NOTE TO THE SECOND EDITION.

By a decree of the French Minister of Public Instruction, dated February 26th, 1901, certain deviations from commonly accepted rules of grammar are permitted at all examinations held under his control. In the Appendix (see last page of this volume) will be found a reference list explaining the bearing of these deviations upon the various sections of the Grammar affected thereby.

vi

FRENCH GRAMMAR.

PHONETIC INTRODUCTION.

I. General Distinctions. The pronunciation will be explained, as far as possible, by comparison with English sounds, but it must never be forgotten that the sounds of two languages rarely correspond. Important general distinctions between English and French are the following:

1. English has strong stress (§7) and comparatively weak action of the organs in articulation.

2. French has weak stress, while the action of the organs in articulation is very energetic.

3. Hence, French sounds, both vowels and consonants, are almost all 'narrow,' i.e., uttered with tenseness of the organs concerned in their articulation. (To understand 'narrow' and 'wide,' compare the narrow sound of ea in 'seat' with the wide sound of i in 'sit.')

4. Tongue and lip positions for French vowels are more definite, and more promptly taken, than in English. Lip-rounding (as in 'who,' 'no,' 'law') and lip-retraction (as in 'let,' 'hat') are much more definite and energetic in forming French vowels.

5. The tongue, both for vowels and consonants, is, in general, either further advanced or further retracted than in forming English sounds requiring tongue action.

6. English long vowels (like a in 'fate') are diphthongal (especially as pronounced in the South of England), while French vowels, whether long or short, are uniform throughout their utterance.

7. The nasal vowels of French are entirely foreign to English. They are formed by allowing the soft palate to hang freely, as in ordinary breathing, thus causing the air to escape through both nose and mouth at once. If, for example, the a of 'father' be uttered with the soft palate hanging freely, the resulting sound will be approximately that of the nasal [ã] in 'tante' [tãit]. The position of the soft

palate in forming this sound may be readily observed with a mirror. It must be carefully noted that there is absolutely no sound of n, m, or ng, in French nasal vowels, and hence that great care must be taken neither to raise the tongue nor close the lips until the sound is complete.

2. Sounds. The French language has thirty-seven sounds, exclusive of minor distinctions. The orthography, like that of English, is irregular and inconsistent. Hence, to avoid confusion in indicating the pronunciation, we shall employ a phonetic alphabet (that of the 'Association Phonétique Internationale'), in which each sound is represented by but one symbol, and each symbol has but one sound.

3. Table of Symbols. In the following table, the examples are in ordinary orthography, the heavy type indicates the sounds which correspond to the symbols, and the phonetic transcription is given within brackets:—

4. The Alphabet. The letters of the alphabet, with their French names, are as follows::

NOTE.-Words are commonly spelled by naming their letters, as above, together with the other orthographic signs, if any.

5. Other Orthographic Signs. In addition to the letters of the alphabet, the following signs are used:—

1. The acute accent, Fr. 'accent aigu' [aksat egy], e.g., l'été, l'Écosse.

2. The grave accent Fr. 'accent grave' [aksã gra:v], e.g., voilà, père, où.

3. The circumflex accent ^, Fr. 'accent circonflexe' [aksã sirkɔ̃flɛks], e.g., âne, tête, île, hôte, flûte.

Observe: None of the above accent marks serve to denote stress (§ 7).

4. The cedilla, Fr. 'cédille' [sedi:j], used under c to give it the sound of [s], before a, o, u (§ 17, 13), e.g., façade, leçon, commençait, commençons, reçûmes, reçu.

5. The diæresis ", Fr. ́tréma' [trema], shows that the vowel bearing it is divided in pronunciation from the preceding vowel, e.g., Noël, naïf.

6. The apostrophe, Fr. apostrophe' [apostrof], shows omission of final vowel before initial vowel sound, e.g., l'amie (= la amie), l'ami (= le ami), l'homme (=le homme), s'il (=si il), § 19.

7. The hyphen, Fr. 'trait d'union' [tre d ynjɔ̃], used as in English. 6. Syllabication.

1. A single consonant sound between vowel sounds always belongs to the following syllable.

Ex.: Ma-rie, in-di-vi-si-bi-li-té, a-che-ter.

2. Two consonants, of which the second is 1 or r (but not the combinations rl or lr), similarly both belong to the following syllable. Ex.: ta-bleau, é-cri-vain.

3. Other combinations of consonants representing two or more sounds are divided.

Ex.: par-ler, per-dre, es-ca-lier.

N.B.-Great care should be taken to avoid the consonantal ending of syllables, so frequent in English. Compare French 'ci-té,' 'ta-bleau,' with English 'cit-y,' 'tab-leau.'

7. Stress.

'Stress' is the force with which a syllable is uttered as compared with other syllables in the same group. In French, the syllables are uttered with almost equal force, a very slight stress falling on the last syllable of a word of two or more syllables, or, on the last but one, if the last vowel of the word is [ə].

Ex.: Che-val, par-ler, par-lai, per-dre, cré-di-bi-li-té (compare the strong stress of English cred-i-bil-it-y).

NOTE.-In connected discourse the rule above stated varies considerably, but a full treatment of the subject would exceed the limits of an elementary work. The safest practice for the beginner is to pronounce all syllables with almost equal force. It should be remembered that accent-marks have nothing to do with stress, and that all vowels, except [ǝ], see § 19, whether stressed or unstressed, have their full value, never being slurred over as in English.

8. Vowel Quantity. The most important general rules

are:

1. Final vowel sounds (including nasals) are regularly short, e.g., fini [fini], vie [vi], loue [lu], parlé [parle], rideau [rido], mais [mɛ], donner [done], enfant [ãfã], parlerons [parlərɔ̃].

2. Stressed vowels are long before the sounds [v], [z], [3]; [j], [r final], e.g., rive [ri:v], ruse [ry:z], rouge [ru:3], feuille [fœ:j], faire [fɛ:r].

3. Of stressed vowels standing before other consonant sounds, nasals are long, e.g., prince [prẽ:s]; [o], [ø], long, e.g., faute [fo:t], meule [mø:1]; [a], long (almost always), e.g., passe [pa:s]; [ɛ], long or short, e.g., reine [rɛ:n], renne [ren]; other vowels regularly short, e.g., cap [kap], poche [pɔ], koupe [kup], pipe [pip], seul [sal], lune [lyn].

NOTE. It is possible to distinguish also between 'long' and 'half long' vowels, but it has been thought best to omit, in an elementary work, the rules relating to this distinction, and to indicate 'long' vowels only in the transcriptions.