jocose, joke, loach, loaf, loath, locomotive, locust, lotion, moat, mope, mote, motive, motion, narcosis, negotiate, note, notary, notice, notion, oaf, oak, oakum, oat, oath, open, opium, opiate, parochial, poach, poke, post, potable, potent, potentate, precocious, procreate, prognocis, promotion, protest, (s.) quote, quota, quotation, remote, reproach, revoke, roach, roast, rope, rotatory, rote, scope, slope, sloth, smoke, smote, soak, soap, sociable, social, sofa, spoke, stoker, stroke, throat, toast, token, tope, total, trophy, trope, utopian, vocal, votary, vote, wrote, yoke, yolk; bolt, bolster, bolter, colt, colter, dolt, holt, jolt, moult, molten, poultry, poultice, revolt, volt, won't.

III. Aonian, bonus, bowline, Caledonian, clover, cobalt, curioso, demoniac, diploma, encomium, ennoble, eolian, erosion, foliage, folio, froward, frozen, gnomon, harmonious, hautboy, holy, immelodious, inconsolable, incontrollable, inharmonious, inodorous, mastodon, matrimonial, mohair, molar, moment, noble, October, odious, odour, odorous, ogle, ogre, olio, omen, omer, onyx, opponent, oval, over, overboard, overt, overture, ovine, pagoda, parsimonious, petroleum, probate, Roman, roseate, sober, soda, solar, spoliate, toga, trover, zodiac.

IV. Appose, arrode, atone, behold, blown, bold, bole, boll, bone, bowl, brogue, close, (v.) clothes, clove, code, cogniac, cold, coal, condole, cove, comb, corrode, crosier, depone, depose, dethrone, dispose, doge, dole, dome, doze, droll, drone, explode, expose, flown, foal, foam, fold, gloze, groan, hold, hole, homely, hose, hosier, impose, incommode, control, indisposed, infold, intone, knoll, load, loam, loan, loathe, lobe, moan, mode, mole, mould, node, nones, nose, ode, old, oppose, opprobrious, osier, own, parasol, pistole, pole, poll, pose, prone, probe, propose, road, roam, roan, rogue, roll, rose, rove, repose, scold, shoal, shown, shrove, sold, soldier, sole, soul, stone, stove, suppose, swollen, though, thowl, throve, throne, toad, told, toll, tone, troll, unload, uphold, vogue, woad, wold, wove, zone.

V. Although, beau, below, bestow, blow, bo, bow, bureau, crow,

dough, flow, foe, fro, glow, go, grow, ho, hoe, holloa, know, lo, low, mow, no, owe, roe, row, show, sloe, slow, snow, so, sow, stow, throe, throw, toe, tow, trow, woe.

THIRTEENTH VOWEL.

OBSERVATIONS.-This is the closest of the Labial class of Vowels. In its correct formation, the base of the tongue is depressed, and the lips are evenly approximated. Its mechanism is very often rendered deforming to the mouth, by the lips being "thrust out like a funnel." Indeed, this is the mode of formation set down in the great majority of books which profess to give directions on the subject; but it is faulty in many ways, both to the eye and ear. It muffles the voice, and deprives it of depth and mellowness; it is a hindrance to expressive utterance; and it impedes the actions of articulation, and renders them heavy, thus creating, or greatly aggravating, difficulty in cases of stammering and defective articulation. The corners of the lips should meet, and their central edges approximate, without projection; and the depression of the root of the tongue should be so firm as to round off the angle of the neck and chin. The close position of the lips is merely required to lessen the external aperture of the mouth, and, in whatever way this may be effected, the sound will be modified into oo. The projection of the lips is therefore as perfectly unnecessary as it is unquestionably graceless.

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This element, like the 1st, has an Articulative effect, when the modifying organs are further approximated during the continuance of the sound. By a slight appulse of the lips, the vowel oo becomes the articulation W. Thus if the lips be momentarily compressed between the finger and thumb while sounding oo, the voice will be modified into woo, woo, woo, &c.

