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In that alphabet c is unnecessary, it being always represented otherwise either by s or k. Qis also useless, for k might always take its place, and is the same with it. Jis needless, because it is a compound of two other consonants, as I shall presently show. If retained it would be only a matter of convenience, not of necessity. W is likewise unnecessary, as it merely represents, and is, the vowel 7. G should be recognized as having but one sound, as heard in either ga or ag. Its name might be either. Let eng, as heard in thing, long, among, dangle, be pronounced as it naturally would be, and this pronunciation would be a proper name for that consonant. It is never found except in the end of a syllable. Let eth, as heard

in think, hath, both, through, be pronounced in like manner for its name; and the, as heard in this, that, bathe, for its name. Pronounce ye as heard in year, yet, yell for the name of that consonant, which is one of those that most frequently occur in our language, and more than any other, perhaps, enters into combination with other consonant sounds; yet we have no appropriate character to represent it, for y is often used for the vowel 4, and ye (as I name it) often occurs without any notation at all which can serve to indicate its use. Even its name, as commonly given it, might as well have been James as wi, for any purpose of indicating its proper use. He is neither a consonant nor vowel. It is merely an aspirate, or peculiar mode of breathing while a vowel is sounded. It is, however, so much used, and is so important, that it deserves a distinct character and name to denote it. There is another breathing, softer and less forcible, which our language employs, but for which it has neither a character nor name; but, unlike the other, it is a breathing on a consonant, or rather between consonants, and not on a vowel. It is heard in the last syllable of able, between b and 7; in the last syllable of happen, seven, battle, speckle, between the letters p n, v n, tl, k l; and in many other words. We ought to have some character, and a name for it, to denote this kind of breathing.†

I shall now attempt to show the position of the organs in pronouncing each of the consonants, taking them in the order as they stand above. Every reader is desired to make a full

* The name aytch, most usually given this character, indicates its use in no way whatever, and is too barbarous to be retained.

The practice of pronouncing seven, even, and other words in which this breathing occurs, as though it were the short sound of the vowel 3 or 9, is a provincialism which should be discarded, rather than countenanced as it too often is, by men of education, and particularly clergymen. The pronunciation has nothing English about it, and is destroying one variety of utterance, and one of the softest tones of the language.

trial of these positions for himself, that he may be satisfied of

their accuracy.

The position of the organs in pronouncing the first nine of these consonants has been already given, and needs not be here repeated. In pronouncing the letter k, the breath is expelled from the throat through the mouth, when it is suddenly interrupted in its passage, and that sound is made. Instead of passing through the mouth, let the breath issue through the nasal passage, and be there suddenly stopped by the same position of the organs which k requires, the letter enk will be sounded. This consonant, like eng, is used only in the end of syllables, where it is frequently heard, as in the words think, sank, uncle, anchor. The letter ef is pronounced by placing the upper part of the under lip against the ends of the upper front teeth, and allowing some breath to escape between the lip and teeth, and no where else. Let the position of the under lip and upper teeth continue the same, but let no breath escape between them, or very little indeed, and let it gurgle somewhat in the commencement of the nasal passage from the throat, and the letter ve will be pronounced. Place the end of the tongue_against the front upper teeth, and let a little breath escape between them, as in the case of ef, and the letter eth will be sounded. Let all remain as before, but suffer no breath, or but very little, to escape between the tongue and teeth, and let it gurgle, or be vibrated, in the nasal passage, as before, and the letter the will be formed. Place the end of the tongue against the upper edge of the gum of the upper front teeth, let the breath be there stopped, and be vibrated through the nasal passage, and the letter el will be enunciated. Let the end of the tongue be put somewhat farther back, and be turned a little upward, leaving a space between it and the roof of the mouth, through which cause the breath to rush with a whistling sound, with none escaping through the nose, and the letter ess will be heard. With the tongue as before, only let it press against the roof of the mouth so as nearly to stop the breath, and then cause the breath to vibrate in the nasal passage, the letter ze will be uttered. Let the tongue be drawn a little farther back, with the end of it turned up, and somewhat over, near to the roof of the mouth, and a slight vibratory or tremulous motion given it while the breath passes through, the letter ar will be sounded. We trill or vibrate this letter much less, probably, than any other people in whose language it is found. The French,

*The true position of the organs is best ascertained in the sounding of a consonant by letting a vowel precede instead of following it; as ek, ak, ok, in stead of ke, ka, ko; em, am, um, &c., instead of me, ma, &c. See page 15.

Italians, Spanish, and Portuguese trill it very much, as do the Scotch and Irish, so as to be unpleasant to our ears. In our aversion to harshness of sounds, we have almost lost the peruliarities of this letter, and have fallen into the opposite extreme of pronouncing it so faintly as hardly to make its articulation audible,- -an error which is to be avoided. If the sides of the tongue be pressed against the gums of the upper double teeth on each side, and the upper surface of the tongue be brought in contact with the roof of the mouth at the same time, and the breath be made slightly to vibrate in the nasal passage near the throat, the sound of the consonant ye will be produced. This consonant always precedes a vowel, unless it closes a syllable; and is often understood before the vowel 8 when no consonant is expressed, as unit, use, unite.

