt, nt, &c. in change, rung, 
 sunk, want, &c., but elsewhere it is the French nasal when marked n. 
 Preceding the labials it becomes, as in most languages, m." British Indian 
 Monitor, vol. i., p. 9. 
 
 * See British Indian Monitor, vol. i. 
 
 f Unless a Frenchman nasalizes the vowel, as he doubtless does in 
 some instances; but this would not alter the consonant. The vowel is 
 also modified, and requires a separate diacritical mark thus (French) sun 
 (to borrow Dr. Lepsius's orthography). Perhaps it is in allusion to such 
 an instance that Dr. J. Muller says, rather arbitrarily, " the ng of the 
 French language is formed still deeper in the throat !" (p. 1048.) He after- 
 wards (p. 1052) refers to the frequent use in French of these three con- 
 sonants, but especially ng, " in constant combination with vowel sounds of 
 nasal timbre, to the exclusion of other vowels not of nasal character." 
 However, I observe the n in bon (French) is given also by Max Muller as 
 the equivalent of ng in sing (English).
 
 94 
 
 Now, in the following combinations 
 
 nj nk ng nt nd, 
 
 the n, separated from the post positive letter in each case, is in nj, 
 lingual; in nk and ng, guttural; in nt and nd lingual. 
 
 The example = nj in change, would be called by Max Muller, an d 
 many other Oriental linguists, a palatal, as in his examples inch, injure ; 
 but he does not deny, and I question whether any of them would, that the 
 tongue is the active agent in the formation of the palatals so-called, as well 
 as in the linguals. Besides the three common organical classes of con- 
 sonants, Professor Muller has two others viz., palatals and linguals 
 (wrongly called cerebrals, but, he says, properly cacuminals), which he calls 
 modifications of gutturals and dentals respectively. Merely to preserve 
 analogy or consistency in a tableau, or, may be, in deference to Para 
 Brahma himself, these must, forsooth, have their nasal exponents. Professor 
 Lepsius, besides these, has a third additional class viz., the linguales 
 (Arabic), to which he applies the same principle of a forced analogy. 
 See his Table, " Consonants of the General Alphabet" 
 
 To his fourth additional class, the faucales (I. in his Table) of which, as 
 consonants even theoretically true, I have attempted to show the absurdity, 
 he fortunately has no nasal exponent. A plausible law seems to have been 
 snatched at in every case viz., that " the peculiar character of a nasal is 
 determined by the consonant immediately following." (See Haughtons 
 Reasons for so many Indian Nasals, cited by Monier Williams, p. 81.) As 
 it was maintained by the Sanskrit or Arabian grammarians that there are 
 differences in the consonants, and inferred that there must be nasal ex- 
 ponents corresponding to these differences, it seems to be expected by 
 modern Sanskrit scholars that what was considered at least theoretically 
 true in Arya-avarta, or at Mecca, will probably turn out to be practically 
 true at Timbuktu, or in Bushmanland. However, leaving the so-called 
 nasals of the Sanskrit and Arabic linguals to their respective sections, I 
 shall here only refer to the so-called palatal-nasal. In addition to the 
 above law, which I admit to be true in the majority of instances, but not in 
 all, another seems to have been long in vogue to pervert the notions of the 
 linguist in respect to this imaginary element viz., that a palatal is a 
 simple consonant. Were it one, I admit there would be some reasonableness 
 in seeking a nasal exponent for the series; but emphatically deny that any 
 palatal is a simple consonant. By going thoroughly, i.e., inductively, into 
 the subject here, I should be anticipating the matter of the third integral 
 portion of this work, as well as a part of the following section. Reference 
 to a single example, which I cull from Professor Muller himself, will suffice. 
 He says" What we call a palatal n is generally not a simple but a com- 
 pound nasal, and should be written ny'" (p. Ixvii.) Why, then, include it
 
 95 
 
 at all in a series of simple consonants? It must be> evident to the reader 
 that it is not the n that is palatal, but the combination ny, which is a 
 palatal analogue of Ay or ky, or any other letter or combination of letters 
 with a superadded y, and that my and y. y are articulations quite as palatal 
 as ny. In fact, combination of a peculiar kind (not of consonants alone) 
 is essential to palatalization. Again, as is well known, the three common 
 nasals m, n, and ng, exist by themselves, i.e., independently of any other 
 consonant; whereas Professor Miiller himself says elsewhere, in treating 
 of the palatals, " the nasal, again, hardly exists by itself, but only if followed 
 by palatals" (p. xxxvii.) ; therefore it ought at once and for ever to be 
 omitted from the table of simple consonants.* 
 
 In reference to some of these palatals, Dr. J. Miiller, the eminent 
 physiologist, says "The,;, soft g, and ch of the English language are also 
 compound sounds. Thej and the g being pronounced like the French j in 
 ' jamais,' preceded by d ; the ch like t followed by sh," (p. 1052). In fact, 
 the initial of most palatal " sounds" can be resolved into a common lingual, 
 of which there is a nasal exponent ready to hand, without resorting to 
 either the Devanagari or Arabic for any of their superfluous letters. 
 
 Now, if guttural in nk and ng, it must, independently of the 
 post positive consonants k and g, be equivalent to the nasal 
 consonant ng in question. I have shown the French n, in some 
 cases, to be a consonant = ng in king, or German enge. 
 Assuming this digraph to indicate this nasal consonant, rung 
 would be correctly written, but sunk would require to be written 
 sung-k; therefore, in the above examples of Dr. Gilchrist, 
 hongeen and gunge, these would be written -hong-geeng and 
 gung-ge ; so that his French n and his n preceding any gut- 
 turals are identical elements. If his nasal n (or an) were a 
 vowel, and his ng = to the same digraph in the word king, 
 Dr. Lepsius would write the above two words hont ; but if his 
 ng were = to ng-g, the same linguist would write the word 
 hohgt. 
 
 * In the face of these facts, the learned Professor does not make the 
 simple guttural-nasal ng a base letter as common with m and n, but gives 
 this favoured place to the so-called palatal nasal ny (French signe), and 
 actually calls ng a " modification of the second degree" (!) See Table, p. xci.
 
 96 
 
 The conclusion to which we must come is, that in the above 
 table we have a medley of instances, culled indiscriminately from 
 the works of several authors, in which the three separate 
 elements (1) a, the (mean) nasal vowel; (2) h, the nasal guttural 
 consonant; and (3) the latter combined with the kindred guttural 
 g, i.e., h-g, require to be distinguished;* that is, some of the 
 instances will, perhaps, on proper examination, be found equiva- 
 lent to ng, in which the kindred letter g is distinctly enunciated, 
 as in the word English ; some, to n (or ng in king, German enge, 
 French n in bo?i) alone, without the kindred element; and 
 some as real vowels, the pure and indisputable forms of which 
 are to be found in the Hottentot (a living member of the Egyptian 
 family of languages) and Chinese. 
 
 If it is by these dissimilar examples that we are to understand 
 the class of nasals of Dr. Latham, of which he considers the 
 English ng (n of Lepsius) as the representative, I trust that I 
 have proceeded far enough to show the impropriety of such a 
 classification, and that this element is rather a distinct member 
 of another set of nasal consonants, viz., the analogue (guttural) 
 of the lingual n and the labial m; a statement which admits of 
 abundant proof in what follows. 
 
 Dr. Latham writes : 
 
 " We cannot close the nostrils, as we can the lips, by the action of their 
 own muscles. Neither is there such an organ as the tongue in the nose. 
 If there were, we might form as many sounds through that organ as we do 
 through our mouth. As it is, however, all that we can do with a column of 
 air passing through the nostrils, is to narrow its line of exit by contracting 
 the passage. ,f The nasal and palatal muscles allow us to do so. They allow 
 us to bring the walls of the nasal cavity a little nearer each other, or to 
 separate them a little farther from each other. They do not, however, 
 allow us to close the passage altogether," &c. The English Language. 
 
 * I have, for the purpose of this distinction, made use of letters in the 
 " Standard Alphabet" of Lepsius. 
 | The italics are mine.
 
 97 
 
 The above appears to explain exactly the nature of the nasal 
 action in the formation of the narisonant vowels. There is no 
 contact of organs in the faucal passage, this being only more or less 
 narrowed, as in the case of any ordinary vowels ; the nasalization 
 of the vowel is caused entirely by a change in the compass of the 
 nasal passage, whereas with the nasal consonants m, n, and j^* 
 there is a contact of organs in the faucal passage and a perfect 
 closure of the same, but no change in the nasal passage. 
 
 Just as n and m are formed, respectively, by the tongue with 
 the palate, and by the lips alone, so g. (ng) is formed by the 
 contact of the same organs required in the formation of its 
 kindred forms k and g ;f so far they are simple <f explodents." 
 They differ from the other liquid consonants, I, r, &c., in that they 
 are all mutes ; that is, the faucal passage is closed by the contact 
 of the organs J the action of these organs is "perfectly valvular" 
 their closure is complete. Nevertheless, they are analogous to 
 
 * In order to avoid as much as possible the use of diacritical marks in 
 distinguishing the timple consonants or elements, I shall in future employ 
 this letter in place of either the Sechwana n, the of Lepsius, or the 
 digraph ng. I believe it was introduced by Pitman in England, and I 
 have observed that Mr. Appleyard and Mr. Grout, both able linguists, have 
 suggested the use of it in a general South African alphabet. As the 
 original character of the nasal is often determined by that of the simple 
 consonant immediately following, it is supposed by some linguists that it 
 "requires no modificatory sign ;" but the rule is not universal, eg., the 
 nasal above referred to in Hottentot cangha, Sechwana sip-tie, and in 
 Zulu words, -mnandi, -mtoti, -nwana, without their prefixes, show examples 
 to the contrary ; but when the two accessory elements of aspiration and 
 vocalisation are taken into account, as requiring diacritical expedients to 
 mark them, the importance of being particular in giving each its fixed letter 
 cannot be overrated. Two of the above Zulu examples, I suspect, ought to 
 be written mnandi, mtoti, or in any way that will show the m to be vocalised. 
 
 f That is, in the words of Dr. J. Miiller, <( by the application of the 
 dorsum of the tongue to the posterior part of the palate." 
 
 I This is admitted by Professor Miiller (p. xxx.), and by Dr. J. Miiller; 
 but, strange to say, the latter nevertheless denies that m is a labial con- 
 sonant" (p. 1047). See, in self-contradiction, his remark on Kempelen, 
 already quoted, p. 81, in which he calls it a " true mute sound."
 
 98 
 
 the kindred faucal consonants (liquids), in that while there is a 
 contact of the same organs the breathing or vocalisation finds a 
 way of escape. In the case of the liquids, it escapes according to 
 the position of the organs in imperfect contact ; in the case of the 
 nasals, it is withheld and " retroverted " to the nasal aperture,* 
 which undergoes no alteration. Like the liquids, they must 
 then, necessarily, admit of vocalisation as well as aspiration. 
 We have thus presented the three possible forms of each organic 
 series. 
 
 Simp. Asp. Vocal. 
 
 Guttural g g }| 
 
 Lingual D. n H 
 
 Labial m m in 
 
 These all abound in the Sechwana language, with the excep- 
 tion of the aspirate forms, of which there are a few, but they 
 do not just occur to me. The following words, similarly 
 arranged, will suffice as examples : 
 
 p ata (a sheaf) phe (a species of ground-squirrel) 
 nala (loiter) ntsa (produce) 
 
 matla (gallop) tsama (a walking-stick) 
 
 NOTE. (1). The object-particles m, n, and y. (= me) of verbs are in- 
 variably vocalised in the Sechwana language, e.g., mpona, nnama, pkhatla. 
 (2.) In the case of the prefix mo being attached to the initial cognate 
 element b, which by synaeresisf becomes m, e.g., mobala (colour), is always 
 pronounced mala; mobutla (hare), is always mutla. 
 
 * Dr. J. Miiller thus describes them : " In the pronunciation of all the 
 three consonants of this order, the cavity of the mouth forms a blind 
 diverticulum of greater or less length from the throat and nasal canal. 
 This diverticulum is largest during the utterance of m, smallest when ng 
 is being pronounced (p. 1047). I have already copied this phraseology in 
 describing the formation of the other vocalised liquids I, r, &c., without 
 at the time noticing, what I now observe, that the vocalised nasals are in 
 this respect also analogues of those (proper) vocalised liquids.'' 
 
 f It is probable that the initials n and y. are in some instances
 
 99 
 
 (3.) In all cases like mohago (road-food), becoming mhago ; mo henya 
 (conquer him), becoming mo henya ; but iu examples such as the latter the 
 words are pronounced both ways. In this language these three nasal 
 consonants form initials independently of any other consonants 
 nam, mothu. 
 
 II. THE "PALATALES" (OF LEPSIUS) AND THE LETTER "q." 
 
 Next in order in the above General Alphabet of Dr. Lepsius, we find 
 the letter q, and (omitting the mute gutturals which have been fully under 
 consideration) a series answering to the gutturals, but with a diacritical mark 
 attached to distinguish them. Professor Miiller also says "Palatals 
 are modifications of gutturals, and therefore the most natural course would 
 l>e to express them by the guttural series, adding . . any . . sign to 
 indicate their modified value" (p. Ixi.)* Though acknowledged to be com- 
 pound sounds in the pronunciation of Europeans, Dr. Lepsius, with an 
 over-scrupulous regard for the graphic element in the sacred Davanagari 
 writing of the Indians, must, forsooth, pronounce them to be simple sounds, 
 
 analogously formed. See Kellic permutations referred to in sequel (Sec. ii. 
 ch. iv.) The above is perhaps the phonical process called eclipsis by 
 "the Irish grammarians," e.g., mbaile (town), pronounced matte. See 
 Garnett, p. 81. 
 
 * The palatals are indicated by the gutturals Jc, Ich, g, &c., modified 
 thus 
 
 By Professor Lepsius k f kh' g> &c. 
 
 Miiller k kh g &c. 
 
 With regard to the flatus or fricative form of these palatals, Dr. Lepsius 
 adheres to his graphical rule by borrowing the Greek letters thus x'\ x" 
 but Professor Miiller wanders from his own by introducing the sibilants 
 * and z italicised. The following is a list of some of the " sounds" com- 
 monly comprehended under the term palatals : 
 
 i ch in English church, German rutschen, Italian ceci. 
 
 jjin English join. 
 
 (sh in English sharp, French oh in chose, German sch in scharf. 
 
 tj & g in French joli, genou, English s in vision. 
 
 Ich in German ich. 
 g Jconig. 
 
 g taglioh. 
 
 gn in French besogne, &c., &c., &c., (= ny.") 
 
 Its imperfection will account for the amount of unsuccessful speculation 
 on the subject of these " sounds." 
 
 H2
 
 100 
 
 because in that system represented by simple signs. " This is, moreover," 
 he says, " proved by their not rendering the preceding syllable long, and by 
 the possibility of doubling them." Professor Miiller, in other words, 
 says " All (the French tch, the Italian c, and the Russian *[), even the 
 German tsch, are meant to express simple consonants, which, with the 
 exception of the tenuis aspirata in Sanskrit, would not make a preceding 
 short vowel long" (p. Ixi.)* I have already alluded to this subject in the 
 preceding section, in attempting to show that there is no such element as a 
 separate palatal nasal, and shall therefore not attempt to anticipate by 
 more than a few remarks here, what will be fully treated on in its proper 
 place. 
 
 Just as " the name of x (chi) connects it with the vowel i" in the minds of 
 such as have given more attention to graphic differences, so the letter q, 
 from its Hebrew and Greek names qof and Jcoppa, seems to be connected 
 with the vowel o ; but it is necessary to disabuse the mind of the " syllabic 
 power" originally attached to such letters, and resolve them into their 
 elements. The former is merely an instance of a guttural being prefixed to 
 the prepositive vowel of a palatal diphthong, and the latter (in later ortho- 
 graphy) of the guttural k being attached to that of a labial diphthong. On 
 this account, neither they, nor any analogous syllabic combinations,! can 
 be said to fall under a classification either of the simple or compound con- 
 sonants, and are, therefore, reserved for the third part of this treatise. 
 Professor Miiller again says " Although, therefore, we are forced to 
 admit the palatals, as a separate class, side by side with the gutturals, 
 because most languages retain both sets, and use them for distinct etymo- 
 logical and grammatical purposes, still it will be well to remember that the 
 palatals are more nearly related to the gutturals than to any other class, 
 and that in most languages the two are still interchangeable" (p. xxxvi.) 
 It is to be hoped that before the writer has time to disprove this phonetical 
 tenet, of which some European linguists seem so tenacious, they will 
 anticipate the numberless proofs to the contrary which he hopes to produce 
 from a barbaric dialect viz., that " palatals" are as much modifications 
 of both dentals and labials as of gutturals, and that they are in no instances 
 simple consonants. 
 
 * He, however, elsewhere says " Frequently the pronunciation of the 
 palatals becomes so broad that they seem, and in some cases really are, 
 double consonants." (p. xxxvii.) 
 
 f There is very little doubt that all " sounds," called by Dr. Latham 
 " Unstable Combinations," fall under these. I find similar ' sounds" are 
 called by Professor Miiller " Specific Modifications of Gutturals"
 
 101 
 
 The Oriental q ; probably the elementary form of the aspirated 
 consonant (German guttural ch, Sechwana g 2 of the pre- 
 ceding analysis.} 
 
 But the element which is intended by Dr. Lepsius to be indi- 
 cated by q is that out of which the modern letter is proved to 
 have grown, viz., the Arabic J (kdf), or the Hebrew p (qof) t 
 which, according to that learned writer, "is formed at the posterior 
 part of the soft palate." Besides the two languages above mentioned, 
 it occurs in the tables of the Persian, Hindustani, Turkish, and 
 Malayan, suspended in a doubtful position between his faucales 
 and gutturales ; and is uniformly represented by the same letter, 
 except by Wilson in the Hindustani, and Smith and Robertson 
 in the Arabic, who employ the pointed letter k, and Crawfurd in 
 the Malayan that of k. However, the same letter q is used by 
 Burnouf and Brockhaus in the Zend, and by Rosen in the 
 Georgian, to indicate another element, which is included by Dr. 
 Lepsius under his faucales; so that there is still a good deal of 
 uncertainty attached to its nature.* To a local student of South 
 African tongues it is very difficult to form a correct conception of it. 
 
 It is, therefore, the more necessary that some discussion should 
 be raised on the subject, as similar elements may occur in those 
 tongues which it will otherwise be a troublesome matter to 
 classify. The Oriental articulation in question is thus minutely 
 described by the learned Dr. Gilchrist, in a work on the 
 Hindustani : 
 
 " Q, or our k, articulated by raising the root of the tongue simply towards 
 the throat, which must not be in the smallest degree ruffled, as in forming Jch, 
 
 * Some objection may be urged against the repeated mention in this 
 work of the graphic symbols used by different writers ; but I refer to them 
 upon the ground of the probability that every linguist will have chosen a 
 certain letter, or diacritical modification of it, to indicate what he considered 
 an articulation approximating to that which it was usually intended to 
 indicate. In this respect, the tabular abstracts which I have made from 
 the numerovis tables of Dr. Lepsius cannot but be valuable.
 
 102 
 
 or gk. The q may consequently be styled a deep but liquid linqual letter,* 
 produced by clinking tbe root of the tongue against the throat, so as to 
 cause a sort of nausea. The same sound will be recognised when pouring 
 water in a particular manner from a long-necked guglet, as the liquid 
 decanting may represent the lower part of the tongue acting upon the throat 
 or neck of the vessel in question, unruffled by the water gushing from it." 
 British Indian Monitor, vol. i., p. 12. 
 
 Again : 
 
 "Though q be called a guttural, I would rather name it a linqual letter, 
 because its formation is almost entirely owing to the root of the tongue being 
 raised to the roof of the palate or throat, which last is preserved perfectly 
 unruffled in this operation, whence the real difference between q and the other 
 gutturals already enumerated. Water poured in a particular manner from 
 a long-necked guglet, or the hiccup of a man more than half-seas over, will, 
 I believe, yield a sound very near the q, which, when duly articulated, has 
 the peculiar property of exciting a nausea in the learner. When followed 
 by u, the scholar must never, as in English, change u to w, but call words 
 like qulum (a pen), qazee (a judge), kulum, kazee, never qwulum, qwazee, &c. ; 
 nor qeer (pitch), queer, but keer, or rather qeer, &c., with the lingual q above 
 described alone."f Ibid. p. 20. 
 
 The above quotations only confirm the fact of the universally 
 acknowledged difficulty of giving a reader an adequate con- 
 
 * In taking exception to this term, I may as well state that the root of 
 the tongue is called into operation in the formation of all tbe gutturals, and 
 that there is no good reason for not including this element q among them. 
 
 f The italics are all substituted ; also in the examples throughout the 
 above two quotations. 
 
 Dr. Duff considers that the articulation has been happily described by 
 Dr. Gilchrist in the former. See " Original Papers," by Monier Williams, 
 M.A., p. 79. 
 
 Professor Miiller, I find, makes little reference to it. At p. xxxv. he calls 
 it " a low guttural," and speaks of its " superlative degree of explosiveness" 
 as " a characteristic peculiarity." In his Table, at p. xci , it is called a 
 guttural tenuissima, and indicated by q as a base letter, or by K as a " modi- 
 fication of the second degree." Rather indefinite ! When in Natal, in 
 August, 1861, I examined a Hindoo on the subject of this element. His 
 pronunciation answered to Dr. Gilchrist's description, and confirmed me 
 in the above conclusions. It did not appear to be more explodent in its 
 nature than I or r, and, so far as I was then able to judge, is certainly not 
 a mute. An acquaintance of mine, who spoke Bengali, considered it was 
 " a sort of liquid guttural."
 