Words ending with oo are liable to the fault noticed with respect to E, (page 80); the sound dies away in breath as the organs, assume their close position. This habit will be easily corrected by prolonging the sound, and sharply finishing it in the glottis, without waste of breath.

The thirteenth vowel is so associated with the articulation Y in English, from the Alphabetic monograph U bearing the compound name Yoo, that the English student has often some difficulty in believing that u= =yoo is more than a simple vowel; but he must lose sight of letters in his study of sounds, and then he will be able to analyze this seemingly simple element, and detect in it an articulative action, as well as a vowel sound.

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In Scotland we commonly hear the 3rd Labio-Lingual formation û (French) instead of o0. This is the general Scotch pronunciation of words containing

13

oo represented by o or oo, as in do, too, &c. In some districts the Lingual sound

2 1

i or ee is used,- -as in dee for do, seen for soon, skill for school, fill for fool, &c.;

and in long syllables, as when the vowel is final, the Third vowel (monophthongal) is not uncommon; as in tae for too, day for do, &c. Thus the

3

12

3 3

û 3 13

2

sentence, "Poor John's so heated that he's just gone out to cool himself," conveys to an English ear the rather startling assertion, that "John is so hated that he has just gone out to kill himself."

Element Thirteen is the common Scotch sound of the English diphthong 7-13, as in house, plough, now, cow, &c. pronounced hoose, ploo, noo, coo, &c.

In Ireland this vowel is seldom heard exactly as in England; the vernacular sound used instead of oo is the Labio-Lingual formation produced by the union of the formations. This gives a very peculiar sound, which an English mouth will have some trouble to mould. The Irish sound will be Anglicised by simply holding the tongue well back; the labial position being the same as for 00.

EXERCISES.

Unaccented.-Ambush, anteroom, arrowroot, bivouac, bridegroom, brunette, brutality, cesspool, cherubim, comminute, congruous, courant, crusade, faithful, ferula, fruition, fulfil, hurrah! huzzah! instrument, into, issue, pressure, prudential, prunello, rendezvous, routine, rubescent, rupee, souchong, tissue, together, toupet, treasure, unto, virulent.

Accented, (short). -II. Book, brook, butcher, cook, crook, cuckoo, cushat, cushion, foot, footman, footstool, hook, look, nook, partook, push, puss, put, rook, ruth, ruthless, soot, took, pulpit.

III. Bosom, bullock, bullet, bulletin, bully, courier, fuller, goody, pullet, pulley, sugar, unbosom, unwomanly, woman, womanhood, woody, woollen.

IV. Bull, bullion, bulwark, full, fully, good, hood, pull, should, stood, wood, woodman, wool, would, would-be.

(Long) I. Alleluiah, congruity, cruel, cruet, doer, druid, fluid, gruel, incongruity, insure, poor, roué, ruin, sure, surety, tour, truism, your.

II. Behoof, boot, booth, booty, bouquet, brutal, caboose, coop, coot, croop, crucify, croupier, droop, fluke, flute, fruit, fruitage, goose, croup, hoof, hoop, hoot, hookah, inhoop, inscrutable, loof, looping, loose, moot, peruke, poop, proof, recruit,

reproof, roof, roost, route, rufous, ruler, rutilant, schooner, scruple, scrutable, shoot, sloop, sooth, soup, spruce, stoop, tooth, troop, truce, truth, uncouth, whoop, wootz, woof, youth.

III. Cerulean, booty, doodle, foolish, frugal, gloomy, looby, manœuvre, moonish, obtrusion, oozy, ousel, prudent, prudish, removal, rheumatism, rhubarb, ruby, rudiment, ruminate, rumour, schooling, smoother, souvenir, trusion.