The aspirate he is produced by causing the breath to rush with considerable force through a hollow passage made by raising the sides of the tongue to the upper gums in the back of the mouth, and depressing the center of it. This position may be somewhat varied to accommodate the utterance of the different vowels; but in all cases there is a hollow passage made for the breath by the tongue and roof of the mouth.

From the preceding representation, it appears that we have nineteen simple consonants in our language; and if we include the aspirate he, we have twenty. If the nine vowels are added, we have then twenty-eight or twenty-nine simple sounds in all. For the representation of these, we ought to have as many artificial marks or characters, each of which should invariably stand for the same simple sound. This would give us a perfect alphabet; would save at least seven eighths of the time now spent in teaching children to read and spell, and would teach them with entire success; would enable foreigners to acquire our language so as to read and speak it in half the time now consumed, and cause them to admire it besides; would save much time and expense in writing and printing, because then there would be no silent letters, which now, as supernumeraries, occupy so much space; and, in addition to the whole, would render our written and printed language much more worthy of the hundreds of millions of people who will hereafter speak it.

But what provision, it may be asked, is made in the foregoing view for the expression, or representation, of the sound usually denoted by ch, as in much; of that heard in treasure, and represented there by s; of that heard in shun, nation, there represented by sh and tio; and of the sound represented by j, and sometimes by g, as in jade, age? I will answer the question.

Each of those sounds alluded to is a compound of two simple consonants, as badly represented in our orthography as they well could be. The first (ch) is in reality a compound of t and y, that is te and ye, nothing more or less. This will appear most readily by placing this compound between two vowels, or in the middle of a word. Take the word teach, and add the syllable er, so as to make teacher; spell the latter word with ty instead of ch, the other letters retaining their former sound, and we shall have teatyer, which we can pronounce only in one way, giving the sound of ch. Spell leeches, leetyes, satchel, satyel, hatching, hatying, righteous, rityous, riches, rityes, the results will be the same. In all these examples, each word, however commonly spelt, has the sound of ty, and ought to be represented by them. Much, blotch, ditch, churn, choose, church, contain precisely the same sound, (the last twice over,) and should, of course, have the same representation.

In the words treasure, seisure, adhesion, we have the compound of zy; as, treazyure, seizyure, adhezyon, or still better expressed, tr3zy9r, s4zy9r, adh4zy9n. All other words containing the same sounds should have the like spelling.

In the words nation, captious, wish, shun, sure, the sound of sy occurs in each, though differently represented. Let the letters, except those which stand for sy, be retained and pronounced as usual, and insert sy; we shall then have nasyun, capsyus, wisy, syun, syure. Place the organs in the position for pronouncing sy, and no other sound than the one under consideration can be made, whether at the beginning, middle, or end of a word.

The sound commonly represented by j, or soft g, as it is called, as in jade, age, adjure, ledger, agile, is compounded of d and y. This will be best seen by taking a word with these consonants in the middle. Ledger is ledyer, adjure is adyure, agile is adyil, age is ady or adye, and jade is dyade. Here, again, the organs, placed in the position of these two consonants, can give no other sound than that of our common j.

X, which has not been mentioned before, is well known to represent a combination of sounds. In the beginning of a word it is pronounced like z. When used as a double consonant, it represents either ks, or gs, as tax, exist, which might be written taks, egzist. It is not, therefore, a letter representing any distinct sound, and of course cannot be necessary.

If there is any sound in our language which cannot be expressed by the simple vowels and consonants which I have exhibited, including the aspirate he, and the simple breathing heard in able, seven, it has altogether eluded my researches. To a

person who has never analyzed the sounds of our language by ascertaining the actual position of the organs in the formation of each of them, (the only way in which a perfect analysis can be formed,) the notation which I have employed may at first appear awkward. Let the novelty of it, however, wear off, and let him become familjar with it by practice, this awkwardness would disappear. Surely, if we have been so accustomed to the use of ch to denote the sound which we hear in much as to be reconciled to it, when in fact neither c nor h enter at all into the composition of the sound, it would not require much practice to reconcile us to a notation which expresses the truth.

What must have been the accuracy of the ears and of the research of those men, who, sensible that ch is not quite the proper notation of the sound for which these letters are made to stand, have substituted for them tsh as the true representatives of the compound letters of that sound? The same question might be put with regard to several other notations; for example, those which have been adopted to express the sounds heard in pleasure, nation, age. The truth is, we have suffered our ears to be misguided by our sight, or by our imagination, until we have become involved in errors which we are more solicitous to perpetuate than remove.

A knowledge of the elementary sounds of our language, and the true position of the organs in uttering them, is very important to him who would attain to a good elocution. Faults in articulation seldom arise from defective organs. They generally proceed from a bad management of them. To know how to place them aright in order to produce a perfect sound of the intended kind, must surely be the direct way to get rid of making imperfect ones. If a person errs in the distinct and proper articulation of a particular letter, or combination of letters, let him bring his organs to the right position for uttering them, he will then, of course, make the proper sound, and will continue to make it so long as he shall be attentive to the subject.

Every person who lisps does so by a wrong position of the organs. He places the end of his tongue against the roots of the upper front teeth, or near them, instead of farther back, as directed for the pronouncing of the letter s. After knowing the source of his mistake, and the correct mode of avoiding it, he needs to lisp no longer, if he is willing to take a little trouble to habituate himself to the change.

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