E. C. Hakding. — 0)1 Vowel Sounds. 427 



music of church-bells," we have only to examine some of 



those 



. . . jewels five words long 

 That on the stretched forefinger of all time 

 Sparkle for ever. 



Wherein lies the charm of their vitality? Not in the senti- 

 ment — expressed a thousand tmies before in as many forms. 

 Surely not in any mere jingle of rhyming or alliterative words. 

 It will be founcl to be deeper — in the subtle melody of the 

 vowels, each appealing to its own specific emotion of the 

 mind. Take the simple phrase, "Hearths and homes." Here 

 we find a sentiment appealing to the highest and purest emo- 

 tions of the mind, emphasized and enforced by the two noblest 

 and loftiest notes of the vowel- scale. The melody of the tones 

 being in perfect harmony with the sentiment, the two are 

 wedded, and, thus divinely joined by a natural law, they 

 cannot be put asunder.''' 



Here, I think, we may find the key to the origin of allite- 

 ration both in poetry and prose. When we group together 

 epithets like grasping and grecdij, griping and _ grudging, 

 clammy and flahhy, we are not following a mere artificial trick 

 of composition, but acting upon an instinctive perception of 

 one of the subtler laws of language itself. And, acknowledg- 

 ing that there is in each of the vowel-sounds a quality answer- 

 ing to a certain mental state, we raise the interjection, despised 

 by grammarians, to the dignity of a " part of speech" in no 

 wise inferior to the onomatopoetic substantive or adjective. It 

 is not by accident, nor is it by mere rhetorical trick, that the 

 preacher exclaims, "Ah, how sad the condition ! " or, " Oh, 

 how grand the thought ! " No correct speaker would inter- 

 change these interjections. 



* On the occasion of this paper being read, a member of the Insti- 

 tute, commenting thereon, instanced Longfellow's " Evangeline " as a 

 poem abounding in illustrations, and quoted as an example the following 

 beautiful passage : — 



Then from a neigbbouriug tliicket the mocking-bird, wildest of singers, 



STOUgiug aloft on a willow-spray that himg o'er the water, 



Shook from his little throat such floods of delirious music 



That the whole air and the woods and the waves seemed silent to listen. 



Plaintive at first were the notes and sad ; then soaring to madness 



Seemed they to follow or guide the revel of frenzied Bacchantes. 



Single notes were then heard, in sorrowful, low lamentation; 



Till, having gathei-ed them all, ho flung them abroad in derision, 



As when, after a storm, a gust of wind through the tree-tops 



Shakes down the rattling rain in a crystal shower on the branches. 



The whole poem affords a striking and beautiful example of the artistic 

 use of vowel-music. In one lino especially, since reading this paper, I 

 have found a remarkable confirmation of the characters here ascribed to 

 the long vowels : — 



Over the laws of the land and the hearts and homes of the people. 

 Each of the long vowels analysed in this article occurs in this line, and 

 each one in the precise mental character which is its peculiar and especial 

 characteristic. 