 103 
 
 ception of a consonant by mere verbal description ; they will at 
 all events enable us to form a pretty close comparison. 
 
 Dr. Forbes says of it : 
 
 " <_3 bears some resemblance to our c hard, in the words calm, cup ; with 
 this difference, that the is uttered from the lower muscles of the throat." 
 Hindust. Grammar, p. 6. 
 
 I have already given Dr. Gilchrist's description of his digraph 
 kh, alluded to in both of the above quotations, and shown it to 
 be identical to the ch in German lachen, or the Sechwana g of the 
 missionaries (^ of preceding analysis). The learned writer 
 describes the element q as only differing from this kh in the fact 
 that in its enunciation the organs in contact are unruffled, by 
 which may be understood that they undergo no vibration by 
 means of a strong aspiration of the breath. It is evident, from 
 the whole description, that the element intended to be indicated 
 by q, is a leiiis form of the simple explodent k that is, a liquid 
 modification of g, bearing the same relation to this letter as I 
 have proved r and I do to d, and as ch (lachen}, # 2 does to aspirate 
 g viz., g] 
 
 Now, in respect to all that has preceded, it must be borne in 
 mind that I have stated my objections to the terms fricatives or 
 continues merely as generical terms, in contradistinction from 
 explodents on the one hand, and aspirates on the other. My 
 meaning will, I trust, be apprehended, inasmuch as I have at 
 the outset attempted to show that, in respect to the gutturals, the 
 terms fricative and aspirate have been confounded, and to the 
 sibilants, that some of the so-called fricatives are simple " ex- 
 plodents," and the others aspirates. I am not aware of having 
 denied that either word, fricatives or continues, may be used in a 
 specifical sense, or that it may be introduced consistently into a 
 general classification, in contradistinction from the mutes. In 
 fact, the whole of my reasoning goes to prove that this is quite
 
 104 
 
 practical, and that it amounts to a necessity, as the following 
 tableau of the results of my operations thus far will clearly show. 
 While I hold that certain elementary forms of r and Z, and those 
 elements that may be proved to be their analogues, are all simple 
 (tenues) liquids, I admit that all these must also have corres- 
 ponding aspirated forms (" modifications" of the first kind}, and 
 also vocalised forms (" modifications" of the second kind^to both of 
 which the terms fricatives or continues are not only applicable, but 
 have already been applied, unfortunately, by those who, in 
 hastily leaping at a physiological classification and terminology, 
 ignore demonstration of another kind. To borrow the opinion of 
 Dr. J. Miiller, the application of the principles upon which the 
 distinction between mutes and liquids is founded, has been imperfect 
 (Physiology, p. 1045); and so long as men refuse to abide by 
 these principles, it is impossible to arrive at correct results. 
 
 
 Simp. Exp. 
 
 
 Asp. Exp. 
 
 
 fortis. 
 
 lenis. 
 
 fortis. 
 
 lenis. 
 
 GUTTURALS 
 
 (Mutes k 
 
 '"(Liquids ... 
 
 g 
 
 ^ 
 
 e 
 
 
 (Mutes t 
 
 d 
 
 t C 
 
 d' 
 
 LINGUALS . . . 
 
 Liquids... j 
 
 r 
 
 1 
 
 
 r 
 
 It must be evident to the reader of the above tableau, that if I 
 would maintain consistency in this . classification, an element is 
 actually wanting where I have placed the asterisk, that is, a 
 simple liquid " explodent " related to /*, as r and I to r and 
 T respectively ; or to g, as r and I to d. It is difficult to con- 
 ceive of any other position to which to assign the Oriental q in 
 
 * I am aware that, in consequence of q being a superfluous letter in the 
 European alphabets, it has been employed in the Hottentot as well as the 
 Kaffir to indicate one of the clicks ; but as it, or the letter from which it was 
 derived, has for ages indicated a guttural sound, it is not improperly em- 
 ployed in the above classification.
 
 105 
 
 question, for it is evidently not an aspirate consonant. If my 
 conclusions prove correct, and the letter q be retained for this 
 peculiar element, in order to preserve analogy in their graphical 
 representation, we shall have another letter prepared to supply 
 the want of one to represent the g* of my analysis (ch in lachen, 
 Sechwana g) viz., g. 
 
 The foregoing remarks will, no doubt, shed a little light on the 
 following quotation from Mr. Donne's admirable dictionary of the 
 Zulu, and bring the subject of this consonant a little within the 
 range of observation of those whose studies are confined to the 
 South African tongue. 
 
 " G is a guttural, and has, in Zulu Kafir, two sounds. The first is the 
 hard sound e.g., igama, goba, as in English go, gab ; the second is soft 
 e.g., gapa, or a sound between g and k, or between g and r (soft}.* The 
 dialectic differences, however, respecting the gutturals, particularly in 
 Natal, render it extremely difficult, if not impossible, to assign to each 
 sound its proper limit, and hence only one character represents them both. 
 Besides, there is no provision made yet for the proper distinction of sounds 
 in the present state of orthography." Zulu Kafir Dictionary, letter G, p. 90. 
 
 By the aid of all these quotations, I am led to conjecture that 
 the Oriental q, and the soft form of the g of Mr. Dohne, are 
 probably identical consonants ; but to proceed beyond conjecture 
 is impossible, without the aid of more satisfactory data than have 
 been collected. 
 
 It is very probable that the Danish g (y or x' of Lepsius), which 
 I have only heard pronounced by one intelligent Dane, is the 
 same element, inasmuch as it is not an aspirate, but a simple 
 liquid articulation, though considered by Dr. Lepsius as the soft 
 form of ch (in lachen), the g of this arrangement, and called by 
 him Sifortis fricative. This assumption would only make them 
 both lenes, and, judging by the above fragment of a classi- 
 fication suggested by the Sechwana phonology, no fricative (or 
 continuous or liquid) consonant can be hard. 
 
 * The italics are substituted. By the r here must be distinctly under- 
 stood the arbitrary letter introduced by the missionaries to indicate the 
 Kaffir " soft guttural"
 
 106 
 
 The result of the above analysis is, that the Oriental q is 
 probably the simple guttural liquid (tenuis); but Professor 
 Miiller writes (p. xxvi.), " in truth, a guttural liquid is not to be 
 distinguished from a guttural flatus, except in theory." I have, 
 however, proved the lingual aspirated liquids (lingual "flatus") 
 r and Z in Sechwana and Zulu respectively, to have corre- 
 sponding simple lingual liquids in the former language ; and the 
 probability is, that there is elsewhere to be found an analogous 
 guttural form, to which the three elements above alluded to are 
 very close approximations. The above very learned writer, as I 
 have already shown, confounds simple breathings with their 
 guttural modifications, which will account for his opinion just 
 quoted ; but the physiological fact should be borne in mind, that 
 the same disposition of the organs (i.e., partial contact of the 
 dorsum of the tongue with the posterior part of the palate) is re- 
 quired in the enunciation of the pure guttural liquid as in that of its 
 aspirated form, ch in loch, and its vocalised form, the Arabic . 
 
 However unsuccessful the reader may consider me in at- 
 tempting to prove this interesting point, he will no doubt admit 
 that the relations of, or differences between the powers of, the 
 three letters, o Arabic, g Danish, and the soft Zulu g of Dohne, 
 are worthy of further investigation. 
 
 III. CEREBRALES INDICJE (or LEPSIUS.) 
 
 Next in order we find the two series (1) the Cerebrales, said to be 
 peculiar to the Sanskrit ; and (2) the Linguales, pertaining as " exclusively 
 to the Arabic and cognate languages," both of which appear to be frequently 
 confounded, but are considered by Dr. Lepsius to be " entirely different." 
 
 Professor Miiller says " It is true that there is a difference between 
 the Sanskrit ~g and the Arabic J-,. In the former, the tongue is more con- 
 tracted than in the latter, but both are produced by contact between the 
 tongue, more or less contracted, and the palate. Their difference is so 
 slight, that here again an organ which is able to form the Sanskrit lingual 
 is generally unsuccessful in the formation of the Arabic lingual. In 
 Hindustani, therefore, where, owing to the mixture of Arabic and Sanskrit 
 words, both letters occur, no difference is made between the two." Wilson, 
 Indian Terms, p. xvi.
 
 107 
 
 This able writer classes them as first and second modifications of the 
 " dentals" (common linguals) t, d, s, z, <tc. ; and (in his Table, p. xci.) 
 indicates the former (except the sibilant sh and the liquid r) by italicised 
 letters, and the latter by capitals. It is to be questioned, however, whether 
 these " modifications" (excepting the Sanskrit sibilant sh) are intended by 
 him to be analogous to those of the gutturals called palatals, as he would 
 appear to make them in his " Missionary Alphabet" by italicising them. 
 He says elsewhere (p. xxxix) " These linguals vary again in the degree of 
 obtuseness imparted to them in different dialects, a difference which evades 
 graphical representation." 
 
 In the absence of the living pronunciation, I shall, as usual, give the 
 reader an abstract of the various modes of indicating these consonants by the 
 able linguists who have given attention to those tongues, so as to enable 
 him to arrive at an approximately correct conception of their peculiarities. 
 
 The Series of" Indian Cerebrals" in the Orthographical Systems of different 
 Linguists. 
 
 "Standard Alphabet' 
 of Lepsius, used also 
 by him for the Sans 
 Jcrit and Sega 
 
 fort 
 t 
 
 Explosivce. 
 
 is. lenis. nasals 
 
 d n 
 
 FricativcB. 
 fortis. lenis 
 
 Ancipites. 
 r I 
 
 Aspirates, 
 f (t 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 Sanskrit (Orient, gr.)... 
 
 2 
 t 
 
 d n 
 
 ? 
 
 T 35 
 
 t d? 
 
 Wilson 
 
 t, 
 
 d n 
 
 8* 
 
 T 
 
 th dh 
 
 Bengali : 
 
 t 
 
 d n 
 
 sh 
 
 
 th dh 
 
 Zend: 
 (Oriental gr.) 
 
 S 
 
 t 
 
 d 
 
 s % 
 
 
 
 Burnouf 
 
 t 
 
 t 
 
 ch j 
 
 
 
 
 t 
 
 
 s' sh 
 
 
 
 BrocJchaus 
 
 t 
 
 
 sh i 
 
 
 
 Hindustani : 
 Yates 
 
 t, 
 
 d 
 
 sh zh 
 
 
 
 Oikhrist (1796) 
 (1806)* ... 
 Wilson 
 
 
 
 * 
 
 f 
 
 d 
 
 sh zh 
 sh zh 
 sh zh 
 
 f 
 
 r 
 
 
 Malayan : 
 
 I' 
 
 d- 
 
 (s') 
 
 
 
 Javanese : 
 Crawfurd 
 
 f 
 
 d- 
 
 
 
 
 * British Indian Monitor, vol. i.
 
 108 
 
 Other letters are made to take the place of these consonants, under the 
 explodents of the Chinese. 
 
 
 Explosives. 
 
 FricativcR. 
 
 Ancipites. 
 
 AspiratcB. 
 
 "Standard Alphabet" 
 
 fortis. lenis. nasals. 
 
 fortis. lenis. 
 
 
 
 of Lepsius, used also 
 
 
 
 
 
 hy him for the Sans- 
 
 
 
 
 
 krit and Bega 
 
 t d n 
 
 w 
 
 r I 
 
 t' df 
 
 
 
 *. 
 
 
 
 Chinese : 
 
 
 
 
 
 Revs. J. Gough ...") 
 T.McClatchie) 
 
 t(ts) d(d)) 
 
 r z 
 
 
 t (ts) 
 
 Stephen JEndlicher ... 
 
 tc' tc' 
 
 sli sh 
 
 
 tc' 
 
 1. Explosives In the comparative table under this head, there is not 
 sufficient variety in the letters used for these articulations to assist one in 
 his conjectures. The following is Dr. Lepsius's physiological description 
 of their formation : " This class ... is formed by bringing the tip 
 of the tongue backwards, and upwards to the neighbourhood of the palatal 
 point, so as to produce there the explosion or friction.* To our ear, these 
 sounds are nearest to the dentals." Standard Alphabet, p. 44. 
 
 Of the same sounds, Sir John Stoddart says : 
 
 " The reason of applying the term cerebral to any of these letters, I never 
 could discover; nor does Dr. Lee's remark render it to me more intelligible- 
 He says of the Hebrew teth, ' it should be pronounced with the tip of the 
 tongue against the roof of the mouth, just as our own t is, and hence it may 
 be termed cerebral.' To the English ear, the sounds expressed by the two 
 Sanskrit series appear scarcely, if at all, distinguishable; but, to the native 
 ear, they are perceptibly different. According to some persons, this arises 
 from a slight lingual vibration in the (so-called) cerebral series, somewhat 
 approaching to the Mexican tl.\ It is said, however, that the native writers 
 employ the characters of this, but not of the other series,] to express the 
 t or d in English proper names." Glossology, p. 133. 
 
 According to Dr. Gilchrist, one of the most able authorities quoted, the 
 above articulations, which he indicated in 1796 by 1, d, and in 1806 by t, d, 
 
 * This description, as well as Dr. Gilchrist's, in the sequel, does not differ 
 from that of the formation of the cerebral click in Hottentot, by Mr. Tindall, 
 p. 12 of his Grammar, before referred to. 
 
 f As will be observed in the sequel, this sound is frequent in the Sechwana.. 
 
 I There appears to be confusion in this quotation i.e., the Hebrew 
 teth to, according to scholars, is equivalent to the Arabic lingual Jb (not the 
 Sanskrit cerebral) ; so it is not certain to which series the remarks are 
 intended to apply.
 
 109 
 
 are " formed by conveying the tongue forcibly against the roof of the mouth, 
 while articulating the common dentals t and d of our own alphabet, in 
 tub, duck, &c., which, he continues, are however softer than they. Elsewhere 
 he says " d, t, r, require that organ [the tongue] to be curved backwards, 
 and then struck against the roof of the mouth, as in dull, tub, rub," and 
 then further describes them as " a great deal harsher than our English 
 d, t, r." 
 
 Professor Miiller indicates them by I and d (always italicised), and 
 classes them as first modifications of the common European linguals, t, d. 
 The same with their aspirate forms. 
 
 Both Dr. Duff and Dr. Forbes concur with Dr. Gilchrist in his 
 description of these elements in Hindustani, excepting that the latter speaks 
 of the tongue being only well turned up towards the roof of the mouth in 
 their articulation. They also indicate them by t and d. All state that 
 they approximate more closely to the European linguals than do the Arabic 
 elements. According to the former linguist, the Sanskrit t and d are of far 
 less (ten times) frequent occurrence in Hindustani than the Arabic linguals 
 t, d. According to the latter, Sanskrit d is very much akin to Sanskrit r 
 (r of Duff) 5 " in the Davanagari, the same letter serves for both, and the 
 same applies to their aspirated forms," dh and rh, 
 
 Notwithstanding the above attempts of able linguists to explain the 
 nature of these two members of this so-called series of consonants, it is a 
 difficult matter to conceive of even an approximation to their " sounds." 
 I have already alluded, under the head of vocalisation, to the nature of 
 the articulation produced by an attempt to vocalise the mute consonants 
 viz., that the explosion of the element in each case is strengthened, and 
 a hiatus is caused between it and the following vowel. Some analogous 
 articulation has also been referred to as occurring in the Hottentot language. 
 In the absence of the living pronunciation, it is not easy to explain those 
 in question otherwise. Were they only described as faucal utterances, it 
 might be possible to explain them as modifications of lingual consonants, 
 or combinations of these with liquids; but the subject is rendered more 
 intricate by the addition of a nasal to the series viz., n, in the Sanskrit, 
 Sega,* and Bengali. 
 
 As the late Professor Wilson is one of the authorities quoted in the table, 
 the following remark from Sir John Stoddart, on the letter n, will enable 
 the reader to make an effort at hair-splitting in English phonology, based 
 upon the Sanskrit distinctions : In the latter (' proper n'), indeed, Pro- 
 fessor Hayman Wilson makes three distinctions (besides the other which 
 he galls guttural) viz., & palatal in singe, a cerebral in none, and a dental in 
 content ; but I must own that I see no ground for these distinctions in the 
 
 * An African language.
 
 110 
 
 proper pronunciation of the English language."* Glossology, p. 142. ( See 
 Professor Wilsons " Sanscrit Gram.," p. 5, cited in that work.} 
 
 Professor Wilson (cited by Miiller) has four modifications of the 
 common n e.g., 
 
 Sanskrit Lingual. (Tamil). Guttural. Palatal, 
 
 n n n n 
 
 I have already shown that the third, viz., n (= $ is decidedly a simple 
 consonant, as much as m or n ; and the fourth a compound articulation, as 
 much as my or y-y would be. To call either of them a modification of the 
 common n is only a graphical fallacy, arising from the assumption that the 
 sound of a nasal depends on the nature of the consonant which follows it. 
 It is strange that, though the Hindustani linguals t and d are borrowed 
 from the Sanskrit, the corresponding Sanskrit lingual nasal (so-called) did 
 not accompany it. As it is, phonically, only one, i.e., the common n is used 
 in Hindustani. The probability is that, as a phonic element, it has no 
 existence separate from that of the common n, as it is said to occur only in 
 the Sanskrit (and Bengali) ; and the former is a dead language, which, 
 according to Professor Monier Williams, "was never spoken, and 
 never intended to be spoken in the way it is at present written" (p. 262). 
 
 It may perhaps assist the reader in forming his own conclusions, if I add 
 that, besides the n's preceding a guttural, " dental," and labial, respectively, 
 and the " French nasal" in bon, all of which have already been considered, 
 Dr. Gilclirist gives, in his work on the Hindustani, frequently quoted 
 above, the following remarks on two additional forms of the letter: 
 
 " n") The first is peculiar to the Hindoos ; the second to the Arabs ; still 
 n)both are pronounced like the common n in run, nurse." Brit. Ind. 
 Mon., p. 47. 
 
 2. Fricative. Under this head (in above table), there is more material for 
 conjecture, assuming the comparative tables of Dr. Lepsius to be correct. 
 
 It is remarkable ih&tjive English linguists, and one German, have repre- 
 sented the fortis (s of Lepsius) by the digraph sh; one French writer by 
 ch, which in his language is well known to coincide with the above English 
 sound; Bopp by s, which, judging by the remarks at p. 34, Stand. Alph., 
 is intended by him to indicate a sound equivalent to " the English sh, the 
 
 * Trusting that the reader will not suspect me of presuming to " abrogate " 
 English orthography, I venture the following remark : 
 
 The n's in the three words here instanced would, upon the principles of 
 his work, be written as follows singe, none, content. In the first example, 
 the "palatal" element is not n, but a portion of the combination of sounds 
 following it, which is improperly indicated by g. The is only vocalised, 
 as is also the second n in none ; both upon principles to be examined in 
 the sequel.
 
 Ill 
 
 French oh, German sch ;" only one writer, Crawford, gives it a new letter 
 viz., '. In all the tables of the languages, except the Sanskrit and the 
 Bengali (the only two in which the so-called lingual n is said to occur), 
 these two fricative elements are confronted by Dr. Lepsius's exponents 
 * and z, not s and z ; so that it must be concluded the is also confined to 
 those two languages. It is therefore strange that, while the explodent forms 
 are represented as occurring in so many languages, only the Sanskrit should 
 contain an example of the fricative equivalent s (Lepsius). 
 
 Professor Miiller calls the fortes s a lingual flatus, and says it " is a 
 sound peculiar to the Sanskrit, and, owing to its hollow guttural pro- 
 nunciation, it may be expressed there, as it has been hitherto, by s, followed 
 by the guttural k (sh)." P. Ixxi. 
 
 Dr. Duff says of it, in Hindustani " it is pronounced in the same way 
 as sh ; and is so marked (sh) because it has a distinct letter in the Sanskrit." 
 " Original Papers," by Monier Williams, p. 84. 
 
 Dr. Lepsius himself, by placing * in the series in the Bega and Zend, 
 would seem to indicate that it indicates the same sound ; but the following 
 is his description of the difference : 
 
 "When the tongue recedes still further [than in the articulation of **], 
 so that behind the upper and lower teeth a greater hollow space remains, 
 this enlarged resounding space produces the sound s. . . . . The 
 Indian cerebral |, however, receives, from the peculiar flexion of the tongue, 
 which produces a double cavity in the mouth, a somewhat different ex- 
 pression, indicated by the cerebral point." 
 
 As to the lenis form, the fact of three English writers representing it by 
 zh, and one French writer by j, leads to the supposition that the intended 
 element approximates to z of Lepsius (zh, or s in vision). 
 
 So it is really in the Sanskrit and Bengali that the fricative s and z 
 belong to the series of sounds confronting them under the head of explosives. 
 Judging by the examples of the explodents in Chinese, to which the common 
 '' palatals" sh and zh, s and z , are apparently allied, the probability is that 
 s and 2 also will rather be included among the " palatals," otherwise called 
 the " unstable combinations" of Dr. Latham. 
 
 3. In respect to the letters under the head of ancipites and aspirate, I 
 shall merely, for the information of the reader, add the following remarks, 
 culled from Dr. Gilchrist's able work : 
 
 (a) " The letters r, rh, are rather nominal deviations from d, dh, than 
 formal characters." B. I. Mon., p. 23. 
 
 (&) " r, I, letters peculiar to the Hindoos in form, but exactly of the 
 same power as r and I" Ibid. p. 47. 
 
 Professor Miiller says " The liquid is the lingual r, produced by a 
 vibration of the curled tongue in which the Italians and Scotch excel, and 
 
 * Interpolated.
 