IV. Admove, approve, balloon, behove, bloom, boon, boom, bouse, brood, broom, bruise, brucine, buffoon, cardoon, cartoon, choose, cocoon, cool, crude, cruise, detrude, doom, doubloon, food, fool, galloon, gloom, gouge, groom, groove, harpoon, improve, intomb, loom, loon, lose, maroon, monsoon, mood, moon, move, noon, noose, ooze, pantaloon, peruse, picaroon, bigaroon, platoon, poltroon, pool, prove, prude, prune, remove, reprove, rheum, rood, room, rouge, rubric, rule, ruse, saloon, school, shrewd, smooth, soon, soothe, spoon, spontoon, spool, stool, swoon, tool, whose, whom, womb, wound, yule.

V. Accrue, ado, beshrew, bestrew, brew, coo, crew, do, drew, halloo, Hindoo, loo, ormolu, ragout, rue, screw, shampoo, shoe, shrew, strew, taboo, tattoo, threw, through, too, true, two, undo, who, woo, you.

THE ASPIRATE, H.

OBSERVATIONS.—We have shown, at page 36, that the letter H does not represent any fixed formation, but simply an aspiration of the succeeding element. Thus H before e is a whispered e, before a a whispered a, &c.—differing, however, from the simple whispered vowel by the inexplosive commencement of the aspiration, as before explained;—and H before alphabetic u— which, it will be remembered, represents the combination y-oo-denotes a whispered Y, as in hue, human, &c. pronounced Yhue: Yhyoo, Yhuman, &c. Some writers analyze the combination Wh, correspondently, into Whw; and it must be acknowledged that many persons do pronounce such words as what, which, when, &c. with a Vocal as well as a Breath W,What, Whwen, &c. but this is by no means the general mode. Wh-the Breath W-is often in these words used independently; although its lingual correspondent, the Breath Y, is not so used in English.

=

English speakers too commonly omit the aspirate of Y and W, and so confound in their pronunciation, such words as hue and you, which and witch, whale and wail, whither and wither, whig and wig. These aspirations are very unwelcome to the English mouth, but they can only be omitted at the expense of ambiguity. How very awkward to have a brother named Hugh." I assure you I gave the book to 'Ugh." "I beg your pardon,-that you certainly never did." "Upon my honour!-'Ugh cannot have forgotten it." "I!come, come!" "You! no, no, I did not mean you, but 'Ugh,—your brother 'Ugh!"

The Vowel aspirate is very irregularly used in many parts of England; it is heard when it should be silent, and silent when it should be sounded; and that with such perverse obstinacy that pure initial vowels are almost unheard, except in cases where they ought to be aspirated. A gentleman dining on cold hare, astonished his entertainer, by exclaiming, "The hair is very 'ot. Explaining himself, when he observed the misapprehension, he said, "I mean the hair we breathe, and not the 'are we're heating."

This remarkable perversity of custom has been amusingly made the subject of a petition in verse from the letter H to the inhabitants of Shrewsbury, who are notorious for their haddiction to this abit.

Whereas by you I have been driven

From House, from Home, from Hope, from Heaven ;

And placed by your most learn'd society

In Ills, and Anguish, and Anxiety :

Charged, too, without one just pretence,
With Atheism and Impudence,-

I now demand full restitution,

And beg you'll mend your Elocution!

To this petition by the Rev. R. W. Evans, an aspiring Shrewsbury poetess

aptly rejoined :

Whereas we rescued you, ingrate,

From Horror, Havoc, and from Hate,

From Horse-pond, Hungering, and from Halter,

And consecrated you on Altar,

And placed you, where you'd never be,

In Honour, and in Honesty ;

We think your talking an intrusion,

And shall not change our Elocution.

Many public speakers contract a very disagreeable habit of giving a vocal commencement to H,-ŭhold, ŭhundred, &c.,—as if fearful that otherwise it would not reach the ears of their auditors. But if it be legitimately aspirated, and no more, it will not fail of audibility: the succeeding vowel makes it heard far better than can the tasteless expedient of putting a vowel sound before it.