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ANALYSIS

OP

THE PARTS OF SPEECH

CONVERSATION 1.

OF WORDS.

NATURE BEGINS.-REASON COMPLETES.

Scholar. WHAT are words?

Master. The signs or representations of our ideas and thoughts. S. How many kinds of words do you distinguish?

M. Nine: viz. the noun, adjective, article or determining word, pronoun, verb (so called by way of eminence), preposition, adverb, conjunction, and interjection, which are adequate to the full expression of all our ideas, thoughts, and sensations; and will become the subject of the following conversations.

S. What are words composed of?

M. Of sounds in speech, and of letters, which are written characters, when they represent those sounds to the eye.

The useful art of representing speech in written characters is called writing, the invention of which is ascribed to Cadmus, and has been celebrated by Brébeuf, in the following beautiful lines:

C'est de lui que nons vient cet art ingénieux,
De peindre la parole & de parler aux yeux;
Et par les traits divers de figures tracées,
Donner de la couleur & du corps aux pensées.

The following version will not, I imagine, be unacceptable to the English reader:

"From him this art descriptive took its rise,
'Of holding converse with the wond'ring eyes
"The various figures, by his pencil wrought,
"Gave colour and a body to the thought."

S. How many kinds of sounds are there?

M. Two; inarticulate and articulate: the former are so called from their formation by the voice, unassisted by the tongue or lips; while the latter are formed by the voice, modified by the lips, teeth, throat, tongue, palate, or nose. The first are also called vowels; the second, consonants.

S. What name is given to the lettors which represent the inarticulate sounds?

M. Vocal letters; or, simply, vowels: there are five of them, viz. a, e, i, o, u.

S. What are those termed, which describe the articulate?

M. Consonants, and make eighteen in number, viz. b, c, d, f, g, j, k, l, m, n, p, q, r, s, t, v, x, z. They are called consonants, from the Latin words cum, with, and sonare, to sound; implying the necessity of their junction with the vowels, to express those sounds which alone they could not. If you add to the foregoing letters the consonant h, to denote aspiration, and the letter y, which generally describes the sound already represented by I, all the above letters, twenty-five in number, compose our French alphabet, in which, as you may observe, the W has not been found necessary.

S. What general name do you give the various sounds which constitute a word?

M. Syllables, which, like the vowels or consonants, are expressed or written.

S. Of how many letters is a written syllable composed?_

M. Sometimes of a single letter only, which must be a vowel; and sometimes of several, one of which must also be a vowel.

S. Are there no more than five vowels?

M. No: but there should be many more, since these five letters cannot represent even all the sounds which the voice, not modified by any motion of the organ of speech, may utter, by the simple emission of the breath. To obviate this difficulty, we have recourse to various means to express different sounds, without resorting to additional letters or characters, which would swell our alphabet.

First, we use three marks, called accents, placed over the vowels, to render their sounds more or less forcible: they are described thus: acute', (aigu); grave', (grave); and circumflex, (circonflexe). Their application is exemplified in the following words: á, páte; é, unité; è, procès; é, tempête; ó, cóte; í, gite; ú, flúte,

Secondly, we combine several vowels, and term their combination a compound vowel; they are ten in number: as ea, il mangea; ai, j'ai; cai, je mangeai; au, étau; eau, chapeau; eu, heureux; au, væu, eo, geolier; a, œsophage; ou, ouvrier. I must here point out an imperfection, which is, that all these, except the last, describe no sounds different from those before represented by the five simple vowels with or without accents.

Thirdly, to express the simple sounds passing through the nose, m or n is subjoined to the vowels, whether simple or compound, and the letter thus subjoined causes them to be called nasals; as am, Adam; an, enfant; aen, Caen; ean, vengeance; em, emplacement; en, ensemble; aim, faim; ain, pain; ein, dessein; im, impossible; in, enfin; om, sombre; on, confondu; eon, mangeons; eun, jeun; um, humble; un, tribun. The imperfection just noticed, is also observable here.

S. What do you call a diphthong?

M. The distinct sound of two vowels, the first of which is nearly lost in the second. This double sound, though expressed by several vowels, like the compound, is essentially different. In French, there are nineteen: i. e.-six simple, as ia, diamant; ié, pitié; io, fiole; oe, moelle; oi, moi; ui nuit; seven compound, as, iai, je confiai; iau, miaulement; ieu, adieu; iou chiourme; oua, rouage; ouai, je jouai; oui, enfoui; and six nasals, as, ian, viande; ien, bien; ion, ambition; oin, soin; ouin, marsouin; uin, Juin.

The above will give you an idea of the mechanical plan, adopted in written language, to fix the fugitive sounds of the voice. We might indeed have dweit considerably on the subject, and written almost a folio on the numberless irregularities of French pronunciation, complicated with rules, the greater part of which you could never have retained.

That your mind may not be perplexed with unnecessary matter, we shall lead you to French pronunciation, by the simple and easy method which nature daily indicates. To accelerate the attainment of this great object, it will be necessary to pay the most particular attention to the following comprehensive system, in which the sounds of the vowels, diphthongs, and consonants, are fully exemplified by numerous and appropriate examples. These you will pronounce after your instructor, till the pronunciation of each word becomes familiar; but, should you be debarred from the assistance of a French teacher, a free command of the Key which precedes the system, and by means of which French sounds are taught by comparing them with those of a similar nature in your own language, will, in a great degree, prove a substitute.

SYSTEM OF PRONUNCIATION;

PRECEDED BY

A KEY to the PRONUNCIATION of the VOWELS, &c.

THE French alphabet, as we have already observed, consists of twenty-five letters, viz. a, b, c, d, e, f, g, h, i, j, k, l, m, n, o, p, q, r, s, t, u, v, x, y, z.