 112 
 
 whiclj we find it difficult to imitate," p. xl. The same occurs in Welsh, 
 and is that I have attempted to show is the vocalised form, or second 
 modification of the unmodified liquid r in Sechwana morimo. 
 
 In the foregoing observations on the " Indian Cerebrals," it must be 
 evident to the reader that it is only with regard to those under the head of 
 explosive that any real difficulty is presented, which would lead one to doubt 
 whether they are merely simple modifications of t. At all events, no one 
 will deny that it is absolutely requisite that sounds should be resolved into 
 their elements before they can admit of classification. 
 
 IV. LINGUALES ARABICS (OF LEPSIUS). 
 
 The following table shows in a compendious form the different modes in 
 which the members of this series have been, indicated. 
 
 Tlie series of " Arabic Linguah" in the Orthographical Systems of different 
 Linguists. 
 
 " Stand. Alph." of Lepsius ... 
 
 Expl 
 
 fortis. 
 t 
 
 osivce. 
 
 lenis. 
 
 d 
 
 Fricativce. 
 
 fortis. lenis. 
 s z 
 
 Aspirates. 
 fortis. 
 
 
 & 
 
 ]e 
 
 t 
 
 t 
 
 Z 
 
 t 
 
 t 
 
 tw 
 
 t 
 
 (t) 
 
 t 
 t 
 
 &> 
 d 
 
 X 
 
 b 
 d 
 
 * 
 thw 
 ?. 
 
 (11) 
 z 
 dv 
 
 37 
 ye 
 
 s 
 
 s 
 
 8 
 
 sw 
 
 * 
 CO 
 
 ? 
 
 z' 
 
 
 
 * 
 
 z 
 
 z 
 th 
 z 
 
 V) 
 
 z 
 
 z 1 
 
 3 
 
 z 
 
 Arabic 
 
 Smith and Robinson 
 Persian : 
 M M Ibrahim 
 
 
 
 Hindustani : 
 Yates 
 
 Oilchrist 1796 
 
 Wilson 
 
 Malayan : 
 
 Turkish : 
 
 Galla (African) : 
 JutscheJt.... 
 
 Other letters are made to take the place of these consonants, under the 
 explodent of the 
 
 Chinese : 
 
 
 
 
 Revs. J. Gough ^ 
 T.McClatchie ...) 
 
 t(ti) d(dz) 
 f 
 
 
 t (is) 
 
 Stephen EndlioJier 
 
 ts ts 
 
 
 ts 
 
 
 

 
 113 
 
 In the above table, the examples which would lead men to suppose that 
 they are a series of compound sounds, is that they are represented as such 
 by Gilchrist in four members, by Crawfurd in one, and by Jutschek 
 in one. 
 
 Dr. Gilchrist elsewhere* remarks of the explodent forms "The Oriental 
 t, d, [are] formed with a slight protrusion of the tongue between the teeth. 
 Tub, duck, do ; tube, duke, dew, due, will convey a tolerable idea of the 
 difference between palatials [Indian cerebrals already noticed] and dentals 
 [Arabic linguals] f in the Eastern tongues, the t d of the four last even with 
 us being much softer than in the three first ; for, in fact, some people seem 
 to soften the liquified d and t with us so far as to say tshube,jooJe,jew for 
 due, &c. The lisp of children and others will convey a tolerable notion 
 of the very soft dentals d t in question, as essential sounds in the Oriental 
 tongues, &c." 
 
 Again, he writes} " The soft d, t, r [Arabic linguals], cannot be softener! 
 too much, and the harsh d, t, r, can hardly appear enough so, till their 
 opposite natures be sufficiently understood from practice." 
 
 Dr. Duff (Papers by Monier Williams, p. 80) writes " It resembles, says 
 Dr. Carey, the Yorkshire pronunciation of t in butter^ It also resembles 
 as nearly as possible the soft French dental t in tu." Of the d, " it is 
 formed with the point of the tongue pressed on the roots of the upper teeth, 
 nearly as in duke, due; or still more nearly as the French dental d in des." 
 
 Dr. Forbes, also, in the Hindustani, describes the pronunciation of 
 the fortis thus : " Softer and more dental than that of the English t, it 
 corresponds with the t of the Gaelic dialects, or that of the Italian in the 
 word sotto." Of the lenis d his description is literally the same. 
 
 Professor Max Muller considers these elements as modifications of 
 the second degree of the common linguals t, d, s, z, and represents them 
 thus 
 
 Tenuissima. Flatus Diacrit. Flatus Aspirate. Tenuissima Atsil. 
 T, Z; Z(fr), T. 
 
 From the above descriptions, it seems but reasonable to conclude that 
 the sounds in this series, if not consonantal diphthongs, can only be 
 regarded as those combinations of simple elements which Dr. Latham 
 would call " unstable," and which, under the provisional denomination 
 " palatal," I propose to reserve for the third part of this work. 
 
 * British Indian Monitor, vol. i., p. 10. 
 | Parts in brackets are interpolated. 
 
 * British Indian Monitor, vol. i., p. 17. 
 
 This is not unlike but-ther. See Chap. V. 
 
 I
 
 114 
 
 In respect to both the Indian cerebrals and Arabic linguals, 
 and I may add the Namdn dicks, it is very difficult for any 
 European, without hearing the sounds thus indicated, by means 
 of numerous orthographic expedients, to decide whether they are 
 consonantal diphthongs* (mutce cvm liquidis), vocalised con- 
 sonants, or elements combined with the pure " palatals ;" but 
 there is nothing in the foregoing analysis to warrant the con- 
 clusion that any of them is a simple consonant. 
 
 In studying these peculiar consonants, it ought not to be for- 
 gotten that they belong to graphic systems which possess " such 
 a superabundance of characters that one sound has often three 
 letters," and in which the forms of the letters are " not less liable 
 to change" than the "powers of the letters are very absurdly 
 ever varying" in the European systems. In the words of 
 Professor Monier Williams, "what creates the difficulty [in 
 reading them] is, that every letter has four separate forms, 
 according as it is initial, medial, final, or detached; and that 
 groups of three, four, five, or even six letters are shaped exactly 
 alike, being only distinguishable from each other by the number 
 and position of their dots."f In comparing the opinions of the 
 learned on the distinctive natures of such letters, it is difficult 
 to discriminate between those of men, on the one hand, who 
 have studied a language critically that is, who have had 
 to do with its literature very much in the same way as 
 we, spite of the absence of the living pronunciation, manage to 
 command a knowledge of Greek and Latin ; and those, on the 
 other hand, who have acquired it practically, by "condescending 
 to learn the vulgar tongue," as spoken by the bulk of the people. 
 As an instance of the confusion arising from a superfluity of 
 letters being worse confounded by the contrary opinions of 
 learned linguists, I give the following : 
 
 * See Chap. III. on Compound Consonants. 
 + " Original Papers," p. 260.
 
 115 
 
 An interesting icriter, in a late journal 
 of literature *commentiny unfavour- 
 ably on a system of " romanising" 
 suggested by Professor Monier 
 Williams, writes 
 " He would only give one h for the 
 
 Hindustani two ; 
 
 Remarks. 
 
 " Only two t's for the Hindustani 
 three ; 
 
 One z for four z's in Hindustani 
 
 " Only two s's (viz., * and sh) for 
 the Hindustani three, and similarly 
 in other letters "* 
 
 As to the " two h's" I have already 
 given a quotation from the learned 
 Orientalist, Dr. Gilehrist, to the 
 effect that they are identical ele- 
 ments in Hindustani. 
 
 As to the " three t's," the preceding 
 analysis will show how far linguists 
 are at present justified in regarding 
 them as simple consonants, and, till 
 resolved into their elements, it is 
 impossible to distinguish them by 
 any uniform orthographic expedients. 
 These, viz , z, z, z_, which Dr. 
 Gilchrist gives, besides zh, he pro- 
 nounces " merely formal varieties of 
 the self-same sound." 
 
 These, viz , s and which Dr. 
 Gilchrist gives besides sh, he pro- 
 nounces " varieties of simple sounds 
 by different letters."! 
 Such glaring differences of opinion are of course to be attri- 
 buted to difference in the modes of acquiring Oriental tongues. 
 Indeed, unanimity cannot be expected to exist between the 
 closet student and the colloquial learner. In the case of the one, 
 the language is presented in written characters to the eye ; of 
 the other, in spoken sounds to the ear. Both modes of research 
 may be united, but how seldom is this convenient to men bent 
 on some third occupation. 
 
 Sources of Confusion, and the main Obstacles to Uniformity. 
 (a) The nature of the confusion which exists will be more 
 clearly illustrated by an examination of three series of letters in 
 the Hindustani alphabet. 
 
 * Evangelical Christendom, vol. i., p. 242. 
 f See British Indian Monitor, p. 47. 
 
 12
 
 116 
 
 (1) The Sanskrit has a set of peculiar linguals (Linguales 
 Indicce of Lepsius.) 
 
 (2) The Arabic has also a set of peculiar linguals (Linguales 
 ArabicfB of Lepsius). 
 
 (3) Each of these languages, again, has a set corresponding 
 with the common European linguals, t, d, &c. 
 
 (4) Now the Graphic /System of the Hindustani is a composition 
 of the alphabets of both of these languages ; i.e. } every consonant in 
 either of them is represented graphically (that is, however, not to 
 say phonetically} by a corresponding new letter in Hindustani. 
 
 (5) But, phonically, the peculiar Sanskrit linguals are said by 
 linguists to approximate to the common European linguals. 
 
 (6) Moreover, phonically, the peculiar Arabic linguals are 
 said to be actually used by the natives of Hindustan to represent 
 t;he common European linguals. 
 
 (7) Therefore, phonetically, the Hindustani alphabet must be 
 deficient in some consonants, viz., some of the European linguals; 
 and is, after all, rather a sort of artificial or hybrid orthography 
 maintained out of traditional respect or veneration for those 
 more ancient ones of which it is composed. 
 
 (8) It seems to be the vain object of modern linguists to pre- 
 serve these merely graphical distinctions in any scheme for a 
 phonetic alphabet. 
 
 I append the following example among those alluded to : 
 
 /Lepsius ... t d 
 
 4SBy ***- T ? 
 
 *r&..^} ?.<-> ; 
 
 fits peculiar ) , 
 linguals..) 
 ARABIC i 
 
 s z 
 Z T 
 
 s z (we) 
 \i 
 
 u 
 
 Its common | ^ 
 ( linguals..) 
 
 quiva en j- JTJ W ^ M J S ^ j 
 
 LT J 
 
 S 2
 
 117 
 
 Now, according to the descriptions of most linguists the 
 phonical equivalents are 
 
 Of the former t d s z 
 
 (peculiar) (common Europ.) 
 
 Of the latter t d s z 
 
 (common Europ.) (common Europ.) 
 
 So that the only strange elements are really t and d of the 
 former ; and it is very probable that such an examination of the 
 Sanscrit linguals would have nearly a similar result. Thus, to 
 a legitimate number of phonetical equivalents are added hosts 
 of superfluous graphical equivalents, which must necessarily 
 suggest divergent articulations, and tend to mislead. 
 
 The above is a suitable example to show the degree to which 
 the subject has already been complicated by trying to maintain 
 a scrupulous respect for Oriental classifications. It is out of 
 such a jungle of graphical materials that it is necessary for the 
 linguist to extricate himself before he can fall into the plain 
 paths converging to a uniform phonetic alphabet. 
 
 (6) This very important error, which made the Hindustani 
 alphabet a mere graphical hodge-podge rather than a phonetic 
 model, must forsooth be followed up by European linguists in 
 the application of one graphic system (the Roman) to two dif- 
 ferent processes of transcription and transliteration. 
 
 By transcription must be understood the employment of certain 
 letters to represent certain articulations and sounds; by trans- 
 literation that of certain letters (e.g., Roman) to represent certain 
 other letters (Oriental or Hieroglyphic). 
 
 The one process, which is that of the principle of a phonetic 
 alphabet, would indicate 
 
 A simple articulation or sound by a simple letter. 
 
 A compound do. by a confound letter. 
 
 A modification of either by a modificatire mark.
 
 118 
 
 The other process, however, is proposed to represent 
 
 " Every [Oriental or other] double letter, though in") , & ^^ letter> 
 
 pronunciation it may be simple > 
 
 E.g., that anything like the English word though, pronounced tho, be 
 transliterated to the same number of letters. 
 
 "A single letter [Oriental or other], although its ) , ft . fo letter." 
 
 pronunciation be that of a double letter > 
 
 E.g., that the Sanskrit 13| = ch in church, consequently a compound 
 articulation, should be represented by k' (Lepsius), or 4 by Jc (italicised, of 
 Miiller) ; or, that the Armenian e and o, which are pronounced ye and we, 
 be written e and o. 
 
 The difficulty which has no doubt given rise to this new 
 process is thus carefully described by Professor Lepsius : 
 
 It " is greatest in those systems of writing, which originating in an 
 earlier period of the language, and fully developed, have been retained 
 unaltered, whilst the pronunciation has undergone a change, as also in 
 those in which several reformations have left their traces. An instance of 
 this kind has already been mentioned in speaking of the Sanscrit palatals. 
 The differences of European orthography have mostly arisen from similar 
 circumstances. Some such difficulties, however, are presented by almost 
 all existing alphabets which are not of modern formation. As the object 
 of a standard transcription is to avoid as much as possible all such incon- 
 gruity of sound and sign, no other course remains open in such cases than 
 to fix upon a distinct period of the language in question, and to adapt its 
 transcriptions to the different purposes of rendering either the actual pro- 
 nunciation, or the ancient one which had been expressed by the alphabet, 
 and which may be deduced from it by linguistic researches." Standard 
 Alphabet, p. 53. 
 
 This able linguist chooses the latter alternative, in the words 
 which I have confronted with those of the late Baron de Bunsen 
 on the title-page of this treatise, viz., that " the linguistic 
 scholars will prefer to follow the written system fixed by litera- 
 ture, and to neglect the varying deviations and shades of modern 
 pronunciation." It must, however, be apparent to my intelli- 
 gent readers, that for Professor Lepsius to ignore the actual 
 pronunciation is tantamount to a denial that phonetic philology 
 is "a branch of inductive science" standing "on precisely the 
 same footing as geology, and those other sciences which are
 
 119 
 
 ' connected by this bond, that they endeavour to ascend to a 
 past state of things by the aid of the evidence of the present.'"* 
 
 Professor Miiller, in defence of this process, recently suggested 
 by him, remarks : 
 
 "If we attempted to represent the sounds in transcribing literary lan- 
 guages, we should be unable to tell how, in the original, sounds admitting 
 of several graphic representations were represented. In written languages, 
 therefore, we must rest satisfied with transliterating letters, and not attempt 
 to transcribe sounds." 
 
 Again, in other words : 
 
 "If, instead of imitating the letters, we attempted to represent their 
 proper pronunciation at a certain period of history, how should it -be 
 known, for instance, in transcribing the French of the nineteenth century, 
 whether ' su' stood for ' sou,' halfpenny, or ' sous,' under, or ' soul,' tipsy."f 
 
 Now, it cannot be denied that " in historical languages the 
 system of orthography is too important a point to be lost ;" but 
 it seems very natural to expect that by mere transliterations, 
 such as that suggested, it is most likely to be lost. And, just as 
 much as " it is a mistake to imagine that in living languages all 
 etymological understanding would be lost if phonetic reforms 
 were introduced,''^ so it would be equally a mistake to suppose 
 that in archaic literatures all etymological understanding would 
 bo lost if the historical orthography were maintained. A refer- 
 ence to the Greek classics will bear me out in this assertion ; for 
 in spite of our ignorance of the genuine pronunciations, the ety- 
 mology of this extraordinary language is to this day a rich field 
 of research, and will be rendered still more interesting in the light 
 shed on its structure by vernacular forms of speech. Professor 
 Lepsius tells us that " the Armenian alphabet has also undergone 
 peculiar alterations of pronunciation, which may be historically 
 proved ;" and also speaks of the ancient pronunciation of a tongue 
 being deduced from the actual one by linguistic researches. In 
 
 * Dr. Donaldson, Ency. Brit., vol. xvii., p. 53'.), citing Whewell. 
 f Troposals, &c., p. Ixxxix. 
 1 Ibid.
 
 120 
 
 a similar manner, the difference between Professor Miiller's 
 examples, su of the present, and sou, sous, and soul respectively 
 of the past, could be arrived at by comparing French works of 
 the nineteenth century with past historical records of the lan- 
 guage. According to this learned philologer himself, historical 
 or antiquated alphabets are objects of archasological research ; 
 and I think that under this specification ought to come all 
 Oriental alphabets, most of which have already been reduced to 
 " romanized" forms. Vernacular alphabets, on the other hand, 
 no one will venture to deny, are, elementarily, objects of phonical 
 research. Transliterations may be all very well in the one 
 branch of inquiry, but transcription is certainly the process 
 which is indispensable to the record of phonetical data ; therefore 
 the two methods ought to be kept separate. The one scholar 
 ought to persist in Avriting the Greek eyyve as the Greeks wrote 
 it the other, if he adopt the Roman alphabet, to write it 
 according to the ear, engus or epgus, or to any preconcerted 
 standard of letters ; but neither of them is justified in trans- 
 literating it to arbitrary Roman characters (thus, eggus), in 
 which word the two gutturals are universally agreed to have 
 distinct phonical powers. 
 
 The two modes of recording the symbols of speech can be 
 pursued separately, the one rather aiding than detracting from 
 the other. In the one case, the philologer merely places and 
 transposes the dusty specimens of a valuable cabinet, and con- 
 tents himself with noting the chronological relations of materials 
 collected and successively shifted by his predecessors; in the 
 other case he plods, and observes, and notes as he treads the 
 situs of all that his attention is bent upon, while his mind con- 
 ceives and generalizes, and thus builds up a fabric of positive 
 science, which in its turn becomes a subjective means of fresh 
 and more important acquisitions. 
 
 In presuming to write in this strain, I have been actuated
 
 121 
 
 merely by a desire to unveil to those versed in historical philo- 
 logy the difficulties which have occurred to myself at the 
 threshold of vernacular studies, in endeavouring to overcome 
 this troublesome subject, and certainly not by any meddlesome 
 inclination to question the mature opinions of men supposed to 
 know better. 
 
 I trust that what has preceded in this humble treatise will 
 show the reasonableness of my opinions, viz. (1) That if Dr. 
 Lepsius only aims at a standard historical alphabet, his maxim 
 holds good, and he remains consistent; but, if his aim is a 
 standard phonetic alphabet, he must abandon to the archaeologist 
 the second-hand materials of historical orthography, to consult 
 him only occasionally and supplementally, and rather look to 
 the situs of all living human speech for the only valid materials 
 of inductive phonology ; and (2) That the compromise suggested 
 by Professor Miiller, between the different modes of recording 
 historical and phonetical data, would only be another name for 
 " confusion worse confounded." 
 
 V. DENTALES (OF LEPSITJS). 
 
 It is under this series of Dr. Lepsius's classification that we 
 first meet with a few instances of simple consonants foreign to 
 the Sechwana, and in disposing of which, especially, I shall have 
 to alternate with a little speculation, the treatment of those 
 instances found in the language to admit of classification; as I 
 have already done with regard to the element q, under the head 
 of the gutturals. 
 
 Inquiry into the Nature of the Letters s and z, th (in thin) and 
 th (in thine) ; and the probable Existence of their Elementary 
 Forms. 
 I have elsewhere implied that the consonants I and r, which 
 
 are common in the Sechwana, form only part of a more complete
 
 122 
 
 set of lenes elements, the remainder of which do not exist in the 
 language ; and the probability that the element s,* in the 
 English words parts, parks, harps, and the elementary form 
 of zAf in the word thin, which has frequently been indicated by 
 the letter 6, upon the supposition that it represented the same 
 consonant in the ancient Greek, both belong to it. It is, how- 
 ever, necessary for us to arrive at a conclusion on this head 
 more satisfactory than such mere conjectures. I am fully 
 aware that this would in any case involve a further conclusion, 
 as in the case of g and k, that had the said elements s and th 
 occurred in the language as initials of verbs, they would have 
 been commuted into t ; that, moreover, like r and I, they would 
 be expected to have their aspirated and vocalised forms. ' 
 
 The consonant s, as before remarked, seems to be little under- 
 stood. The letter is chiefly employed in English to represent 
 two different consonants, as in this and these. It is by some 
 writers regarded as not admitting of classification, and of a 
 peculiar nature ; therefore not included under either the liquids^ 
 or the mutes. Its affinity to r seems to be often admitted. Of 
 the Latin language, Zumpt writes 
 
 " S, like the Greek a, was pronounced more sharply than with us 
 
 " In the ancient pronunciation, there must have been a peculiar re- 
 semblance between the letters * and r; since it is mentioned by Varro 
 
 * That is, as a simple consonant, independently of any prepositive 
 element. It abounds in the language in composition with the letter t, as 
 in mocwetsana (a fountain), morwetsana (a damsel). 
 
 f For the purposes of this section, I shall in the text indicate th in thin 
 by th 2 , assuming it to be in most cases in English an aspirated liquid (con- 
 tinua) ; the other, in thine, by th 3 . 
 
 I Unless it be shown that this and the term continues are intended by 
 them to be descriptive of the same instances. 
 
 It is remarkable that Dr. Latham places under his aspirate mutes all 
 those sounds called by Dr. Lepsius fricative or continuous, except s and a, 
 which he includes among the lene mutes ; but upon what principle it would 
 be difficult to say. Much more difficult would it be to account for his 
 placing any continuous sounds under the mutes, unless by the latter term 
 he means " explodents," in the sense in which I use it throughout this work.
 
