1825.] 3 
Magazine, two others from Dryden and 
Bishop Hall, in which the word is used 
in the sense in which I applied it. The 
same meaning is also given to it in 
Walker’s, Buailey’s, and Crabbe’s Dic- 
tionaries, as well as in Rees’ Cyclo- 
pedia : therefore [ still believe that you 
were not justified in taxing me with 
ignorance for having made use of it. 
The rule which you say should direct. 
me, and other foreigners, in the choice 
of English words, is a very good one; 
but the word idiom is used in two dif- 
ferent senses, as well as idiotism ; for 
many eminent English writers have ap- 
plied it in the sense of dialect, which is 
its original signification, and the only 
one that, I think, it should have ; while 
the word idiotism should mean. nothing 
but @ peculiarity of expression, as you 
have the word idiotcy or idiocy, which, 
from its etymology, is a better one than 
idiotism to mean imbecility, and which, 
also, is more generally known. 
Yours, &c. E. Duvarp. 
Leeds, Sept. 18, 1825. 
——— 
To the Editor of the Monthly Magazine. 
‘Sir: 
READ with much pleasure the let- 
ter of your correspondent G.B.L., 
in your last number, on the cultivation 
of the strawberry. By way of experi- 
ment in February last, I transplanted © 
“twenty-five young plants in some good 
earth between bricks, let into the 
ground in a tessellated form — they 
occupied about a square yard ; the sides 
were enclosed with some pantiles, rather 
inclined, in order to attract the sun as 
much as possible ;—they were watered 
occasionally, as were also some of the 
same sort near them (not transplanted) ; 
those placed between bricks were much 
eatlier—far superior in size and flavour 
—and more abundant ; for although the 
pisnss were removed so late, not one 
had less than twenty strawberries, and 
several nearly double the number. I 
had the satisfaction of having a prize 
awarded by our Flower and Fruit 
Society, for a plate of them produced 
at the Exhibition the 20th of June. 
I mention this merely to convince your 
readers tliat the plan succeeded, and as 
IT am an admirer of horticultural pur- 
suits, wish to promote its adoption as 
much as possible.—Your’s, &c. 
Ross—Sept. 16, 1825. C.S 
Will any of your readers haye the 
goodness to inform me the best mode 
of preserying the auricula, during the 
an 
Montary Mac, No, 416. 
The Anatomy of Speech. ° 
305 
MR. THELWALL’S LECTURE ON THE 
ENUNCIATIVE ORGANS AND FORMA- 
TION OF THE LITERAL ELEMENTS. 
[Concluded from p. 202.] Prigant 
AM aware, that upon the formation 
of the vowels much more might be 
said; and that there is abundant room for 
criticism on what has already been writ-’ 
ten on the subject. But the task is 
endless to wade through the multitu- 
dinous schemes of vowelative utter- 
ance; many of which seem to have been 
copied without examination from pre- 
ceding theorists, and others to have 
been run into from hasty conjectures, 
without sufficient analysis or attentive 
experiment: and perhaps, after all, 
there is no part of the whole theory of 
enunciation so little capable of precise 
and satisfactory illustration from the 
. pen, as what relates to the formation 
and discrimination of the vowels. For 
these elements being formed almost 
entirely by the mere modifications of 
aperture and cavity, without contact of 
the enunciative organs, and every the 
smallest alteration, either of the form or 
dimensions of the opening, necessarily © 
producing a corresponding difference of 
sound, the possible yarieties are almost 
infinite, and the minute diversities (even 
among speakers of admitted accuracy) 
defy almost every effort. of verbal dis- 
crimination. 
Every writer (whether a native 
of the metropolis, or of Scotland, 
Ireland, or whatever province, taking 
his own practice as the standard of pro- 
priety—if he content not himself with 
the unexamined dogmas of some popu- 
lar predecessor) accommodates his defi- 
nitions to his individual usage. 
The Italians confine themselves, in 
the pure pronunciation of their lan- 
guage, to what may be called ‘the five 
distinct or perfect colours of the oral 
prism, rejecting all- the intermediate 
meltings and minglings, and thus sim- 
plify their vowels into an easily ascer- 
tainable scale; and, for aught I know, 
they may be right in so doing. But 
such, assuredly, is not our practice : and 
our usage (our best usage, I mean,) has 
obyiously more varieties than are ac- 
knowledged or explained by our most 
popular writers. hat nice ear, for 
example, will admit, after attentive exa- 
mination, that the a in a//, and the in 
popular differ only in duration or quan-— 
tity ? ‘at 
Th the pronunciation of parts of 
Scotland, it is true they do; and I have 
no doubt, that the ears even of those 
QR very 