Of the Vowels.

The sounds of all the French vowels, with the exception of u, are to be found in the English language.

A.

4 has two sounds: one short, as in patte; the other long, as in pâte: the first is represented by a, au, ea, in the English words hard, laugh, heart; the second by a, au, aw, ou, oa, in the English words pall, caul, hawk, ought, broad. It is, however, to be noticed, that the French sound in pâte is rather less open.

Note. With an ear fastidiously nice, a critic may discover two more sounds appertaining to the French a; the one not so short as in patte, as a in race: the other not so long as in pâte, as â in âge.

However, as such niceties, frequently liable to objections, and considered of little importance by the latest French orthoëpists, might render our Key more intricate, and perplex the learner, we shall dismiss the subject. D'Olivet, that faithful guide to French prosody, remarks, on a similar occasion, that "it is useless to dwell too much on the anatomy of sounds."

E.

E has four distinct sounds, besides one which is scarcely distinguishable. The first is close or acute, as in vérité, marked with the accent thus ('), and the sound is expressed by the English a, ui, ay, ei, as in fate, pail, nay, weight.

The second is grave or open, and is found in the English words there, where, or the French words trumpette, très, colère. It is marked thus (').

The third is long or circumflex, as in the words mème, crête, denoted by the circumflex accent (4), and the sound is discoverable, nearly, in the words there and where, above mentioned. The difference between the grave and circumflex eis trivial; the latter, to a descriminating ear, would seem a little broader.

The fourth is guttural, so called on account of its being pronounced from the throat: we trace it in the French terms je, me, le, refus, and the English her, over, sister.

The fifth sound, commonly denominated mute, we shall, with D'Olivet, define thus: "It is a mere emission of the voice, which is scarcely heard." It is, however, to be noticed, that the mute e lengthens the preceding syllable, by giving a full sound to the final consonant.

It is important to mention that the learner, deprived of the assistance of a native of France, and making the attempt to teach himself the sounds of the language of that country, must not begin pronouncing the words given in the exercises till he has attained the pronaciation of the French vowels, by means of the following mechanical process,-and not until the observations on consonants, diphthongs, the union of words, &c. have been impressed on his memory. At that period, he may safely attend to the exercises, and pronounce the words as he conceives the French would do: those exercises being calculated to display also to the French themselves the notation and pronunciation of their words, according to the mode of their purest speakers.

A plan of fixing the pronunciation of a language according to its genius, and introducing an explanatory Key for the use of foreigners, in order to give them equal advantages with the natives, appears the most natural that can be devised. Experience has proved the correctness of my views in the success of my Universal Pronouncing Dictionary of the French and English languages, from which I have taken the present system; and I refer to its preliminary discourse for further elucidation.

I.

I has two sounds: one short, and the other long. The former is found in the French words virilité, minime, and represented by the English i, e, u, o, ui, in fit, yes, busy, women, guilt; the latter in the French terms ile, glte, and described by the English ea, ee, ei, ie, in meat, meet, deceit, field.

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O has two sounds, short and long. The first is found in the French terms econome, noble, and in the English some, come, love. The second in the French words côte, aumône, anémone, dôme; and described by the English o, eau, oe, od, ow, in no, beau, foe, moan, blown.

U.

U has also two sounds, short and long. The one is found in the French words curule, usufruit: and the other in brûlure, buse.

Note. As no such sounds are discoverable in the English Catalogue, the only resource we have is to learn to pronounce the u from those only who are well acquainted with the true pronunciation. It is worthy of remark, that, by watching the organs of speech in the act of pronouncing that vowel, a mechani. cal mode may be devised, which shall cause the emission of that identical sound. Thus we can discover, from minute observation, that, by bringing the teeth near each other, without closing them, while the tip of the tongue (which assumes a circular form) touches the fore-teeth of the lower jaw, then protruding the lips, and leaving a passage between them merely sufficient to emit the breath, the u will be readily produced, which is a peculiar sound, unknown in English.

Of the Vowels eu, ou.

Eu has two sounds: the one short, and the other long, nearly like that of the guttural e.

The first is expressed by the French words jeune, peuple, pleurs, heur, malheur, and tolerably described by the English e, i, u, oo, eu, in over, sir, cur, blood, earth: the French sound being rather more open than the English.

The second is similar to that in jeûne, bleus, veux, but has no corresponding sound in English: it may, however, be formed by dwelling a little longer on it, immediately after protruding the lips in such a manner as to leave a narrower passage between them for the emission of the breath, than the vowel e in over in such a process requires.

Ou has a short and long sound: the former is conveyed in the French words poule, boule, coule; and the English u, ou, o, oo, in pull, could, wolf, wool. The latter in the French words goût, soûler; and the English ou, oo, in group, pool.

Of the four Nasal Vowels, an, in, on, un.

AN.

The sound of this vowel is also represented in French by aen, am, ean, en, ent, aon, but in this Key it is only represented by an or an, according as it is short or long. This nasal sound may be extracted from the English words want, wand. The learner, in extracting this sound, must carefully avoid modifying it by any motion of the organ of speech, as it is a simple emission of the breath like all other vowels, but, passing through the nose, instead of the mouth, and of course is unassisted by the organ of speech, dissimilar, on that account, to the English mode of pronouncing the name Ann.

IN.

The sound of this vowel is also represented in French by aim, ain, im, ein. In this Key ein has been preferred. That sound may be extracted, with a sufficient degree of accuracy, from the English word shan't. I repeat the important caution, that the learner must carefully avoid modifying the sound represented by ein, in, &c., which is merely a simple emission of the breath, passing through the nose only, and of course without any motion of the organ of speech,

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