 123 
 
 (De Ling. Lat. vii. 6), and others, that formerly that is, before the Latin 
 language had assumed a fixed form through its literature s was pronounced 
 in many words for which afterwards r was substituted, as in Papisius, 
 Valeslus, lases, eso, &c." Latin Gram, by Dr. Schiidtz, p. 6. 
 
 It is not improbable that also in the Sechwana barimo, and 
 the Suahili wasimo, dialectical variations of the same expression, 
 the letters r and s indicate only analogous elements.* 
 
 There is every reason to suppose that tJi (0) is related to ,f as I 
 is to r. In one respect, there is a remarkable analogy between the 
 two couples. What is often considered the natural infirmity, or 
 disability of pronouncing I instead of the r, called in Greek 
 rpuuXio-juoe, and in Latin balbuties, is precisely analogous to the 
 substitution of the articulation th for s in the words " mith for 
 miss, thpell for spell, and the like," by those who are said to lisp, 
 and which was called sonus blaesus among the Romans. There 
 can be but little. dispute as to s and th belonging to the lingual 
 series ; for though they may be both continuous and fricative, 
 or semivocal, in some of their modifications, like I and r, they 
 are, like these elements, essentially formed by a contact^ of two 
 organs, though not a complete stoppage of the breathing, there- 
 fore as much as any consonants explosive. 
 
 But the main difficulty appears to be in establishing their 
 quantity under the " explodents." Where, but under the lenes 
 forms of these linguals, can the two elements in question be 
 
 * In mozimo (-nto-rimo), the singular form of this word found among the 
 seaboard tribes of Sofala, the letter z indicates perhaps only a vocalised 
 modification of the Sechwana element. 
 
 f Dr. J. Miiller calls the English th a modification of s (p. 1049). 
 
 A writer in " Chambers's Cyclopaedia" (1860), under " Alphabet," says: 
 " The sound of th is very nearly allied to that of s (witness ' loves or loveth') ; 
 also the pronunciation of a person who lith^th," p 169. He suggests that 
 for each pair Z and r, s and th, one letter would suffice. And I may add, 
 that th 3 is similarly related to z. Sir John Stoddart (p. 134, Glossology) 
 writes " these two sounds, th 2 and th 3 , approximate less nearly to t and 
 d than to a and z." 
 
 \ For the elementary forms of these consonants I shall, for the purposes 
 of this section, employ the letters th 1 and s 1 .
 
 124 
 
 placed? They differ physiologically in no respect whatever 
 from I and r, except the fact that the contact of the tongue, in 
 place of with the palate, is with the teeth ; and that while the 
 former may be called, organically, palatal linguals, the latter 
 are dental linguals. Moreover, admitting that they are liquids, 
 and, what may be inferred from all that precedes, that all liquids 
 are lenes, their quantity is explained. It is only by this train 
 of analogical reasoning that I can arrive at their classification as 
 kindred forms of r and I, and therefore as lenes. In the event 
 of its appearing unsatisfactory to the reader, I shall at any rate 
 venture to assume it ; for it is not till I come to treat of certain 
 combinations of simple consonants that the assumption will be 
 found to bear the test of anything like a legitimate proof. 
 
 The set of lenes simple " explodent"-linguals thus amounts to 
 five viz., l t r, d, s 1 , and th 1 . I have shown that I and r have 
 their corresponding aspirate forms ; the same must consequently 
 apply to s 1 and th 1 . It is easy to form a theoretical conception 
 of the aspirate forms of r and I, even had no objectively true 
 instances of these occurred, by simply supposing a forcible " aug- 
 mentation of the breathing" in every case, which is well indicated 
 to the eye by the spiritus asper, e.g., r,"l; but the difficulty is 
 to conceive of aspirate forms of s 1 and th 1 ;* and why? Simply 
 because of the absence of a preconceived notion of these elements, 
 in their simple " explodenf forms. This difficulty will remain so 
 long as the fact is lost sight of that all consonants are essentially 
 " explodent ;" that s 1 and th 1 , though liquid consonants, and may 
 be either aspirated or vocalised, are both completely formed 
 by a mere contact of organs, and, as I have shown, with 
 regard to I and r, to say that they are either continuous or sibilant, 
 or lisping, is to say that they are aspirated ; to say that they are 
 semivocal, ought to mean that they are vocalised. It would not 
 
 * Latham denominates the two English forms of th " so-called aspirates," 
 and elsewhere classifies them as " aspirate mutes."
 
 125 
 
 be going too far to say that, in English speech, just as the con- 
 ventional notions of the simple forms of I and r, which are so 
 prevalent in it, exclude any notion of the rough forms of these 
 elements found in other languages ;* so the rough forms of s 1 
 and th l (viz., s 2 and tfi\ usually called sibilants and lisping-dentals 
 respectively, and by others continues or fricatives, equally prevalent 
 in it, seem to preclude the formation of correct notions of their 
 simple liquid-" e&plodent" forms. It would be difficult, and almost 
 impossible, on the mere spur of this suggestion, for myself or 
 any one to distinguish cases in English phonology of the occur- 
 rence of either of these elements s or th in both their simple and 
 continuous (or aspirate) forms. But, in the Sechwana language, 
 I have been able to ascertain beyond a doubt that, in the com- 
 pound examples, mocwetSana (a spring of water), and natSane 
 
 * I have since met with the following remarks of the Rev. Kichard 
 Garnett: " An Englishman or German is apt to take a limited view of the 
 subject, because he only allows of one power of the letter I, and naturally 
 supposes that the same is the case in all other languages." Philological 
 Essays, p. 249. (See context.) Again " The same remark is equally 
 applicable to the other liquids, especially to r. A native of our Southern 
 counties, accustomed to enunciate this element with a delicate, sometimes 
 scarcely perceptible vibration, naturally thinks his pronunciation the 
 standard and only genuine one, and regards every marked deviation from 
 it aa a defect in utterance or a provincial peculiarity." Ibid. p. 254. 
 Again " In Welsh, the common soft r is unknown as a primary initial of 
 words, the aspirate form rh being invariably considered as the primitive." 
 Ibid. p. 255. Now, this articulation abounds in Sechwana, in both its 
 aspirated and vocalised forms. I have heard a very intelligent Welsh 
 missionary so much at home in it, his native sound, that it gave (even 
 independently of one or two of his native gutturals) a character of unusual 
 accuracy to his pronunciation, which of course elicited a good deal of 
 obsequious flattery, of which Bechwanas are so lavish ; but, at the same 
 time, this led him to misuse the tennis, or simple liquid r, in such words 
 as morimo, rusa, rila. Moreover, the Welsh I, as it is usually called, is a 
 fine instance of the aspirate I, also found in the Zulu language, and none 
 except a Welshman will be inclined to deny it, as I have heard one do, 
 by alleging that (like the clicks of other " barbarians," Hottentot and Kaffir) 
 the contact of the tongue with the palate is lateral !
 
 126 
 
 (a young buffalo), the instances of s are respectively simple and 
 aspirate.* The fact of its being practicable to distinguish such 
 instances of s alone in the Sechwana phonology, satisfies me 
 that, could we arrive at them by a similar principle of ana- 
 lytical investigation, success would follow in all instances of both 
 elements. In the Sechwana, neither of the two forms of r 
 (r and r) need be left doubtful in any word of the language. I 
 am very sanguine the same remark will soon apply to s ; and 
 is it unreasonable to suppose that if the language contained 
 the element ih (0), it would be a mere matter of inductive 
 analysis to distinguish its different forms ? 
 
 Again : I have shown that I and r have their corresponding 
 vocalised forms. If s and th are analogues of those elements, 
 the same must apply to them. I have elsewhere stated that the 
 approximation to vocality is stronger in the aspirate lenes, inas- 
 much as vocalisation implies aspiration, which again means 
 something more than the mere momentary action of the breath, 
 required in the sudden collision and separation of two organs ; 
 therefore we must look to modifications of the aspirate s 1 and th* 
 for their vocalised forms. Now, s 2 and th* are commonly supposed 
 to have the same relation to z and th 3 ( of Lepsius) respectively 
 as t to d, k to g, &c. viz., that the former are fortes, and the 
 latter lenes ; indeed, as before stated, they are so classed by Dr. 
 Lepsius, Dr. Latham, and most writers. But, upon the prin- 
 ciples of this treatise, s 2 and th 2 are analogues of r and I] which 
 are lenes; therefore they are also lenes, and consequently also 
 analogues of d\ g] b\- but differing from some (two) of these 
 organically, and with all (three) specifically, in that these are 
 mutes, and they are liquids. They cannot, therefore, have the 
 
 * A proof is to be found in the fact that, in the former case, ts is a 
 euphonical modification of simple r 2 in the noun mociveri (r 1 ) ; in the latter, 
 of aspirate r j in the noun nairi (r 2 ).
 
 127 
 
 same relation to z and tfo (3) as k to g, and t to d. The 
 forms z and th 3 must then be accounted for in some other way, 
 and is it unreasonable to suppose that they are the vocalised 
 forms of s 2 and th 2 ? The former of these latter elements I have 
 said exists in both its simple and aspirate forms in the Sechwana 
 language, in such words as morwetsana (a damsel), and nafsane 
 (a young buffalo), which examples are a sufficient proof that z is 
 not the simple aspirate form of s, as the words exhibit, exhort, in 
 English, in which x is considered a substitute for either ks or gs, 
 would lead one to suppose. It must be evident to any. one who 
 pays a moment's attention to the utterance of either z or th 3 , that 
 they are vocalised elements ; and it cannot be questioned that 
 the affinity between s and z, and th 2 and th 3 (0 an'd B of Lepsius), 
 bears a striking resemblance to that existing between r and r. 
 On this point I have the satisfaction of coinciding with Dr. Lepsius, 
 who considers that, in the pronunciation of z and th (his S), " a 
 vowel sound is produced in the larynx." All the modifications of 
 these two liquid elements will now be indicated as follows : 
 S 00 k c (s 2 ) S (>?orz} 
 
 th (th 1 ) th (th 2 in thin) th (th 3 in thine) 
 
 NOTE. If there be any truth in the results at which I have arrived, a 
 difficulty is here presented as to the graphical representation of these 
 modifications of the simple " explodent" element. If the mode of employing 
 a diacritical mark, in the form of a small circle, either above or below the 
 letter, he adhered to by learned linguists, who have adopted it in the case 
 of both I and r, to indicate the vocalisation of an element, z must he thrown 
 out, and rendered as superfluous and useless as q is long known to have 
 been. Again, the diagraph th, for the well-known consonants in English, 
 has been considered so objectionable, as to have ancient foreign letters 
 substituted for its two forms viz , 9 and S ; but there is little probability 
 of even these meeting with public favour. Admitting the correctness of 
 ray conclusions, it would not be going too far, I think, to suggest that the 
 letter z* be substituted for it; as such an innovation would at all events 
 
 * I find, as precedents, MM. Ibrahim in the Persian, Yates, Gilchrist, 
 and Wilson in the Hindustani, Crawfurd in the Malayan, Jaubert in the 
 Turkish, Hahn in ihe Herero, all adopt s and z to represent the two English
 
 128 
 
 obviate the necessity of introducing a foreign letter into the Roman 
 alphabet. The series of modifications would then stand thus : 
 
 Z (W) z (th 9 ) z t 3 
 
 But this change would not be admissible in the event of all the vocalised 
 modifications ever being indicated by separate letters, as with z and the 
 letter v (still to be considered). The difficulty would then be increased 
 viz., to finding three simple letters for the vocalised forms of r, I, and q, 
 instead of r, l, q, and even th 3 , which, though phonically different from 
 th?, is not graphically distinguished from it in English phonology, not to 
 mention the vocalised forms m, n, and J-, already noticed. 
 
 I am fully aware that my opinions on the subject of these two 
 elements and their modifications are not likely to find general 
 favour, especially as I am unable to produce any objectively 
 true instances in support of my conclusions. However, what- 
 ever of an original character has preceded on the lingual series, 
 will, I trust, suggest that it is worth the consideration of such 
 philologers as are too well assured of the importance of the science 
 of language relatively to that of speech, to deem such a subject 
 as trivial, or " below the dignity of a philosophical inquiry." 
 
 The remaining articulations in Dr. Lepsius' series of dentales 
 viz., s and !z, usually indicated by sh and zh (French ch and j\ 
 and by most writers called simple consonants, but unquestionably 
 " palatals," and, as much as any other instances furnished by 
 Dr. Latham, " unstable combinations," I reserve for the third 
 part of this work, as the Sechwana and other aboriginal tongues 
 contain satisfactory proofs of their formation from more than 
 one element. 
 
 forms of th. Professor Max Miiller represents them by th and dh (or th, 
 dh), or as " second modifications" of these ; thus TH and DH, and frankly 
 states that he is " at a loss how to mark" the elements (p. Ixvi.) 
 
 * Professor Miiller calls s the dental flatus asper, which is nothing more 
 than I have assumed it to be in the letter s (s 2 ). He says, " the more con- 
 sistent way of expressing the sonant flatus (z, his dental flatus lenis), 
 would be to put a spiritus lenis over the s," (p. Ixx.) I happen only to have 
 acted upon this by substituting for the spiritus lenis the circular dot to mark 
 its vocalisation. He, however, retains z.
 
 VI. LABIALES (OF LEPSIUS). 
 
 Under this head Dr. Lepsius's only other simple consonants 
 not yet considered, are those commonly indicated by the letters 
 / and v, to which it is probable a mode of classification will apply 
 similar to that employed in the case of the linguals above men- 
 tioned. Assuming, upon the grounds stated in that case, that/, 
 in its continuous and sibilant form, is an aspirate, the lenis form 
 of ph (p 4 ) it must also have its simple " explodent" form viz., the 
 lenis form of p ; and v, which Dr. Lepsius admits as containing 
 the indistinct vowel sound, must be its vocalised form, so that it 
 may be represented in its modifications thus 
 
 NOTE. _ Graphically considered, v would thus become superfluous, unless 
 it were decided to substitute it for / in all three instances ; but as there is 
 an instance of a pure liquid labial in the native languages of Greenlaed 
 and Mexico (before referred to), its retention for the purpose indicating this 
 would perhaps be considered desirable. 
 
 Another element is included by Professor Miiller among the labials as a 
 tenuissima, viz., the Ethiopic pait ; but as yet I have met with no description 
 to decide whether it is the tenuis (or simple liquid) form of either/, or the 
 so-called Mexican/, or whether a liquid at all. 
 
 As in the case of some other elements above referred to, it is 
 not till I come to treat of the combinations of these dental-labials 
 
 * Professor Miiller calls / the labial flatus asper. I have already 
 assumed the common /to be an analogue of f, and therefore write it "f. 
 He thinks this " soft labial" ought consistently to be written, as / with a 
 spiritus lenis. I have, as in the case of s already adopted /, to express 
 the sonant v. He fears, however, we must sacrifice consistency to expe- 
 diency, and therefore retains v.
 
 130 
 
 that any proof will be afforded of their belonging to the class of 
 liquids, i.e., as analogues of r, I, s } &c. The Sechwana does not 
 contain these elements, and it is only by this analogical mode of 
 viewing them that I find it possible to dispose of them.
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 SUMMARY OF PRECEDING ANALYSES. 
 
 1. COMPENDIOUS VIEW OF THE SIMPLE CONSONANTS, AS 
 SUGGESTED BY THE PHONOLOGY OF THE SfiCHWANA LAN- 
 GUAGE. 
 
 I flatter myself that, in the analysis contained in the second 
 chapter, I have provided all the requisites of a complete in- 
 duction. The presumption with which I started, upon the basis 
 of a palpable inference from a few facts, has been verified in a 
 detailed and more complete examination. The third chapter 
 was an attempt to supply by speculation that is, by the as- 
 sumption of a continuity of principle, or by analogy other facts 
 in which the Sechwana language appeared to be deficient. 
 
 The following is a complete tableau* of the results : 
 
 FAUCAL. 
 
 NASAL. 
 
 Simple Explodent, 
 
 Aspirate 
 
 
 
 
 or 
 
 Expl., or 
 
 
 
 Tenues. 
 
 fortes, lenes. 
 
 . (Mutse... k e 
 Gutturales-L. ., 
 
 ( Liquidas q 
 
 Aspiratae 
 fortes, lenes. 
 
 k c g 
 
 q" 
 
 Voo. 
 
 lenes. 
 
 q 
 
 Ten. Asp. Voc. 
 g > g 
 
 (\ 
 
 r 
 
 1 
 
 
 
 Liquidae.. j r 
 
 r* 
 
 r 
 
 
 Linguales 
 
 Mutae ... t d 
 
 t' d< 
 
 j 
 
 n n h 
 
 
 (s 
 Liquid^.. \ 
 
 c 
 
 s 
 
 Z (thin) 
 
 S TZ proper) 
 Z /Mil) 
 
 
 
 Liquidae ... / 
 
 f 
 
 f(t. proper) 
 
 
 Labiales 
 
 Mutoe p b 
 
 P b< 
 
 
 m m ni 
 
 
 Liquidse ... v 
 
 V 
 
 V 
 
 
 * Those in bold type occur in the language ; the rest, excepting , are 
 foreign to it. Those in italics indicate elements not hitherto, to my know- 
 ledge, admitted in any classification. 
 
 K2
 
 132 
 
 The above are all the simple consonants suggested by the 
 phonology of this language, together with their aspirated or 
 vocalised forms, or first and second modifications. 
 
 NOTE. Professor Max Miiller writes: "All I insist on is this, that 
 there should be one class of simple or base-letters ; that there should be a 
 second and third class of modified letters, expressive of the first and second 
 degrees of modification, as explained in the physiological alphabet." Again, 
 " The three classes of simple and modified letters must be kept distinct." 
 (Proposals, d-c., p. Ixxiv.) However, it is an open question as to whether 
 the learned Professor has given even a physiological explanation of the 
 nature of his first and second degrees of modification. His description of 
 these is decidedly indefinite, and they are applicable to only two classes 
 of his consonants, the dentals and the gutturals. When Dr. LepsillS 
 uses the acute accent, and Professor Miiller the italics, to indicate the 
 palatals [thus, for ch in church, the one writes Je', and the other k (italicised)] 
 neither of them has given a scientific explanation of what a palatal is. The 
 s ame with the Sanscrit and Arabic linguals ; and though some of either of 
 these may yet be proved to be simple consonants, those able linguists, in 
 the case of the palatals, are virtually speaking of combinations of conso- 
 nants with vowels as modifications. Whereas, before speaking of evert 
 simple modifications, they are expected to refer us first to simple consonants, 
 or elements; e.g., in my table above, the gutturals, It, g, q; the linguals, 
 t, I, r, d, s, z (th') ; and the labials, p, b,f, are all simple consonants or 
 phonetic elements in fact, tenues proper. Again, the gutturals, k, g, q ; the 
 linguals, t] I] r, &c., &c., are first modifications by the spiritus of both 
 mutes and liquids. Again, , Z? r, s, &c., are second modifications (but 
 only of the liquids) by the element of vocalization. These are simple 
 modifications, applicable not only to simple consonants, but also to the 
 palatals of the above writers, which, as I have said, are combinations of 
 articulations, not simple consonants modified, e.g., t, and s, and y, are all 
 phonetic elements or simple articulations, which, without exception, may be 
 aspirated (1st mod), and the two latter may also be vocalised (2nd mod.), 
 and thus indicated respectively, t? s, y, s, y ;* but the same applies to their 
 combinations (not modifications) usually called palatals tsy (=ch in 
 church), sy (=sh in shall), y (=si in vision). These combinations would 
 be written by Professor Miiller, k, s, z (all italicised); by Professor 
 Lepsius, Je't s, 2, by simple letters, because they consider them simple 
 consonants modified by a change of the passive organ from the throat 
 to the palate. With regard to these palatals, Professor Muller's principle 
 
 * As this element y belongs to an analysis of the vowels, it is rather pre- 
 mature to indicate it by any arbitrary letter ; it is sufficient for me to 
 imply by above that I consider there is a vocalised form of y.
 
 133 
 
 of a first modification is based upon a mere assumption that there are 
 modified forms of only gutturals and dentals ; whereas, as before stated, it 
 will be easy to prove that some of them are also analogously modified forms 
 of the linguals and labials. This very process of modification by the combi- 
 nation of simple articulations is that which has never yet been explained to 
 us. The question has never yet been answered as to what constitutes a 
 " palatal," whether called by one a "palatal," by another a " specific modifi- 
 cation," by a third an " unstable combination," or by a fourth a " divergent 
 articulation;" and, of course, it is impossible to arrive at a correct reply, till 
 we first ascertain all the simple articulations. It has been the object of this 
 treatise to arrive at that reply. Such_/?rs and second modifications as those 
 embraced in the above classification, I have attempted to explain in a clear 
 manner, which will, I trust, meet with the concurrence of the reader. 
 
 From this it would appear that there are sixteen elements, 
 or simple forms of articulation (temies)\ thirteen of which are 
 faucal, and three nasal. Of the faucals, seven are liquids, 
 leaving the same number of mutes as has always obtained viz., 
 six. The nasals remain as usual, according to the latest autho- 
 rities viz., three. 
 
 NOTE. If there is any truth in my inferences from the Sechwana, and 
 therefore in this classification, the above table shows the practicability of 
 having a complete scale of simple consonants, without the introduction of 
 one foreign letter viz., by the mere transposition of z and v for other 
 letters, viz., the English th, and the Mexican liquid-labial, respectively. It 
 must be borne in mind that I have omitted in the above table all sounds 
 usually called "palatals," or any which can be resolved into a simple con- 
 sonant and a post-positive vowel element, under which may be included 
 both sh (Fr. ch, Germ, sch) and zTi (Fr.j), not to mention the Italian gl, 
 or the French II, mouille,-&c. 
 
 The result of the preceding analyses may be explained as 
 follows: 
 
 (a) All the faucal elements are simple articulations, formed 
 by the mere contact of two organs, and momentary (partial or 
 complete) interruption of the breath, whether viewed as liquids 
 or mutes, and therefore essentially "explodents." 
 
 (b) They all admit of an accessory element, called the spiritus 
 asper, and are therefore divisible into simple " explodents " and 
 aspirate " explodents," or, better expressed according to the old
 
 134 
 
 nomenclature, tenues and aspirates. The probability is, that the 
 spiritus exists in binary quantities. 
 
 (c) They all exist in binary quantities viz., pairs, between 
 which there is an affinity, not only as universally acknowledged 
 to exist between k and g, t and d, p and b, but also between k, 
 and a liquid form of g, i.e., q ; between t, and several liquid 
 forms of d } i.e., r, /, s, and tk; and between p, and a liquid form 
 of b, i.e.,/. The same remark applies to their aspirate forms.* 
 
 (d) In the case of all these liquids, the terms continuous and 
 aspirate are synonymous. 
 
 NOTE. There is, after all, nothing new in the general arrangement thus 
 suggested by facts of a very original character; for it is but a return to 
 that of the ancients, with the addition of a second vertical set of aspirates 
 to correspond with the mediae, of these systems, or the lenes " explodents" 
 (tenues) of the more recent one. 
 
 ANCIENT SYSTEM. 
 
 Tenues. Mediae. Aspirate. 
 
 Gutturales 
 
 Linguales 
 
 Labiates 
 
 The only remarkable thing is, that the principle of binary quantities 
 which did not exist in the ancient classification, while it was the turning 
 point of a new one, became at the same time the erring point in the latter, 
 because based on a vulgar view of the correlation existing between certain 
 letters; and that the liquids were in both systems excluded from classi- 
 fication. The error of the ancients arose from ignorance of the binary 
 nature of some elements; their only alternative was to place the media 
 (lenes) into an intermediate position with respect k> the tenues and aspirates, 
 and to exclude the liquids, because they apparently bore no analogy to any 
 of these. That of the moderns consists in their making certain consonants, 
 partially similar to these mediae (as lenes), but different from them (as 
 continue), into a separate division, corresponding with one of mutes, in- 
 cluding both tenues and media, thus : 
 
 MODERN SYSTEM. 
 
 Explosives. Continues. 
 
 fortes. 
 (Ancient 
 Tenues.) 
 
 lenes. 
 
 (Ancient 
 Media.) 
 
 fortes. 
 
 (Aspirated 
 Liquids.) 
 
 lenea. 
 (Vocalised 
 Liquids.) 
 
 * See Proposals, dc., by Max Miiller, p. xxvi., where he remarks : " Pro- 
 fessor Wheatstone's researches prove that a distinguishing mark of the
 
 135 
 
 Thus excluding from the tabular view the aspirated mutes (ancient aspiratte,) 
 as merely "explosive sounds which are pronounced with a simple but 
 audible breath,* as well as placing the commonly known liquids r and I 
 under the head of ancipites, because apparently both continuous \ and 
 explodent in their nature, and thus altogether leaving doubtful the important 
 fact that they also have tenues and aspirated forms, and ignoring altogether 
 the probability of there being several consonants analogous to these two. 
 
 The more natural classification, suggested by an inquiry into the pho- 
 nology of the Sechwana, is the following : 
 
 Tenues. Aspirates. 
 
 fortes. lenea. fortes. lenes. 
 
 Mutes 
 
 While it admits the division into tenues and aspirate of the ancient 
 arrangement, instead of the explosives and continue of the modern, it at the 
 same time admits the binary quantitative arrangement of the latter under 
 
 liquid semi- vowels consists in their having no corresponding mutes." My 
 conclusion above, if correct, would seem to prove that they have corre- 
 sponding mutes. 
 
 * Professor Miiller calls the aspirated fort is a "modified tenuis." 
 f It is easy to account for I and r being thus dubiously classified, and 
 alone of all the other liquids considered " explodent" by both Lepsius and 
 Miiller, by the fact that the sibilant nature of s, th,f, &c., and which has 
 led to their being classified as continue, is quite accidental to the breathing 
 required in their articulation i.e., arising from the permeable nature of the 
 set of teeth, and the proximity of the aperture of the mouth; any sibilation 
 in I and r being stifled by their formation above the aperture. It is, however, 
 remarkable that, conversely, the same fact will account for the " explodent" 
 or simply liquid nature of these analogous elements, s, th,f, &c., being lost 
 sight of, and which it is one of the objects of this treatise to uphold. 
 
 Professor Miiller considers that in the formation of these " sibilants" 
 " there is no contact at all, and the breath passes between the two organs 
 without being stopped, still not without giving rise to a certain friction in 
 passing that point of contact where guttural, dental and labial consonants 
 are formed." Proposals, So., p. xxvi. I leave the reader to test the cor- 
 rectness of this statement, by experimenting on his own organs. His 
 description, I believe, applies only to the formation of the spiritus, and the 
 German ich, which under the new name of flatus he confounds with the 
 liquid consonants of the different organs. See preceding note on Z and r 
 (p. 125). What I have aimed at proving is, that these fricatives of Lepsius 
 and/atas of Miiller, viz., Germ, ch (gutt), s, th, f, as well as the aspirate 
 form of r and Z otherwise called continuous consonants are in every case 
 liquid consonants or spiritus (or flatus or fricative}.
 
 136 
 
 each head with respect to the six mutes ; but goes still further, as the 
 reader will presently see, with respect to the liquids, which it leads us to 
 suspect are not only more numerous than is usually supposed, but also 
 admit of consistent classification of another nature, under each organic 
 series viz., that they are all lenes, and none fortis. Of these liquids, it 
 proves that not only I and r are both explodent and continuous, but that, 
 viewed as the former, they are simple liquids, and, viewed as continues, they 
 are aspirated liquids ; and, moreover, that the same applies to all the 
 elements usually classed under continues. 
 
 (e) That / and r, commonly called liquids under the old as 
 well as new arrangement, but, in the latter, shelved under the 
 head of ancipites, are probably only two members- of a numerous 
 set of analogues viz., seven, including, one guttural,/owr linguals, 
 and two labials ; that they are tenues, being lenes forms of t, and 
 have their corresponding aspirate forms, which again are lenes 
 forms of (aspirate); and it is only in the case of these aspirated 
 liquids that the term continuous is at all applicable to con- 
 sonants. 
 
 NOTE. T would here remind the reader of these two elements, called 
 ancipites by Dr. Lepsius, and by him considered as both " explodent" 
 (formed by a contact and apertion of organs) and continuous, that, by my 
 inferences from the Sechwana, there are tenues forms of them both, and 
 also aspirate forms, which may occur separately and distinctly. According 
 to the principles of this treatise both are explodent,* whether tenues or 
 aspirate, but both are continuous only when aspirated. 
 
 (f) That certain articulations viz., Germ. gutt. ch, Sech. g, 
 s, tk (English), and /(above indicated by 5, s, z, and/'), usually 
 regarded as continuous consonants, and therefore, in such in- 
 stances, according to what has preceded, aspirate forms have 
 also their simple "explodent" (elementary liquid) forms (q, s, 
 2j/), just as some writers have supposed both I and r to have, 
 and as has been proved in the second chapter. 
 
 (<jr) The probability that both sf (in parts, parks, and harps}, 
 
 * Professor Miiller, I observe, also admits that in the formation of liquids, 
 among which he includes r, I, and a guttural 'h, there is " an approach or a 
 very slight contact between the organs." Proposals, <&c., p. xxv. 
 
 f The following occurs in an able American periodical, the Bibliotheca
 
 137 
 
 and the English th (in thin}, in their simple as well as aspirate 
 " explodent" forms (tenues and aspiratas) the former of which 
 are not usually included in phonological classifications are not 
 only analogues of the simple and aspirate forms of r and / re- 
 spectively, inasmuch as they are all liquids; but, moreover, 
 organically, kindred forms of these two elements, and therefore 
 also lenes forms of t and ; and that the correlation usually sup- 
 posed to exist between them, as indistinctly represented by 
 the letters s and th (thin), and the other kindred articulations z 
 and th (thine), is not analogous to that between each of the three 
 pairs of mutes k-g, t-d, p-b ; but that these simple and aspirate 
 forms are both lenes, and z and th (thine) vocalised, modifications 
 of these aspirate forms. 
 
 NOTE. It must have struck the reader that we have no satisfactory 
 terms by which to express the nature of the distinction between the in- 
 stances of any pairs in this binary arrangement of consonants, but it is 
 necessary that we should hear in mind the peculiar nature of those which 
 
 Sacra, so recently asOct, 1860 (p. 831), and affords another instance of theusual 
 loose mode of forming deductions from the physiology of the human voice : 
 
 " 8 is a sui generis sound, which, like the sponge, mediate, as it were, 
 between a vegetable and an animal, or the bat between birds and quad- 
 rupeds, occupies a sort of middle ground between a consonant and a vowel, 
 uniting the characteristics of them both." B. W. Dwight. 
 
 This is, of course, only a circumlocutory way of saying it is the only semi- 
 votvel or semi-consonant, but the same writer elsewhere calls $ and a lingual 
 or dental aspirates,) which I have admitted; but only on the principle that 
 the continuous forms are tenues-liquids + the spiritus asper) , and distinguishes 
 the latter from the spiritus as follows : 
 
 "H is not so much a consonant as a breathing. It differs from the 
 sibilant, physiologically, only in being a breathing through the whole open 
 mouth, with the tongue at rest on its base, and the teeth apart; while the 
 sibilant is a breathing through the teeth, in a nearly closed state, with the 
 tongue against the upper teeth. H and are therefore both breathings, 
 and differ only in the different positions of the tongue and teeth. The 
 sibilant and aspirate have accordingly an etymological as well as phonetic 
 parallelism with each other, &c." Ibid. p. 839. (The italics are substituted.) 
 
 Whereas, the actual difference may be simply expressed in the following 
 formula: h = spiritus asper. The sibilant (aspirated or continuous) s ~ a 
 tenuis-liquid (dental lingual) + the spiritus asper.
 
 138 
 
 were called semi-vowels under the ancient arrangement, and continue under 
 the new, and their similarity, essentially r to all called liquid-lenes (whether 
 simple or aspirate)^ under that suggested by the Sechwana, and that, in 
 respect to the mutes, the terms fortis and lenis short and long are perfectly 
 compatible. When most of the writers who reason upon a physiological 
 basis admit that the difference between vowels and consonants consists in the 
 former being caused by free emissions of both the voice and the breath, 
 and the latter by the check, interruption, or impediment of the breath, and, 
 moreover, use such expressions as quickly slowly, complete incomplete, 
 intense firm, strong weak, in reference to the degree of closure, contact, 
 collision, or compression of the articulating organs, it seems strange that 
 the idea of relative time, which appears to be implied in every antithetical 
 expression, has not also suggested the terms short and long, which would 
 convey, in the case of the consonants, a difference, or a correlation, pre- 
 cisely analogous to that between the vowels; for in all cases the position 
 of the organs is the same in the respective pairs, whether vowels or con- 
 sonants. In the case of vowels, proportion of time is distinctly the element 
 of the difference ; in the consonants, it is only less distinctly the element 
 in the interruption of the breath. At all events, quantity is a term quite 
 as applicable to the binary arrangement of the pairs of consonants, as to 
 that of the vowels.* Admitting all this, it must be the more satisfactory 
 that the terms lenis and long are quite compatible to express the quantitative 
 nature of all liquids. For instance, it will be immaterial whether we give 
 the following nomenclature: 
 
 Tennis, Aspirate. 
 
 Mutes fortis-lenis fortis-lenis 
 
 Liquids lenis lenis 
 
 Or Mutes short-long short-long 
 
 Liquids l n g long 
 
 In order to enable the reader to compare the terminologies of Professors 
 Lepsius and Muller with that of this treatise in the classification of 
 the so-called semi-vowels, I arrange them as follows, the vertical columns 
 showing equivalents : 
 
 Lepsius Liquids. Fricatives or Continues. 
 
 (Including r and I.) fortis and lenis. 
 
 Merely alludes to continuous forms- 
 of r and I, and including both. 
 5 and z 
 
 *ft(in) th(ia) 
 
 eh (Germ, gutt.) e (Arabic) 
 
 / 
 and the spiritus lenis and aspirate. 
 
 * The following will not be out of place here, though intended by the
 
 139 
 
 Max Muller Liquids. Flatus or [Sibilant*. 
 
 (Including r and I, asper and lenis. 
 
 and 'h, a breathing.) Not including modifications of r and 
 I, but all the rest of above consonants 
 in the same order, and the spiritus. 
 
 Arrangement 
 
 gested by the [ Liquidise. 
 
 tenuei aspiratas roc. 
 
 Including simple Including aspirated and vocalized 
 or elementary modifications of the simple forms 
 forms* of s, th, of r, I, as well as of *, th, ch, f, 
 /, Germ. g. ch, &c., and consequently all above 
 &c., as well as consonants, viz.: 
 of rand I (viz., s s ( proper) 
 
 *,,/,?.) 2(th 3 ) I (th) 
 
 /(Germ ch) q (Arabic ) 
 "f ( v proper) 
 
 The pure spiritus is classed as a 
 separate and independent ele- 
 ment. 
 As to quantity, all three divisions are lenes. 
 
 (A) That the elements m and n, usually called liquids, are not 
 properly so in their tenues forms ; but, so far as regards the 
 organs by the contact of which they are articulated, both they 
 and their analogue y- (ng, n, of Lepsius) are strictly mutes. On 
 the other hand, viewed as nasals, their aspirate and vocalised 
 forms are liquids. But they differ from the proper liquids I, r, 
 &c., in that, as will be shown in the sequel, these are liquid 
 with all other faucal consonants, and form the post-positive ele- 
 ments in diphthongal combinations; whereas m, n, and <?, 
 are only liquid with their cognates b or p, t or d, and k or g, 
 respectively, and their aspirated or vocalised forms, and generally 
 
 learned writer to have quite another application : " The consonantal, like 
 the vowel, elements of speech, have their different degrees of weight; and 
 their weight is hut another name for the amount of their phonetic force, or 
 the density, as it were, of their phonetic substance." DwigTit, in Bibliotheca 
 Sacra, p. 272, April, 1860. 
 
 * These are the consonants to which I allude as being entirely ignored 
 in classifications.
 
 140 
 
 form the prepositive element in such combinations e.g., mp, nk, 
 nt\ &c. ; but these do not form diphthongs. This is only the 
 case when, combined with their cognates, they form the post- 
 positive element, as pm, tn, k?. 
 
 (i) That all the liquids, as well as the three nasals, and also 
 the spiritus asper, admit of another accessory element called 
 vocalisation. 
 
 Principles at Work in variable Pronunciations. 
 
 It is generally supposed that " the exact place of contact" of 
 two organs " can never be fixed with geometrical precision, and 
 that by shifting this point forward or backward certain modifica- 
 tions will arise in the pronunciations of individuals, tribes, and 
 nations."* But this has the appearance of being too general a 
 conclusion ; at all events, it requires proof. If correct, it will, I 
 think, apply chiefly to cases in which simple consonantal articu- 
 lations are compounded with vowel dipthongs, i.e., the numerous 
 forms of the "palatals." It is strange that while only one 
 capacity of hearing is allowed, every shade of pronunciation is 
 ascribed to a different disposition of the organs; and it is fre- 
 quently forgotten that one element may sound variously to half- 
 a-dozen ears. 
 
 It is chiefly in regard to the gutturals that there is a difficulty 
 in identifying the powers of an element in different languages. 
 There is not half so much dispute in respect to the linguals, even 
 though these include as many articulations as the other organical 
 divisions together ; and still less about the labials, which on 
 this account are rather arbitrarily pronounced by Professor M. 
 Miiller, "the most constant sounds in all dialects," f whereas it 
 is simply because the mode of their formation is the most 
 palpable to the eye as well as to the ear. 
 
 However, I think that the variable pronunciations of different 
 
 * Proposals, &c., p. xxxiii. f Ibid.
 
 141 
 
 tribes and individuals is regulated by certain principles, which, 
 if carefully examined, will very much simplify the subject ; and 
 which it is necessary for me to sum up in review of the preceding 
 classification suggested by the Sechwana language. 
 
 (1) I have referred to the term quantity, expressive of the 
 difference between k and g, t and d, &c., and between k, t, &c., 
 and the liquid forms of g and d respectively (viz., q Oriental 
 gutt., and r, I, s, z(th) linguals). The correlation of the former 
 pairs is what has generally been admitted ; but that of the latter 
 has, I believe, been first pointed out in this treatise. Both g and 
 q differ from k in quantity, 
 
 (2) But between g and q (Oriental), which are both lenes 
 relatively to the fortis k, there is another difference arising from 
 some accessory or accidental property in the latter, viz., that of 
 being prolonged in the utterance ; the one is a mute, and the 
 latter a liquid. The same applies to the difference in the 
 linguals between the mute d and the liquids r, I, s, and z(th). 
 In the case of the gutturals, the position of the organs is the 
 same in every instance, but there is a quantitive difference 
 between k and g or q, and a difference in property between g 
 and q, though both of the same quantity. 
 
 (3) Again, we find that fiie mutes k, g t &c., can be pronounced 
 in another very different way, viz., with first modification of the 
 spiritus, e.g., k or g. But the Oriental q as a liquid can be 
 pronounced in two other very different ways, viz., with first 
 modification of the spiritus, as in the Germ, ch gutt., or Sech- 
 wana g (q of my table) ; and with the second modification of the 
 element of vocalisation as in the Arabic (q of my table,). In 
 these two or three modes of pronouncing the same element, the 
 same organs are at the exact place of contact ; * but the differ- 
 
 * If this does not apply similarly to the linguals, this is easily accounted 
 for by the greater mobility of the point of the tongue required in the forma- 
 tion of them.
 
 142 
 
 ences consist in the modifications by accessory elements. We 
 have thus 
 
 Difference in quantity between fortis and lenis, k and g or q. 
 property lenes g and q. 
 
 modification ( tenue * as P irate \ q, q } q. 
 3 \ and voc. $w 
 
 In the case of the gutturals there are thus seven articulations 
 formed at one point of contact of the organs, " without shifting 
 this point forward or backward." 
 
 Now I have remarked, that "either the fortis or lenis form 
 of any consonant may be enunciated with different degrees of 
 distinctness; but its quantity relatively to that of the other 
 instance of the pair, remains constant." These remarks will 
 apply to any of the seven articulations in the above examples. 
 To repeat the useful description by Sir John Stoddart, " It is 
 not to be understood that either the one or the other articulation 
 in each pair does not .admit of nice shades and discriminatory 
 touches, as it were, perceptible to some ears and not to others." 
 
 It is to such variations of pronunciation that Professor M. 
 Miiller gives the appellation of "Dialectic modifications." He 
 writes 
 
 "Where this variety of pronunciation exists only in degree, without 
 affecting the nature and real character of a guttural or dental consonant, 
 we need not notice it. Gutturals from a Semitic throat have a deeper 
 sound than our own, and some grammarians have made a new class for 
 them hy calling them pectoral letters. The guttural flatus asper, as heard 
 in the Swiss ach, is deeper, and as it were more pectoral than the usual 
 German ch." 
 
 Again, 
 
 " Thp Swiss ch is, according to Wallin, page 21, the same as the 
 Arabic ." 
 
 Again, 
 
 " But though there is a distinction between the ch as heard in loch, and 
 the and of the Arabs, as described above, vet it is not necessary to 
 admit more than one type of the guttural flatus asper."* 
 
 * The italics are mine.
 
 143 
 
 Now, the Arabic is, according to Lepsius, the equivalent of 
 the Germ. gutt. ch, which cannot therefore differ much from the 
 Swiss ch, nor any of these from the Scotch ch in loch, the Dutch 
 g in dag, the Sechwana g, the Naman gh of Tindall, and the 
 Kaffir r; every one of which is to be looked upon as a quantitive 
 equivalent of the others, i.e., an aspirated liquid guttural, and any 
 of them may be chosen as the type. The same will apply to the 
 tenuis form of this consonant, viz., the q (Oriental), which I have 
 suggested has equivalents in the form of the Kaffir g and the 
 Danish g; also to its vocalized form the Arabic the equivalents 
 of which are said to be the Northumberland burr and the 
 Hindustani gh. It is the business of the linguist to put these 
 facts to the test, and raise upon them something more solid than 
 mere conjecture. 
 
 Throughout these analyses it has been my aim to express my 
 meaning by a uniformity of nomenclature ; but where one has 
 to do with a plurality of systems, this is in a measure imprac- 
 ticable. The terms simple and aspirate " exploderit," and some 
 others, have merely been used for the purposes of this inves- 
 tigation ; but, as distinctive terms earlier in use, such as tenuis 
 and aspirate, liquid and mute, fortis and lenis, express all that is 
 required, I propose to adhere to these in future, in the treatment 
 of the various forms of compound consonants. Hitherto I have 
 only attempted to classify simple or elementary articulations, 
 and shall in the following section proceed to the consideration of 
 simple consonants in their mutual combinations.
 
 144 
 
 11. 
 
 ON THE APPLICATION OF THE NOMENCLATURE AND ORTHOGRAPHY 
 ABOVE SUGGESTED, TO SYSTEMS OF CONSONANTAL PERMUTATIONS 
 
 IN OTHER LANGUAGES. 
 
 At the outset of this treatise, I had never given attention to 
 the subject of permutations as existing in other languages. I 
 merely referred to the remarks of Dr. Richardson, commenting 
 on Home Tooke, as rather crude ; and in a foot-note (p. 6) gave 
 a quotation from the North British Review, in which the learned 
 writer does not suppose that Grimm's law, with its nine equations, 
 is without a foundation in the history of language, but considers 
 it exaggerated by being run out into a vicious circle. The 
 following is what has met my eye since, and as it is contained 
 in the first Encyclopaedia of the day, and professes to give a 
 concise view of all that inductive philology has accomplished in 
 what may be called the science of the " embryogeny" of human 
 speech, I give it at length, especially as it is probable some of 
 my readers will not have the means of referring to that cumbrous 
 but invaluable work. 
 
 " Its claim (Philology), however, to rank as a branch of inductive science, 
 does not rest merely on its services in classifying the phenomena and 
 interpreting the facts of language. It has also proved itself able to discover, 
 like other inductive sciences, the general laws which prevail among the 
 phenomena. One of the most important of these general laws is that of 
 the ' transposition of sounds' (Lautversehiebung) ; or, as it is sometimes 
 called, ' the law of the interchange of the mutes," which had been im- 
 perfectly indicated by Rask, and which Grimm demonstrated completely 
 in its application to the Greek (Latin, Sanscrit), the Gothic, and the old 
 High German (Deutsche Grammatic, vol. i. pp. 584, sqq.) and which Bopp
 
 145 
 
 has extended to the Zend and Lithuanian ( Vergleihend Grammatih, pp. 78, 
 foil.) The general law is thus stated : 
 
 Labials. 
 In Greek (Latin, Sanscrit) 
 
 P answers to the Gothic F, and the old High German B or V 
 B P f 
 
 F B, P 
 
 Dentals. 
 In Greek (Latin, Sanscrit) 
 
 T answers to the Gothic TH, and the old High German D 
 D T Z 
 
 TH D T 
 
 Gutturals. 
 In Greek (Latin, Sanscrit) 
 
 K answers to the Gothic -I Q. } 1D1 ,j\ rand old High German G 
 
 G K CH 
 
 CH (H) G K 
 " Or thus :* 
 
 Greek (Latin, Sanscrit.) Gothic. Old High German. 
 
 Tenuis. Aspirate. Medial. 
 
 Medial. Tenuis. Aspirate. 
 
 Aspirate. Medial. Tenuis. 
 " One example of each interchange will explain the application of this law 
 
 Greek. Gothic. Old High 
 
 (Latin, Sanscrit.) (Old Norse.) German. 
 
 P, F, V, (B) 
 
 Hovs=ir6S-s; Pes=*ped-s ; Padas, 
 
 Fotiis, Vuoz. 
 
 B, P, F, 
 
 OopuBos; turba, 
 
 thaurP, doroF. 
 
 | H }B,P, 
 
 fcjjyos, Fagus 
 
 Beyki, Puocha. 
 
 T, TH, D, 
 
 65ovs=6S6vT-s; dens=denT-s , danTas, 
 
 TunTHus,ZanD. 
 
 D, T, Z, 
 
 <5Aoi>s; Dens; Dantas, 
 
 Tunthw, Zand. 
 
 TH, D, T, 
 
 Qvyarno, 
 
 Dauhtar, Tohtar. 
 
 K,{H }G , 
 
 iKvpos, soCer, 
 
 SvaiHra, SchwaGer. 
 
 G, K, CH, 
 
 TBVOS, Genus, 
 
 Kuni, CHunni. 
 
 H ^'}G,K, 
 
 Xopros, Hortus, 
 
 Gards, Karto. 
 
 * This summary, reduced to my nomenclature, would read as follows : 
 Fortis mute. Aspirated liquid. Lenis mute. 
 
 Lenis mute. Fortis mute. Aspirated liquid. 
 
 Aspirated liquid. Lenis mute. Fortis mute. 
 
 But there is no mention of temt-es liquids, which ahound in the European 
 tongues, and the existence of which, in a scale of sounds, it is the object 
 of this work to prove. 
 
 L
 
 146 
 
 '' Mr. Winning has pointed out a curious interchange between the Greek 
 and the Gothic, with regard to the relations established by this law (Manual 
 of Comparative Philology, p. iii). Other modifications require to be intro- 
 duced ; and Dr. Guest attaches so much weight to the exceptions which 
 he has noticed, that he has arrived at a conviction of ' the general un- 
 soundness of these celebrated canons' ('On the Elements of Language, 
 their Arrangements and Accidents.' Proceedings of the Philological Society, 
 vol. iii., p. 180.) The great majority of philologers, however, acquiesce in 
 the general validity of this theorem of interchange. Blinsen calls it ' one 
 of the most fertile and triumphant discoveries of philological ethnology' 
 (Report of the British Association for 1847, p. 262) ; and Max Muller 
 accepts it as a proof of ' the systematic regularity, the almost absolute 
 certainty, to which the phonetic laws of different languages can be brought.' 
 (Edinburgh Review, October, 1851, p. 319.)" ENCYCLOPAEDIA BRITANNICA, 
 vol. xvii., p. 539. 
 
 The above statement of the general law of Rusk, Grimm, and 
 Bopp, is, after all, the mere record of a very general inference 
 that certain articulations in one language answer regularly to 
 those in others, and amounts to a simple synopsis of facts like 
 that at page 15 of this work, of the permutations in the Sechwana 
 language, discovered by the missionaries some forty years ago, 
 though of a different nature. The Indo-European law is based 
 upon a comparison of cognate dialects, which had lost all ap- 
 pearances of cognation by reason of historical vicissitudes, and 
 has been evolved from a mass of heterogeneous materials, which 
 it has become a subjective means of rendering more accessible 
 and comprehensible to the efforts of the mind. Its discovery in 
 the evolution has shed light on that cognation. It amounts to 
 a mere series of palpable facts, exhibiting the relations of other 
 facts ; but I am not aware that any attempts have been made 
 to reduce them to abstract laws or principles. The same, to a 
 certain extent, may be said of the laws of permutation in the 
 Scchwana. The first missionary who reduced the language to 
 writing stumbled upon these laws as so many difficulties ; but 
 the more he observed of them and their constancy, the more 
 easily he made a comprehensive grasp and maintained a firm hold
 
 147 
 
 of his knowledge ; and by noting them, in fact made the language 
 more easily acquirable by others ; but, till the humble attempt 
 made in this work, I am not aware of any efforts to reduce these 
 palpable laws, as fresh objective facts, to still more abstract sub- 
 jective principles. One would think that we have to search in 
 such singular phenomena for " a phase of progress, of growth, 
 of history," for a department of science explanatory of both 
 lexicology and syntax. 
 
 Moreover, the above general law of what may rather be called 
 comparative or dialectical phonology than phonics, however 
 striking, labours under a disadvantage alluded to throughout 
 this work viz., that it is necessarily based upon a very copious 
 induction of materials of questionable analogy, culled from both 
 purely historical and purely phonetical facts, in dead and living, 
 archaic and vernacular examples of speech. Therefore the 
 remark of the North British Reviewer, that " it has been run out 
 into a vicious circle," seems not without foundation, and it can 
 therefore only be regarded as empirical. The late Richard 
 Garnett, an eminent philologer, considered that the above scale 
 of permutations would " admit of being considerably extended 
 beyond the limits assigned by Grimm and Pott." P. 254. 
 
 Of the two, the scale of permutations laid down by the humble 
 and plodding missionary is by far the more important in a 
 scientific point of view, inasmuch as it is based upon the ob- 
 servation of the " living traditional pronunciation," and that in 
 one language. When looked at in this light, what is usually 
 called " Grimm's law" seems at present destitute of value, 
 further than as a subjective means of rendering the relations 
 between the archaic forms of the Greek, Gothic, and old German, 
 and one or two other cognate dialects, more easily accessible for 
 the mind. 
 
 Of considerably more importance, and withal more satisfactory 
 than such general speculations, are the following peculiar per- 
 
 L2
 
 148 
 
 mutations* in Welsh, inasmuch as they also, like the Sechwana, 
 are gathered from the vernacular pronunciation : 
 
 . Gutturals. 
 
 Car (a kinsman) kf fortis "| _ 
 
 Eigar (his ,. ) tog to lenis } TenU6S mutes ' 
 
 Ei char (her ) toq to lenis Aspirate liquid. 
 
 Vy nghar (my ) to Arf to lenis / Aspirate route, with the cognate nasal 
 6 s I preceding. 
 
 Linguals. 
 
 Tad 
 
 (a father) 
 
 Ei dad (7ws 
 Ei thad 7ter 
 
 t 
 
 to d 
 to z 
 
 Vy nhad (my ) to nh to 
 
 Pen 
 
 Ei ben (his 
 
 Ei phen (her 
 
 V mben iy 
 
 LSame mutations. 
 
 I 
 
 (Simple aspirate (spiritus) with the cog- 
 
 1 nate nasal preceding, which is w<?a?- 
 
 ( ised,probcMy by absorption with thed. 
 
 Labials. 
 
 ( 
 
 1 Same mutations. 
 
 o 
 ) to mh 
 
 1 As in preceding cxample,the\) being pro- 
 | bdbJy absorbed inthevocalised nasal. 
 The other examples cited are not so regular, but I append the following : 
 
 Gutturals. 
 
 Gwas (a servant) gw lenis mute. 
 
 Ei was (his 
 Vy ngwas (my 
 
 Duw (a god) 
 Ei dhuw (his ) 
 
 Vy nuw (my ) 
 
 Bar a ( bread) 
 Eibara (his ) 
 Vy mara (my ) 
 
 ) to w lenis is lost. 
 
 , o r lenis is absorbed in the cognate 
 ) to nw \ 
 f I vocalised nasal. 
 
 Linguals. 
 d lenis. 
 to z (th 3 ) to lenis vocalised liquid, 
 r lenis absorbed in the cognate vocal- 
 n \ ised nasal. 
 
 Labials, 
 b \ 
 
 to f (v) I Same mutations as in preceding case. 
 
 to m 
 
 * These, as they occur in the first column, I have found in Latham's 
 " Eng. Lang.," vol. i., p. 327, cited from Prichard ; but I have tested them 
 by the speech of a genuine and intelligent Welshman. 
 
 f The bold letters in the middle column are those arbitrarily assumed in my 
 tables, and the terms in the third column have reference to my nomenclature.
 
 149 
 
 Of the above "regular mutation of initial consonants," called 
 by Garnett the " Celtic process," he states they " are changed 
 into others of the same organ, to denote a diversity of logical or 
 grammatical relation ;" and adds, " the entire system is, so far 
 as we know, peculiar to the Celtic tongues, and it exhibits a 
 phenomenon as curious as it is difficult to account for." 
 
 On examining the living pronunciation, I ascertained the Keltic 
 process to be strictly regular in the case of the tenues-fortes con- 
 sonants k, t, p, except in one instance. The second example 
 under each consonant is a change to the corresponding lenis ; 
 the third into the aspirate liquid (" fricative" or " flatus",), which 
 is also a lenis ; the fourth presents an anomaly, in that, in one 
 case (&), the consonant becomes an aspirate mute, and in two 
 cases, t and p, the mute itself is absorbed in the vocalised nasal 
 preceding e.g., p.g (instead of y-Ti) ; nh, mh. 
 
 In the case of the tenues-lenes g, d, b t one anomaly occurs 
 only under the guttural. The second example, under the lingual 
 and labial, is a change to the cognate vocalised liquid, i.e., Z (th?), 
 and f (v), for, by the analogy of these two examples, one would 
 have expected the corresponding articulation under the guttural 
 to have been qw viz., the voca&serf-liquid-guttural. Under 
 tlie lenes, again, the anomaly alluded to under the fortes does not 
 hold good, for here one finds the guttural, lingual, and labial, 
 respectively, becoming p, h, m. 
 
 It is, probably, principally in reference to this peculiar process 
 of permutation that Mr. Garnett writes of the Keltic language 
 It " appears to be the most ancient, the most singularly con- 
 structed, and the most true to its original form of all European 
 tongues." It' the greater perfection and constancy of the 
 Sechwana process of permutation be considered in conjunction 
 with its equally remarkable and normal syntactical structure, 
 the same remark will apply to it in comparison with other African 
 languages of the same family.
 
 150 
 
 It is to be expected that a process of permutation in one lan- 
 guage must shed some light on that of another, especially if 
 arrived at by the same mode of observation. One case occurs 
 to me at this moment. The Sechwana contains proofs that 
 t and d, p and b, are correlatives or pairs, but it fails in data to 
 prove that k and g are similarly related (see p. 20) ; whereas, 
 the Keltic examples fear to ei-gar, tad to ei-dad, pen to ei-ben, are 
 conclusive and satisfactory in respect to all three pairs of con- 
 sonants. It would be difficult to find such a beautiful example 
 in Grimm's law to corroborate any inductions from even the 
 Welsh or Sechwana, and yet the above result, at which we 
 arrive in both these languages, is founded upon what Professor 
 Miiller would once,* perhaps, have called " the irregular utterance 
 
 It is remarkable that, in Sechwana, precisely the same initial 
 permutations, .presented in the table of verbs at page 15 of this 
 work, are repeated with great exactness in the formation of 
 plurals in Li from nouns in Lo, with one or two omissions only, 
 and also, in some cases, a few exceptions in addition to the 
 normal forms. 
 
 Mutations. Singular. Plural, 
 
 btop Lobopo (form) Lipopo 
 
 PlxcEPTioN. ob to mp e.g., Loobu (brack ground), Limpu. 
 
 * 1855. The following, however, written six years later, shows less 
 scholastic prejudice in the investigation of truth. "In the science of 
 languages, languages are not treated as a means; language itself becomes 
 the sole object of scientific inquiry. Dialects which have never produced 
 any literature at all, the jargons of savage tribes, the clicks of the Hottentots, 
 and the vocal modulations of the Indo-Chinese, are as important, nay, for 
 the solution of some of our problems, more important, than the poetry of 
 Homer or the prose of Cicero." Lectures on tJie Science of Language, by 
 Max Mutter, p. 23.
 
 151 
 
 Mutations. Singular. Plural, 
 
 c* immutable Locwiisa (cuticle side of Licwiisa 
 
 a sldn) 
 
 g to kh (*') Logon ( (wood) Likhon (n) 
 
 htoph(p") LohaTo (fissure) Lipharo 
 
 h to kh (k") Lohihin (umbilical cord) Likhihiri or Liphihiri 
 
 NOTE. I have already remarked that this mutation is probably euphonical, 
 a,nd was the only exception in the case of the verbs. 
 
 Ar immutable Loketla (fragment or Liketla 
 
 chip) 
 
 kh (**) Lokbaru (eggshell) Likharu 
 
 J to t Loleme {tongue) Liteme 
 
 m immutable Lomati (plank) Limati 
 
 n Lonaka (horn) Linaka 
 
 n (P)>, ~Lop&m\i( flank) Lijfamu 
 
 P Lopalo (scab, in goats) Lipalo 
 
 P n (p") Lopheqo, (hollow pots- Lipheqo 
 
 herd) 
 r to t 
 
 EXCEPTION. r to nt eg., Lori (cord), Linti 
 r to th (t') Lorole (dust) Litbole 
 
 s to ts Losika (generation) Litsika 
 
 EXCEPTION. s to nts e.g., Losi (eyelash), Lintsi. 
 h to c Loshwaela (skeleton) Licwaela 
 
 EXCEPTION. sh to no e.g., Lusho (spoon), Linco. 
 t immutable Lotolo (fire steel) Litolo 
 
 th (t') Lotheka (loin) Litheka 
 
 EXCEPTION. th (t*) to nth e.g., Lotha (membrane), Lintha 
 tl immutable Lotlowa (net) Litlowa 
 
 tlh(tl'),, Lotlbakore (side) Litlhakore 
 
 ts Lotsatsa (thin) Litsatsa 
 
 to k Loato, or kato (increase) Likato, or maato 
 
 EXCEPTION. to ny e-g., Loetb (journey), Linyeto. 
 
 But this will not apply to the formation of other plurals, save 
 in a few exceptional cases i.e., nouns in Bo, with plurals in 
 Ma; in Se, with plurals in Li; or in Mo, with plurals in Ba t 
 Ma, or Me, as a general and constant rule, form these without 
 a change of the initial. 
 
 * C of the missionaries, as before stated, equivalent to ch in Charles,
 
 152 
 
 Under Se, we find the exceptions 
 
 I to t Seleru (beard) Literu 
 
 , , 
 
 or to ^ Seqaqa (fc&) li 
 
 ft j I SebhaqaJ 
 
 In the formation of plurals in Ma, from nouns in Le, there 
 are more rariations ; but these are only exceptions, which can 
 be confronted with regular forms. 
 8 (prob. s) to r Lesapo (bone) Marapo 
 
 R ea forms -I Lesa " ri (night g arment ) 
 
 \L0rotobolo (done) Marotobolo 
 
 O (prob. t;) to r Lecoha (hole) Maroha 
 
 .. _ J Lerothori (drop of rain) Marothon 
 
 ~\Leouti (cloud-shadow) Maeuti 
 C to b Lecoyo (arm) Mabo'qo 
 
 Reg. forms .-{ L T ^ man ( e <? ck > Maeomane 
 
 (Lebori (rat) Mabort 
 
 CW to dy Lencwe (stone) Madye 
 
 Reg. forms :- ( 
 
 . 
 voice) 
 
 ts to 1 Letsatsi (swn) Malatsi 
 
 ,. _ j Letsatsa (squirrel-hole) Matsatsa 
 
 ~ \Lelata (female slave) Malata 
 ts to b Letsele (grain of corn) Mabele 
 
 ,. ( Letsela (rag) Matsela 
 
 Reg. forms :-\ ^.^ ^ } 
 
 Letsaina, or) Marama, or 
 
 tsh(ts)tor LeUma \ (cheek) Mft|ama 
 
 Reg. forms : | Lets * ts *> or (louse-nit) Matsetse 
 
 \ Lentsetse Mantsetse 
 
 sh (prob.sy) to r Leshophi (o?rf stfc) Marophi 
 
 Reg.forms. Leshoril (n T eof ^^Af^/.oH 
 (cuhar custom) / 
 
 Among other permutations in Sechwana, we find 
 C to r Cwa (come out) perfect rule 
 
 Causative rusa (Stock, 
 with milk, of a cow 
 
 before calving) 
 
 1 to r Cwela (come out towards) mocweri (fountain) 
 
 8 to sh Cy) Risa (fcmZ) tisho (herding) 
 
 tS to c Eetsa (listen) theco (listening) 
 
 ts to s Tsimo (garden) rnasimo (gardens)
 
 153 
 
 Nwaqa (year) 
 Leba (look, Tr.) 
 
 linyaqa (years) 
 ledywa (pass.) 
 
 huh* (pay wages) 
 
 ruywa (pass.) 
 
 Hapa (bind) 
 Mocweri (fountain) 
 Mariri (hairy) 
 
 hacwa (pass.) 
 mocwetsana (spring) 
 maritshane 
 
 g w (Uw) to ny 
 
 b (prob. bi) to dy 
 
 h (prob. hi) to y (Germ. 
 ch in ich) 
 
 p (prob. pi) to c 
 
 r to ts 
 r tots 
 
 All the preceding regular permutations are those upon which 
 the principles of this work have been based. The exceptional 
 forms (all in bold type) are those other instances of interchanging 
 consonants to which I referred in a note at page 15, and which, 
 together with the following, showing the affinities of the Sech- 
 wana and Isi-Zulu, represents pretty nearly the general character 
 of the numerous irregular dialectical variations observable in a 
 comparison of all cognate African languages. 
 
 List of Permutations showing the Affinities of the Sechwana and Isi-Zulu 
 Languages.* 
 
 Sechwana. Meaning inMh Language,. Isi-Zulu. S. Z. 
 
 Atlhola. (adjudge) 
 
 Dy& (eat) 
 
 Tl& (come) 
 
 (crush or mince 
 with the teeth) 
 (well, beautiful, 
 
 etc.) 
 (backbite) 
 
 (laugh) 
 (shorten) 
 
 (rinse out) 
 
 Sentle 
 
 mega 
 SAepola 
 
 Cokotsa, 
 
 Atlh&m& 
 Qano^a 
 tffcalemela 
 
 Isi-Zulu. 
 
 S. 
 
 A/tZola 
 
 tr 
 
 Hl& 
 
 dy 
 
 H 
 
 tl 
 
 HIM&& 
 
 t 
 
 Lsihle 
 
 Jtl 
 
 Hleba, 
 
 S(prob.s) * 
 
 /ZZeboka 
 
 k 
 
 Hleka, 
 
 ts 
 
 #7epola 
 
 sh (sy) 
 
 flZukuWa 
 
 fc(-toy) 
 
 Its J 
 
 (open wide) Afcama 
 
 ^CanuAra 
 (reprove abruptly) Kulimela 
 
 hi 
 
 tl c 
 
 L 
 
 * All the Zulu examples are from Doline. 
 
 f Kakatha is also used with the same meaning. 
 
 The click.
 
 154 
 
 Seckwana. Meaning m both Language,. Isl-Zulu. 
 
 S. Z. 
 
 A^ara 
 
 (become clothed) 
 
 Am&ata 
 
 p xnb 
 
 Atla. 
 
 (kiss) 
 
 Anga 
 
 tl ) 
 
 Befca 
 
 (jerk flesh) 
 
 Eeng& 
 
 k i 
 
 ItSG 
 
 (know) 
 
 Azi 
 
 ts 1 
 
 Setlhoh 
 
 is. (dangerous \ 
 person) L Ihlo*i 
 k. (a ghost) ) 
 
 r 
 
 
 Tlhwafi 
 
 (species of make) Hlwa^i r * 
 
 
 MoruZi 
 
 (shade) 
 
 UmtunM 
 
 t 
 
 
 Ru//a 
 
 ( s. (pay wages) j 
 (z. (reward) f Vu * a 
 
 h 
 
 
 27ala 
 
 (become full) 
 
 ^ala 
 
 tl 
 
 
 Letsha. 
 
 fs. (lagoon) 
 1 z. (ri^pk) 
 
 
 ts 1 
 
 . z 
 
 
 /s. (breathe 
 
 
 
 
 
 hard, or 
 
 
 
 
 Shuma. 
 
 J hiss of a 
 
 
 t 
 
 
 
 j serpent) 
 
 ' // uinu 
 
 sh (= sy) 
 
 
 
 jz. (toAre % 
 
 
 
 
 
 V surprise) 
 
 
 
 
 Mosari 
 
 (woman) 
 
 Um^ali 
 
 s 
 
 
 tfona 
 
 (themselves) 
 
 Zona, 
 
 C ( = tsy) 
 
 
 Phaceqa 
 
 (bespatter) 
 
 Baceka 
 
 Q (= %) ^1 
 
 <2ama 
 
 (milk, v.) 
 
 (7ama 
 
 q 
 
 JOamelo 
 
 (pail) 
 
 Isicamelo 
 
 kh y c (cZicA) 
 
 Seba 
 
 (slander) 
 
 (7eba 
 
 S 
 
 Tima 
 
 (extinguish) 
 
 Cima 
 
 t ) 
 
 Boruiu 
 
 (dulness) 
 
 Ubutuntu 
 
 t nt 
 
 Sebate 
 
 f s. (rag) 
 (z. (scar) 
 
 r Isibawda 
 
 t \ nd 
 
 Serene 
 
 (^Z) 
 
 Isitende 
 
 th(O J " 
 
 .ffTiaola 
 
 (CM Off) 
 
 <?aula 
 
 kh (&) ) 
 
 tfobo 
 
 (mantle) 
 
 Gubo 
 
 k 1 g 
 
 Pitae 
 
 (the quagga) 
 
 Ibisi 
 
 ts 
 
 
 Is. (the gums) \ 
 
 
 
 
 Marini 
 
 z. (gap of a 
 
 Isisini 
 
 r 
 
 
 
 tooth) \ 
 
 
 
 s 
 
 Coma 
 
 (speaTt a strange oma 
 
 C (= tsy) 
 
 
 
 language) 
 
 
 
 
 Ka mosTiof 
 
 (to-morrow) 
 
 Ngomso 
 
 sh (= sy) 
 
 
 * All the 
 
 Zulu examples are 
 
 from Db'hne. 
 
 
 f The sh 
 
 here is often pronounced like/u-.
 
 155 
 
 Jtfwmfa6ott Language. 
 
 Isi-Zulu. 
 
 s. z. 
 
 (gather) 
 
 .Buta 
 
 ph ) , 
 
 (think) 
 
 Goioda 
 
 P J 
 
 Is. (take a good) 
 
 
 
 
 handful) I 
 
 tabula 
 
 t 
 
 
 z. (separate) ) 
 
 
 
 . 
 
 (male) 
 
 Doda. 
 
 n 
 
 
 (root out) 
 
 Z>omula 
 
 r 
 
 
 (think) 
 
 Goboda 
 
 1 
 
 
 (die) 
 (burn) 
 
 },a 
 
 Sh (=sy) 
 
 
 (spit out) 
 
 ^ela 
 
 kh 
 
 
 (female) 
 
 Isi/azi 
 
 s 
 
 
 (sweet cane) 
 
 Itn/e 
 
 C (= toy) 
 
 
 fs. (bury) ~) 
 jz. (conceal) ) 
 
 .Pihla 
 
 h 
 
 hf 
 
 (s. (person) ") 
 \z. (stranger) } 
 
 Um/o 
 
 th 
 
 
 (Z. (&Z0H7 tffo I 
 
 Mnya 
 
 ph 
 
 
 (cloud) 
 
 Ili/u 
 
 r 
 
 
 j"s. (linger) ) 
 (.z. (consider) ) 
 
 Zin^Za 
 
 tl nhl 
 
 (a lewd female) 
 
 Isibanica 
 
 ntl nx (dick 
 
 (beard) 
 
 Idevu 
 
 r ^ 
 
 (open) 
 
 Fula 
 
 b f v 
 
 (sheep) 
 
 Mim 
 
 k J 
 
 (regular body, or 
 
 MAadu 
 
 ph h 
 
 uniform class) 
 
 
 
 (dog) 
 
 Nja 
 
 (= toy) j (=<%) 
 
 (boil over) 
 
 Pu/)uma 
 
 h p 
 
 (once) 
 
 Kawye 
 
 w ny 
 
 \ s. (pay tribute) \ 
 
 KeZela 
 
 *j 
 
 (name, v.) 
 
 Ta 
 
 sh 
 
 (love, v.) 
 
 Tanda 
 
 r U 
 
 (get) 
 
 Tola 
 
 C (= ty) 
 
 (dulness) 
 
 Ubuiuntu 
 
 r 
 
 (eat) 
 
 Tya 
 
 d
 
 156 
 
 SecJiwana. 
 Hafci 
 
 -KVtucama 
 
 JTotama 
 
 Meaning in both Languages. Isi- Zulu . 
 
 j s. (earth) 
 (z. (down) 
 
 Pansi 
 
 s. (fall on the \ 
 
 knees') L Qotjama 
 z. (crouch) ) 
 (squat) Qotama 
 
 S. 
 ts 
 
 kh 
 k 
 
 Z. 
 
 ns 
 
 q (ofoft) 
 
 The above permutations are, however, not all constant, for s in the 
 Sechwana often corresponds to s in Isi-Zuiu, p to p, b to b, I to I, n to n, 
 and TO to in. This list is a very different one to that given by Dr. Bleek 
 (See p. 40 Sir O. Greys Lib. S.A. Languages) ; but that able linguist 
 laboured under a great disadvantage viz., the absence of any complete 
 dictionary of the Sechwana language a thing which actually does not 
 exist, except, perhaps, in the manuscripts of two or three individuals. I 
 have had the great privilege of comparing my own copious vocabulary of 
 the Sechwana with the excellent Zulu dictionaries of Mr. D6h.ne and 
 Bishop Colenso, which has enabled me to give a more satisfactory 
 summary than has hitherto been published. It is, nevertheless, very far 
 from complete, having been transferred to these pages from a few rough 
 pencil notes on the margins of Mr. Dohne'S interesting work. I have pre- 
 viously stated the drawbacks to a careful comparison of these two important 
 languages, and in the above list, however precise I have endeavoured to 
 be in representing the powers of the Sechwana articulations, it has been 
 impossible for me to be sure of those in the Isi-Zulu, especially after having 
 met with a few discrepancies between the actual pronunciation and that 
 indicated in the orthography of some missionaries. An asterisk points out 
 every instance in which I believe an aspirate has been lost sight of, though 
 I may be wrong in some instances on verifying them by the actual 
 pronunciation. 
 
 The examples of initial permutation in the Sechwana, upon 
 which I have based the principles of a new classification, are 
 absolute permutations of either simple consonants, or their 
 simple modifications, or simple combinations, for which there 
 appears to be no other mode of accounting. But, of most of 
 the exceptional cases above shown (and of the relations between 
 the Sechwana and the Isi-Zulu) this cannot be said. Such 
 permutations must be accounted for upon principles or analogies 
 of either phonical constructions or phonical corruptions. They 
 show the extent to which one or other of these processes has
 
 157 
 
 interfered with the normal forms of speech, and it must be 
 interesting to the European scholar to know that these very 
 processes, which he so delights in observing and describing in 
 the Arian family of languages, are at work in the Sechwana and 
 its cognate barbaric dialects. 
 
 Among the permutations showing the former process viz., 
 that of phonical construction or growth, may be classed the 
 palatals, as they are commonly called, otherwise the " unstable 
 combinations"* of Dr. Latham, or the "specific modifications"} 
 of Professor Max Miiller. The Sechwana abounds in such 
 instances, which may all be traced to combinations of consonants, 
 with a post positive y or w, though in the root neither of these 
 elements may be perceptible. Such mutations as above, of 
 p to c (= tsy), h to yl b to dyw, ts to c (= tsy), s to gh (= sy), 
 are all permutations of this kind. 
 
 Contractive p^^ Wntten^the 
 
 In Hapa (bind), the change to the passive is hapiwa halsywa haeoa 
 Ruha (pay wages) ruhiwa \~uywa rushoa 
 
 Leba (look, Tr.) ,, lebiwa ledywa leyoa 
 
 The above analogy, again, would seem to shed some light on the probable 
 
 existence of an i prepositive to the o, in the formation of verbal nouns 
 
 derived from verbs with terminal sa. 
 
 Retsa (listen) Theco (listening) prob. constructive form, Thetsio 
 
 'Risa, (herd, of cattle) Tis^b (herding) Tisio 
 
 " The Neapolitan echiu, from piu,"\ is an analogous instance. 
 Another is " presented by the Spanish language, in which the 
 Latin li not unfrequently becomes a pure guttural, as in muger 
 for mulier, and hoja for folium, MoXtc and /uoyec exhibit the same 
 species of affinity." In Sechwana, for instance, dya\ is often 
 
 * Vide " English Language," vol. ii., p. 8, &c. 
 f Vide ' Proposals. &c" p. xxxv., &c. 
 \ R. Garnett, p. 241. 
 Ibid. p. 251. 
 
 j| Written by the missionaries ya and yoa ; but the d, in both oases, 
 thoagh mollified, is distinctly audible.
 
 158 
 
 substituted for lea, in the possessive particle of nouns eg., 
 lehuku dya ml (my word) ; the same with dywa for boa e.g., 
 bogbbe dywa qaqive (his bread). Again, the Sechwana has sybna 
 for sebna, tsybna for tsebna* In cases where the spiritus occurs, 
 the combination is less perceptible, and the conjunct articulations 
 have more the appearance of a single sound. But, as has been 
 repeatedly implied, a proper investigation of these compound 
 permutations presupposes a thorough analysis of the vowel 
 System, and ought to form the subject of the third part of a 
 work of this nature ; for it is in all such examples that we have 
 to continue tracing a process of construction, and deriving from 
 this the phonical laws* by which the Sechwana language dis- 
 closes its own peculiar but natural growth from the common 
 elements of all human speech. 
 
 The permutations comprehended under the process of phonetic 
 corruptions are of greater vai'iety ; and they appear to form that 
 branch upon which the labours of the European philologer are 
 chiefly expended. While those included under the first process 
 are to be found in all their simplicity in barbaric languages, 
 these pertain chiefly to languages whose accidental or material 
 forms have alternately undergone disintegration and recon- 
 struction by the numerous circumstances attending the vicissitudes 
 of nations; though both processes have been at work in all 
 tongues, as the Sechwana, distinguished by the prevalence of 
 normal forms, and the paucity of exceptions, will alone show. 
 
 This subject would of itself supply materials for a whole 
 treatise, but a hasty survey of the different classes of irregular 
 permutations may not be uninteresting to the reader, and will at 
 all events throw light on some apparent anomalies in Sechwana. 
 
 1. There are those instances in which the now conjunct con- 
 sonants were formerly merely initials of conjunct monosyllables. 
 
 * Written by the missionaries shona and cbna respectively.
 
 159 
 
 The following quotation, from the invaluable and fascinating 
 work of the late Richard Garnett, will clearly illustrate this 
 principle : 
 
 " Even many of the words usually regarded as Sanscrit roots are capable 
 of being resolved into still simpler elements. For instance, the root i 
 denotes to go (Latin i-re, Greek ievai) ; ri, also to go, may very possibly 
 be a compound of ra + i = per g ere ; tri (to pass), ta + ri q. d , go 
 thither; stri,to strew, or spread, a further formation with the particle sa t 
 and so of many others. Our readers will find much ingenious speculation 
 on this subject in Potts' ' Etymologische Forschungen.' We consider many 
 of his conclusions as highly deserving of attention ; but we do not feel disposed 
 to agree with him in referring the above prefixes to the Sanscrit prepositions 
 in their present form, which is evidently not their primeval one. We think- 
 for example, that tri is probably compounded, not, however, with the 
 preposition ati, but with the pronominal or prepositional root ta. We 
 freely admit that all this is, in a great measure, conjectural, and requires to 
 be confirmed by a more copious induction from cognate dialects. Could the 
 fact be sufficiently established, it would afford scope for much curious 
 discussion respecting the formation of language, and might perhaps serve 
 as a clue in tracing the affinities of tongues commonly supposed to be 
 entirely unconnected. It is scarcely possible for two languages to be more 
 unlike than Sanscrit and Chinese, but it is by no means improbable that 
 both were at a very early period much in the same condition, and partly 
 composed of the same elements. Both consist of monosyllabic roots ; and 
 a few more pronouns and particles, employed copiously in the connexion 
 and composition of words, might have made the latter not unlike the former, 
 But while the component elements of Greek and Sanscrit have, as it were, 
 ci-ystallised into beautiful forms, Chinese, as an oral language, has remained 
 perfectly stationary, and is still, as it was 3000 years ago, ' arena sine calce.'" 
 Pldlolorjical Essays, p. 108 
 
 It is doubtful whether such a principle would always apply in 
 the case of a mute with a post-positive liquid. A Mochwana 
 only knows of two combinations of this kind viz., tl and ts 
 (tla, come ; tsimo, garden) ; but if you give him a foreign word 
 to pronounce, such as Bethleliem or Esther, he will invariably 
 syllabicise every consonant or spiritus, thus Be-te-U-he-me, 
 E-se-te-re'. At all events, he will only use such combinations as 
 those to which he is accustomed in his own speech, and even 
 interpolate these with vowels in some instances. This fact, crude
 
 160 
 
 and superficial as it may appear, ought not to be beneath the 
 notice of the philologer. I know of no objectively true instance 
 in which either of the Sechwana combinations tla or tea can be 
 explained by this principle, but it is possible some may yet be 
 found. 
 
 A reference to my former remarks in the present work, in 
 respect to the influence of syllabic quantity on combinations of 
 consonants, will, no doubt, in connection with the above quo- 
 tation, be suggestive. 
 
 A proof that quantity does give rise to certain combinations of 
 consonants, is afforded by the following facts, which cannot be 
 ignored in the examination of this important subject. In the 
 English language there is very little difficulty in recognising the 
 pronunciation of words when the vowels are all elided, and 
 many persons avail themselves of this mode of writing as a means 
 of short-hand. Take, for instance, the sentence 
 T vd tli mntny Imst nsprblfrm sch sbjct.* 
 
 If we introduce only the accented or long vowel, in every 
 instance, the pronunciation is indicated with double distinctness. 
 T void tli mnotnj slmst nseprblfrm such subjct. 
 
 NOTE. (a) It may be observed that where any liquids, faucal or nasal, 
 occur as initials, the insertion of the preceding vowel is unnecessary, unless 
 it is accented, as nseprbl, almost. 
 
 (b) When a mute is followed by any post positive liquid, the intervening 
 vowel, unless accented, is absorbed in the consonantal diphthong e.g., pr 
 and Jcr in nseprable and mdckrel. 
 
 2. There are those instances of permutation in which the 
 organically distinct articulations " are in reality derivative sounds, 
 descended from a more complex element capable of producing both" 
 e.g., Greek &T and Latin bis, in relation to Sanskrit dwis ; Latin 
 bellum, for ancient form duellwn, &c., &c.f It is to such that 
 
 * This was sugested by the perusal of an article in " Evangelical Chris- 
 tendom." 
 f Garnett.
 
 161 
 
 Dr. Donaldson, who was the first to notice the principle, has 
 given the name of "divergent articulations" It cannot be better 
 described than in the words of the learned discoverer, for ap- 
 pending which I make no apology, as they are contained in a 
 concise form in the Encyclopaedia Britannica, which may be 
 inaccessible to some of my readers. 
 
 " The older grammarians had only one name, metalepsis, for all inter- 
 changes, whether regular and easily explicable, as from p to b, or irregular, 
 and at first sight inexplicable, as from p to AT. The present writer was led 
 to an explanation of these divergent interchanges by an inquiry into the 
 nature of the Greek letter called the digamma, which he proved to be a 
 complex sound, consisting of a guttural combined with a labial (New 
 Cratylm, p. 110), and he extended the same principle to all cases in which 
 two words, undoubtedly of the same origin, exhibit articulations which could 
 not have been interchanged. In all such cases, he concluded that the 
 original form exhibited a combination of the two sounds. The brief but 
 decisive induction by which this law was established, in 1839 (New Cratylus, 
 1st Edition, p. 136), was greatly extended by Mr. Garrett in his valuable 
 paper ' On certain Initial Letter-Changes in the Indo-European Lan- 
 guages' (Proceedings of the Philological Society for 1846, vol. ii., p. 233, 
 sqq.) A simple example or two will show the application of this law. The 
 Sanscrit paktas corresponds exactly in meaning to the Latin coctus, and the 
 Greek iretrTos. But as p cannot pass into k, the Latin differs from the 
 Sanscrit in the initial, and from the Greek in the included sound, or, in 
 Grimm's useful terminology, they differ reciprocally in anlaut and irilaut 
 Now the Latin coquo shows us that the guttural in this case was not pure, 
 but that it was followed by a vocalised labial ; and it is known that even in 
 Cicero's time, coquus was pronounced quoquus (Quintil. Inst. Or. vi. 3, 47.) 
 The divergent articulations p and k, converge, therefore, in the compound 
 sound qv = kp, and the three words are accordingly reducible to an identity 
 of origin as well as of meaning. Again, we have in Greek Ke\aiv6s as a 
 synonym of /xsXas, ptXaiva, fikXav ; and with the exception of the initial or 
 anlaut, the words are identical in root or crude form. But we cannot derive 
 k from p, or vice versa ; and, according to the law, we must assume the 
 complex sound kp as the origin of these divergent articulations. For- 
 tunately, we are not left to an inference in this case, for Pamphilus, of the 
 school of Aristarchus, recorded the fact, that fie\a9pa, meaning " the rafters 
 blackened by the smoke,'' were anciently called Jc/tsXeflpa (Etymol. Magn , 
 p. 521, 33.) Lastly, to take an instance in which we have all forms of the 
 process, the Latin vivus exhibits no traces of a guttural in combination with 
 the labial. But the perfect vixi, from the corresponding verb vivo, shows 
 that the inlaut at least involved a k sound ; whereas a comparison with the 
 Gothic quios = vivus indicates that qv was also the original type of the 
 M
 
 162 
 
 anlaut, or initial articulation ; and thus we arrive with perfect confidence 
 at the conclusion, that vivus => qviqvus was ultimately identical in meaning, 
 as it is in signification, with the old Norse quikr, old Saxon quic, and 
 modern English quick." Ency. Britann., 8th Edition, vol. xvii., p. 540. 
 
 The above process was suggested to Dr. Donaldson by 
 an inquiry into the nature of the digamma, which he concludes 
 to be a combination of a guttural consonant with a post-positive 
 w ; in fact, a " palatal." And it is not improbable that many 
 of these complex articulations referred to will be found to have 
 been " palatals" (whether the post-positive letter was formerly y 
 or w), as well as mere combinations of simple consonants. For 
 instances of several languages having the included articulation, 
 while others have both it and the initial, see Garnett (Phil. 
 Essays, pp. 108, 250, 251, 258, 259, &c., &c. 
 
 I am inclined to apply the process detected by Dr. Donald- 
 son in the Indo-European tongues, to the explanation of an 
 anomaly occurring in the Sechwana system of permutation." 
 See table, p. 16, where I have 
 
 Verb. Verbal Noun. Verb with the Object- Particlet. Mutations. 
 i = self. m, n, n = me. 
 
 16. Sila Tsilo Itsila Ntsila s to ts 
 
 22. Tsenya Tsenyo Itsenya Ntsenya ts immutable 
 
 NOTE. Nos. 2, Cola (teyola), and 17, ShoJca (syoka, perhaps ly), are, so 
 far as regards the simple consonants, in combination, precisely analogous 
 examples, but, being palatals, I cannot notice them here. 
 
 It is true, in the Sechwana the mutation implies a diversity 
 of grammatical relation ; but, inasmuch as I have proved that 
 the whole series of Sechwana permutations of simple consonants 
 may be reduced to phonic laws, is it not legitimate to conclude 
 that these laws will explain any anomalies in their compound 
 forms ? May we not presume that the complex form of s was 
 ds,* and that the primary change is from dsilo to tsilo ? It is 
 possible that the former may yet be discovered in some interior 
 dialects. The example cited by Dr. Donaldson is almost 
 
 * My reader may be inclined to insist on dz, but a perusal of the 5th 
 chapter may convince him of the correctness of my conclusion.
 
 163 
 
 analogous viz., m and km in the examples nt\adpa, K/jif\f6pa 
 In the Sechwana examples, the mute which is elided is pre- 
 positive to afaucal liquid ; in the Greek, to a nasal liquid. The 
 CEolic fipoSov for poSov, ppia for pii^a, are merely analogous 
 phenomena. I have, in the preceding pages, attempted to prove 
 that s, z (th), /, q (Oriental), are analogues of r and I, which 
 appear to occur more frequently in European tongues as the 
 included element ; therefore the same explanation must apply to 
 them. Of all these analogues, only s, r, and I occur in the 
 language ; and the only combinations in which a liquid is post- 
 positive, are ts (see above examples), and tl in the following, as 
 well as their aspirated forms (See p. 16): 
 
 Tlotla, Tlotlo, Itlotla, Ntlotla, we have tl immutable. 
 In the Sechwana, however, we have no example of an I or dl 
 being commuted into tl, so that there are no means of either 
 proving or disproving above conclusions. They will, however, 
 be suggestive to other minds. I am content to admit my 
 ignorance of the consequences deducible from the mere statement 
 of this anomaly, and from my lame attempt to explain it 
 
 At pages 20 and 53 I have^referred to the insertion of a k, 
 in the case of verbs commencing with a vowel or spiritus (See 
 p. 16 
 
 28. Ila, Kilo, Ikila, Nkila, is commuted into k ;) 
 and explained it on the principle of euphony ; but the following, 
 from Garnett, may suggest a different course of speculation 
 on the subject. 
 
 " Formerly the only method of connecting aXivSsu and xa\iv&w together, 
 was by supposing that a guttural had been dropped or assumed. But the 
 knowledge that the former anciently had the digamma, places the matter 
 in a different light, and makes it at all events probable that they are in 
 reality collateral formations." (Phil. Essays, p. 248.) 
 
 I have also^in the course of this work, referred to another 
 peculiar phenomenon in the Sechwana language, which may 
 if 2
 
 164 
 
 perhaps be included under the permutations observed by Dr. 
 Donaldson viz., the tendency to substitute the spiritus or 
 pure aspirate for the aspirated mute or liquid, i.e., h for either 
 q (gutt. ch~),r, or b\ e.g., hbnafor 'gbna (there); hae for 'qae (home) ; 
 he for re (we) ; hela for bhela (sweep). By the analogies pointed 
 out, I conclude of course that the same will be found to apply to 
 I (Zulu and Welsh), // * s, z (th 2 ), d] and In proof of this 
 conclusion, however, I have not found any objectively true 
 instances in Sechwana speech, but have little doubt of the pro- 
 bability of their occurrence to the students, on a comparative 
 survey of cognate dialects. 
 
 Similar phenomena abound in the Indo-European tongues. 
 In the Anglo Saxon hrced, according to Garnett, " h represents 
 a more ancient guttural."f "The Slavonian greblo (an oar), 
 would, in Bohemian, become hreblo."^ " S, in Latin, almost 
 invariably" corresponds with the spiritus asper in Greek e.g., 
 we? and super are exactly equivalent." Dr. Prichard writes : 
 
 " It is to be observed that h never stands as the initial of a word in Erse 
 in the primitive form, or is never, in fact, an independent radical letter. 
 It is merely a secondary form, or representative, of some other initial viz., 
 /or s. It must likewise be noticed, that the same words which begin with 
 s or /as their primitive initial in the Erse, taking h in their secondary 
 form, have in Welsh h as their primitive initial. This fact affords an 
 instance exactly parallel to the substitution in Greek of the rough and 
 soft breathings for the (Eolic digamma, and in other words for the sigma. 
 Oivy, as is well known, stands for Fairy, ^'Evirepos for Feoirepos, and tirra 
 probably replaced a more ancient form of the same word, viz., aeTrrd ;' | 
 stands for oig ; vs and i'pTrw for <ri~s and erp7rw."|| 
 
 In all such cases, it is frequently supposed that the spiritus is 
 merely substituted for the simple consonant, but all such facts 
 
 * The Sesuto, an impure dialect, has /' where the Sechwana has both h 
 and the still purer form bh (&'). 
 
 f Phil Essays, p. 245. 
 
 I Ibid. p. 257. It is not stated whether the g in the Slavonian word is a 
 liquid Germ. gutt. ch (q"), or a mute. 
 
 Ibid. p. 107. 
 
 j| Quoted by Garnett. Ibid. p. 83.
 
 165 
 
 as I have met with in the Sechwana go to prove that the spintus 
 has lost its consonantal form i.e<, the mute, which it formerly 
 modified, has disappeared ; in fact, that , or/, or th, or r, or I, in 
 all such cases, must have been aspirated consonants, and so far 
 complex elements. To be more explicit : upon the basis of the 
 Sechwana examples, he for re, hbna for qbna. I believe that the 
 fact of h being the secondary form, is a proof that the primary 
 forms were not simply the tenues r and q (Oriental), but the 
 aspirates r and \ (gutt. cli) ; or, in other words, the former + the 
 spiritus. In a comparison of dialects, it will not improbably be 
 found that an aspirated consonant in the one will be represented 
 by an aspirated consonant in the other e.g., nari (buffalo) is 
 usually written by the missionaries nari, and the Isi-Zulu equi- 
 valent is written by the Zulu missionaries nyati, but I would 
 venture to assert that it is pronounced ny&i ; for the Isi-Zulu 
 equivalent of the Sechwana 're (we) is not, as usually written, tina, 
 but rather tkina (t), as I have heard it distinctly pronounced. 
 The importance of precision in these matters cannot be over- 
 rated, as the following example will show, in any attempts to 
 make a subjective use of the analogy. UthiXo is the Zulu name 
 for Deity (not Uti^p as usually written). Orija is that mentioned 
 by visitors to the lake ^habi,* as used by the natives there. If in 
 this word the r is aspirated (/), there can be little doubt that 
 Orija and UthiKo] are cognate varieties of the same expression, 
 and that neither has any connection with Morimo of the Sechwana, 
 in which the r is a tennis. 
 
 It would be an easy matter to carry the illustration further, 
 and not an unprofitable task to attempt to arrive at other prin- 
 ciples in a comparative survey of South African dialects ; but 
 when a student is acquainted with the actual pronunciation of 
 
 * Usually written Ngami, but pronounced as above, 
 f Tbe click (x) in the one is probably a substitute for the palatal in the 
 other.
 
 166 
 
 only one dialect in a comparative survey, there is much to 
 detract from the pleasure of his researches. 
 
 I shall close by placing before the reader an extraordinary 
 permutation occurring in the Sechwana language which may not 
 be uninteresting viz., the change of the tenuis combination ri 
 to ts (mocweri, a fountain ; mocwetsana, a spring), and of the 
 aspirate form ri to ts (nari, buffalo ; natsane, young buffalo). 
 For instance, one would little have suspected that the verb rusa, 
 to stock, of milk (of a cow before calving), was the causative 
 form of cwa (come out), but for the above analogy. The 
 occultation of the fact arises merely from the confusion of ortho- 
 graphies. Were cwa written with all its constituent elementary 
 letters, tsywa, it would be more evident. Precisely by the same 
 analogy is it that rule (has come out) is the perfect of cwa, and 
 burule (ripe, ready) of bucwa (ripen). The Batlhapin have again 
 cona (tsyona), for rona of the other tribes. 
 
 I shall not attempt to explain this phenomenon in the Sech- 
 wana, but leave it to the speculations of those who have more 
 collateral knowledge at command. The following, from 
 Garnett, may not be out of place : 
 
 " We may here suggest that it would be a matter of curious speculation 
 to trace the Indo-European words commencing with r, or its combinations, 
 to their equivalents in the Tartarian dialects, supposing any to exist. It is 
 clear that, if they are to be found, it must be under some other forms, and 
 the identification of those forms could not fail to clear up points in philology 
 which are at present involved in obscurity." Phil. Essays, p. 258. 
 
 This able writer held that " an accurate knowledge of the 
 permutations of sound in cognate languages is the very foundation 
 of all rational etymology."* I trust that the few rays of light 
 which I have attempted to throw on the subject, by a careful 
 explanation of the phonology of this barbaric dialect, will in- 
 troduce the Sechwana to the attention of those really able to 
 make use of its stores of new material. 
 
 * Phil. Essays, p. 179
 
 CHAPTER Y. 
 
 COMBINATIONS OF SIMPLE CONSONANTS. 
 
 To the eye, the number of combinations of simple consonants 
 may well appear infinite, because they are arbitrary ; but to the 
 ear, the laws of articulation will very materially prescribe their 
 limits. I have in this chapter nothing to do with any com- 
 binations of consonants with vowels, a subject which will occupy 
 the third and most difficult part of this work. This will alone 
 materially limit the number for present consideration. Before 
 proceeding to treat of such as really occur in the Sechwana 
 language, I shall do what is practicable to every closet student 
 viz., to try the extent of the various combinations of which the 
 simple consonants of my classification are susceptible, in order to 
 arrive at the principles which regulate their use. Those of the 
 mutes (k, t, p ; g, d, b) are as follows : 
 
 kg Jed kb gk dk bk 
 
 tg td tb gt dt bt 
 
 pg pel pb gp dp bp 
 
 gd gb db dg bg bd 
 
 kt kp tp tk pk pt 
 
 In all, thirty** But it is usually held that, in attempting to 
 articulate any one of them, it will be found that though it may 
 be possible to make such combinations to the eye to the ear 
 the first " must assume the property (quantity) of the second." 
 That is, with regard to these mutes, a principle is observed that 
 
 * Not including the double form of each consonant, making six more.
 
 168 
 
 a fortis 'can only stand in opposition to a fortis, arid a lenis to a 
 lenis,* or the corresponding aspirated forms of the respective 
 instances, bj which limitation all those represented in italics are 
 usually excluded, and the remaining twelve combinations to be 
 regarded as proper phonetic compounds. 
 
 Dr. Latham's " Law of Accommodation" 
 
 It is to this principle in the combination of the mutes that 
 Dr. Latham has applied the term " law of accommodation," and 
 others " law of homogeneousness." Even supposing it to be 
 correct and constant in respect to the mutes, that learned writer, 
 however, carries it to a far greater extent than I believe is 
 warranted by legitimate proofs. Excluding his liquids and semi- 
 vowels, the following is his system of consonants, all of which he 
 calls mutes.'^ 
 
 Lene. Aspirate. 
 
 sharp. flat. sharp. flat. 
 
 p b f v 
 
 k g xfa*?) y(q?) 
 
 sz a (sh) (zh) 
 
 Now, of these he adds : 
 
 " Certain combinations of articulate sounds are incapable of being pro- 
 nounced ..... Two (or more) mutes, of different degrees of sharpness 
 and flatness, are incapable of coming together in the same syllable. For 
 instance, b, v, d, g, z, &c., being flat, and p,f, t, k,s, &c., being sharp, such 
 combinations as abt, avt, apd, afd, agt, akd, atz, ads, &c., are unpro- 
 nounceable. Spelt, indeed, they may be ; but attempts at pronunciation 
 end in a change of the combination " Eng. Lang., vol. i., p. Ixiii. 
 
 So far as regards the first three pairs, which I have separated 
 from the rest by a horizontal line, it would perhaps not be 
 possible to contradict Dr. Latham ; and were he to use the word 
 
 * This would only be a more correct and concise rule than that in vogue 
 among Greek grammarians viz., " a tennis can stand only before a tennis, 
 an axpirala before an aspirata, and a media before a media.'' 
 
 f Eng. Lang., vol. i., p Ixiii. Vide my note in reference to this term. 
 
 ; The explanatory letters in brackets I have inserted.
 
 169 
 
 "mutes "in the proper and restricted sense, it might be proper 
 to endorse his remark further on " It is only with the mutes 
 that there is an impossibility of pronouncing the heterogeneous 
 combinations above mentioned." That the law is in force in 
 Greek, in such examples as y^ouTroe ; in Latin, in such as 
 scriptum, rectum (stems scrib-, reg-} ; and in English in stept, 
 pluckt, &c., &c., there is no denying. But in English we have 
 the combinations Jed in backdoor, pd in lapdog, kb in blackbird, tb 
 in nutbrown, dk in woodcock, which are all pronounced exactly 
 as written, whether we accent the first or second syllable, and 
 show that such combinations are not phonically impossible ;* 
 therefore I rather think that an absolute rule does not exist, and 
 that the " law of accommodation" is guided by the particular 
 habit of any language. It is remarkable that, while in Greek 
 it occurs in the beginning and middle of words, in Latin it only 
 occurs in the middle, and in English most frequently at the end. 
 Dr. Latham himself admits that there are no general rules for 
 determining which of the two letters accommodates itself to the 
 other. The phenomenon must therefore be accounted for upon 
 some more satisfactory principle. 
 
 But when Dr. Latham extends the law to the continuous 
 sounds of other writers, it is time to demur. The following is a 
 case in which he applies it to such : 
 
 " Tlie letter s. 111 a very large class of words the letter s is used in 
 spelling where the real sound is that of the letter z. Words like stags, 
 balls, peas, &c., are pronounced stays, ballz, peaz. It is very important to 
 be familiar with this orthographical substitution of s for z. 
 
 " The reason for it is as follows : 
 
 * The example black-guard, pronounced Haggard, is an exception ; but 
 we have "black-gum, in which the articulations are distinct, though kindred. 
 The above examples may be spurned because in compound words ; but 
 surely they are quite as legitimate as the usual examples of nuthook, uphold, 
 &c., employed by scholars to illustrate to an Englishman the nature of the 
 aspirated t* p* &c., occurring in Oriental languages.
 
 170 
 
 " The words where it is so sounded are either possessive cases, or plural 
 nominatives ; as stag's, stags ; slab's, slabs, &c. 
 
 " Now, in these words (and in words like them), the sounds of g (in stag), 
 and of b (in slab), come in immediate contact with the sound of the letter s. 
 
 " But the sound of the letter s is sharp, whilst those of g and b are flat, so 
 that the comhinations gs, bs, are unpronounceable. Hence s is sounded as 
 z." Eng. Lang., vol. ii., p. 69. 
 
 The tenor of this reasoning may be all very logical, but, upon 
 the principle laid down in the preceding chapter, I am inclined 
 to question the truth of part of the premises viz., that s is sharp 
 (or fortis). I would urge that the change of s to z, in the above 
 examples, may be accounted for upon another ground, i.e., there 
 is nothing to disprove that s, in the words stags and peas, is a 
 vocalised form of the letter ; in the word balls, that either s itself, 
 or the I in apposition, is also vocalised. In fact, a proof of this 
 very argument forms the context to the above quotation from 
 his work : 
 
 " In the old stages of the English language, a vowel was interposed 
 between the last letter of the word and the letter s, and when that vowel 
 was sounded, s was sounded also. 
 
 " Hence s is retained, although its sound is the sound of z." Ibid. 
 
 I have already attempted to prove that z (in my tableau I) is 
 only a vocalised form of s. Is it not, then, as likely that the 
 change of the sound in particular English words is to be 
 accounted for by the fact of an indistinct vowel sound, or element 
 of vocalisation, taking place of the old full vowel sound, and 
 merging in the consonantal articulation, so as to form a vocalised 
 consonant ? That, in many cases, the permutation of s to z occurs 
 in combination with the lenes-mutes g, d, b, I do not deny, and 
 shall rather attempt to account for the fact ; but would allege 
 that, (1) there are other instances in which such changes take 
 place without any other consonant in apposition, e.g., disable, 
 dismal, prison, easy, cosmetic, visible, resemble, misery, reason, 
 presence, &c., in all which cases the s could be indicated by z 
 (or s of my tableau); (2) there are also instances in which, after
 
 171 
 
 such consonants, the mutation does not take place, e.g., eggshell, 
 absent, landslip, godsend, abstruse, nutshell. Rosetree, again, is an 
 example in which a lenis, s, precedes a fortis, t. 
 
 There is the more necessity for our arriving at correct views 
 on this subject, inasmuch as, according to the principles of this 
 treatise, what is said of s by Dr. Latham ought to apply to what 
 I have attempted to prove are its analogues viz., q (Oriental ), 
 r, I, f, th l (z of tableau). In the following table there are, for 
 instance, forty-two combinations of the simple consonants of my 
 tableau, in which a mute is the prepositive element : 
 
 TABLE I. 
 
 kq 
 
 kr 
 
 kl 
 
 ks 
 
 kz (tb/) kf 
 
 kv (Mex.) 
 
 91 
 
 gr 
 
 gl 
 
 gs 
 
 gz 
 
 gf 
 
 gv , 
 
 tq 
 
 tr 
 
 tl* 
 
 ts 
 
 tz 
 
 tf 
 
 tv , 
 
 
 dq 
 
 dr 
 
 dl 
 
 ds 
 
 dz 
 
 df 
 
 dv , 
 
 
 pq 
 
 pr 
 
 Pi 
 
 ps 
 
 pz 
 
 Pf 
 
 P v . 
 
 
 bq 
 
 br 
 
 bl 
 
 bs 
 
 bz 
 
 bf 
 
 bv , 
 
 
 Now, according to Dr. Latham, all those combinations in 
 italics are unpronounceable, because, in his system, the conjunct 
 elements are of different quantities. But he holds that gr, gl ; 
 dr, dl ; br, bl, are pronounceable, because both elements are flat 
 (lenes)\ and here he has the testimony of Professor Max Miiller, 
 who says of I and r, " they are soft, like the mediae, owing to the 
 process of their formation." However, upon the basis of new 
 materials in Sechwana phonology, I have already proved, satis- 
 factorily I trust, that the mutes g, d, b, and the liquids I and r 
 are similar in quantity. I have also made an effort to show that 
 q (Oriental) is an analogue of the elementary forms of both r and 
 I. Moreover, by analogy, I have attempted to prove that both 
 s and th l (z of tableau), as well as the labial/, are, in their tenues 
 or elementary and unmodified forms (not usually admitted into 
 
 * These are in bold letters, as particular reference will be made to them 
 in the sequel.
 
 172 
 
 classification), analogues of both r, I, and q ("Oriental) ; and, con- 
 sequently, that the combinations of all these with the mutes 
 g, d, b, are also pronounceable. As to s, the English examples 
 
 bigseat gladsome absent 
 not not not 
 
 bigzeat gladzome dbzent 
 nor nor nor 
 
 bikseat glatsome apsent 
 
 will alone show that the combinations gs, ds, bs, are quite as 
 pronounceable as gl, dl, bl. If the combinations of these mutes 
 with the other liquids, q, th l , and /, existed in English or in the 
 Sechwana, it would no doubt be an easy matter to furnish similar 
 examples. 
 
 But in maintaining that coincidence in quantity is necessary 
 to the proper pronunciation of conjunct articulations, has Dr. 
 Latham not utterly forgotten that in such combinations as kl, kr ; 
 tl, tr; pi, pr, which abound in the English language, in such 
 words as cloth, crown ; little, tree ; place, pride, the elements, so 
 far as regards quantity, are heterogeneous, as well as in such 
 combinations as ts and if, which he also sanctions ? 
 
 In the following table, again, are forty-two combinations, in 
 which the liquids are pre-positive : 
 
 TABLE II. 
 
 qk 
 
 rk 
 
 Ik 
 
 sk (th') 
 
 zk 
 
 fk (Mex.) 
 
 vk 
 
 qg 
 
 rg 
 
 Ig 
 
 sg 
 
 zg 
 
 fg 
 
 Vg 
 
 qt 
 
 rt 
 
 It 
 
 st 
 
 zt 
 
 ft 
 
 vt 
 
 qd 
 
 rd 
 
 Id 
 
 sd 
 
 zd 
 
 fd 
 
 vd 
 
 qp 
 
 rp 
 
 IP 
 
 sp 
 
 zp 
 
 fp 
 
 vp 
 
 qb 
 
 rb 
 
 }b 
 
 sb 
 
 zb 
 
 fb 
 
 vb 
 
 Here, though Dr. Latham has above made such an oversight 
 as that noticed in instances where the mutes are prepositive, he 
 admits that the liquids I and r, though flat (lenes), may be followed 
 by a sharp consonant, as alp, alt. The same is allowed on the
 
 173 
 
 principles of this treatise ; but still more viz., that, inasmuch as 
 I have proved q, s, z (th 1 ), and /, to be analogues of r and I, and 
 therefore all flat (or lenes), their combinations, with a sharp 
 consonant, whether this be post or pre-positive, are all pro- 
 nounceable. 
 
 This treatise not only holds that the liquids of its classification, 
 although lenes, can be pronounced in apposition to the lenes- 
 mutes (which Dr. Latham denies in considering all, except I and 
 r, as sharp), but it also maintains that they are distinctly pro- 
 nounceable in connection with fortes-mutes ; in fact, that the 
 liquids r, I, s, z (th 1 ), q, and/, are pronounceable with any simple 
 mutes (unmodified by either' the spiritus or element of vocalisation), 
 whether post or pre-positive. If this can be disproved, the con- 
 clusions at which 1 have arrived respecting the nature of these 
 liquid elements are invalidated. If not, any conventional notions 
 regarding our habitual use of only some of their combinations 
 must fall to tne ground. 
 
 Now, it must be borne in mind that, in the above groups of 
 combinations, I have only had to do with the tenues forms 'of all 
 consonants, i.e., their absolutely simple or elementary forms, 
 unmodified by either the spiritus or vocalisation ; and, moreover, 
 that among these consonants, those of s, z (th 1 ), /, and q (Oriental), 
 as tenues forms, are not usually admitted into classifications. 
 Men are in the habit of looking at the aspirated forms of these 
 latter consonants viz., the common s, th, f, and the Germ, ch 
 (gutt.), having only their sonant modifications z (common), 
 th 3 (this), v (common), and the Arabic (Northumberland burr"). 
 It is possible that, by now considering all the combinations of 
 these tenues forms, as affected respectively by the spiritus and 
 element of vocalisation, we may be enabled to approximate to 
 correct conclusions, and a satisfactory analysis of the difficulty.
 
 174 
 
 Consonantal Diphthongs. 
 
 The remark of Dr. Lepsius, concerning " a complete and accu- 
 rate theory of transcription" in respect to the vowels, is equally 
 applicable to the consonants, inasmuch as it is necessary to make 
 a distinction between what are and are not diphthongs among their 
 compound forms. Even the subject of vowel diphthongs is in- 
 volved in such confusion, that I need not wonder at finding 
 myself in a labyrinth in the case of the consonants. The fol- 
 lowing quotation will display the unscientific and random style 
 in which these are usually disposed of. 
 
 (Here ends the Manuscript.) 
 
 " The diphthongal consonants are r, w, y, j, q, oh, wh." Author of Article 
 " Stammer," Penny Cyclopaedia.

 
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