THE POPULAR EDUCATOR. 



of course quite incompatible with this state of things, the 

 people passed under the yoke from which their forefathers 

 escaped, their only satisfaction being that their tyrant was one 

 of themselves and within reach. 



All the larger republics held, by treaty or conquest, districts 

 of land and cities apart from their own. Tribute, contributions 

 of men and material were exacted from these, and in war-time 

 they suffered all and more than the hardships borne by the 

 owning republic. Sometimes they were a source of weakness, 

 choosing the time of their master's trouble to pay out some iU 

 will and to requite some oppression ; but generally the deterring 

 influence of fear of punishment after the war kept them loyal, 

 in deed at all events. The civil and foreign wars endured by 

 the republics were continuous, and when very bitter, ruinous. 

 This was the case with the wars between Genoa and Venice, 

 until the latter prevailed in what proved to be at once a fatal 

 struggle for Genoa, and one from which the other state emerged 

 stronger than before. In 1378, Venice, which by her wealth and 

 power had excited the cupidity and envy of other republics, drew 

 down the united forces of Genoa, Padua, and Hungary upon her. 

 The Genoese admiral, Doria, blockaded the city with a fleet of 

 which the strength seemed overwhelming ; distress made Venice 

 ask terms of peace, which were refused by Genoa ; and the 

 ambassadors who went to sue, returned to Venice with the 

 assurance that there should be no peace till the allies had put a 

 curb " in the mouths of those wild horses that stand upon the 

 place of St. Mark." Desperate men do desperate things ; and the 

 Venetians, under the conduct of their admiral, Pisani, thereafter 

 attacked the Genoese, and fought so well that they destroyed 

 the enemy's fleet, and compelled the Genoese to fall back upon 

 their allies in order to save themselves from annihilation. From 

 this time Genoa declined in power, and Venice began to acquire 

 it. For the moment, Venice had to make concessions to the 

 King of Hungary and the Lord of Padua ; but she grew yearly 

 in strength, and the time came when she reduced Padua to the 

 condition of a dependency, and made the Hungarians anxious to 

 secure her alliance. Long after all the other republics had been 

 overthrown, or absorbed in the territory of some grand duke, 

 Venice remained, for wealth and influence, one of the most 

 important states in Europe. Though shorn of much splendour, 

 stripped of almost all her mainland territory, and no longer the 

 entrepot for commerce between Europe and the East, she con- 

 tinued to elect her doge or head magistrate every year, and to 

 preserve a kind of independence, until Napoleon Bonaparte 

 executed the threat of the Genoese admiral, and put a bridle in 

 the mouths of the horses of St. Mark. In 1797 the Republic of 

 Venice ceased to exist, and in 1814 was by treaty embodied in 

 the Austrian empire, a disposition which, though familiar enough 

 historically to all the other republics, was as utterly unknown 

 historically as it was uncongenial to Venice. Hence the deep 

 hatred, deeper than in Milan or other Lombard cities, felt by the 

 Venetians for the Tedeschi during the whole period of occupa- 

 tion ; hence the delight with which, after the battle of Sadowa, 

 the Venetians found that the restoration of their city to Italian 

 hands was one of the articles in the Austro-Prnssian treaty of 

 peace. For the rest, the many other republics to which allusion 

 has been made herein, fell one by one under the authority of a 

 few of the strongest among their brethren ; and these again, 

 as the progress of larger kingdoms in the west and north 

 became more marked and their condition more settled, were 

 found to be incompatible with the new order of things, and 

 were accordingly taken to form parts of grand duchies (for 

 the most part under German grand dukes), till these again fell 

 to pieces under the disintegrating Italian policy of Napoleon 

 III., and became, after Magenta and Solferino, part and parcel 

 of the present kingdom of Italy. 



LESSONS IN ITALIAN IX. 



VH. THE ACCENTS (continued). 

 2. THE ACUTE ACCENT 



THE acute accent has been adopted by modern authors as the 

 mark to show the difference of meaning in some words of the 

 same spelling, though differently pronounced, which words, 

 without the acute sign, might occasion confusion and ambiguity, 

 particularly in the case where words of more than one syllable 

 terminate in the diphthongs ia, ie, and io, and from the use of 

 the acute sign over the i. and the necessary stress laid on the 



syllable thus accented, acquire a different signification. But 

 even in words ending in io and ia, and presenting no ambiguity, 

 the acute sign is not unfrequently placed merely to indicate 

 that the letter i does not make the two terminating vowels o 

 and a in conjunction with the i diphthongs, but that they are 

 separate syllables. It is a characteristic of the acute sign that it 

 can never be used in final letters, like the grave accent. But 

 the use of this accent is, generally speaking, not regulated by 

 invariable rules, and is frequently left to the discretion of the 

 writer. The acute sign, which I have adopted in these gram- 

 matical instructions, exactly answers the purpose for which it 

 has been introduced by Italian writers, with this difference only, 

 that I shall use it throughout the whole course of the grammar, 

 while they place it merely on some words to avoid ambiguity. 



I shall only give a list of words where it is more generally 

 used, some of which I have already quoted in the preceding 

 pronouncing tables : NaUo (nah-tee-o), natia (nah-tee-ah), natal, 

 native ; restio (rai-stee-o), restive, stubborn ; stantio (stahn- 

 tee-o), old, stale, fruitless ; leggio (led-jee-o), reading-desk, a 

 painter's easel ; ubbia (oob-bee-ah), bad presage ; malia (mah- 

 lee-ah), sorcery, enchantment ; bastia (ba-stee-ah), bastion ; 

 strofinfo (stro-fee-nee-o), scouring, rubbing ; mormorlo (morr- 

 mo-ree-o), buzzing, murmur ; rovinio (ro-vee-nee-o), great noise ; 

 fidcine (feed-tchee-nai), skin of raisin-stones ; ztifolo (tsdo-fo-lo), 

 a whistle ; mdrgine (mahrr-jee-nai), scar, edge, margin. 



With the Acute Sign. 

 Balia (bah-led-ah), power. 

 Gia (je<$-ah), he went. 

 Ni (ne-ee), moles, patches. 

 Ancora (ahu-ko-rah), anchor. 



Without the Acute Sign. 

 Balia (bah-lee-ah), nurse. 

 Gid (jah), already, indeed. 

 Nei (nii-ee), in the (pi.). 

 Ancora (abii-ko-rah), again. 



Strvpiccio (stro-pit-tcWe-o), fric- Stropiccio, (stro-p(t-tcho), I rub. 

 tion, rubbing. 



3. THE CIRCUMFLEX ACCENT. 



The circumflex accent is of more recent use, particularly 

 among poets, to distinguish words of the same form, but of 

 different signification ; as, for example : 



With the Circumflex Sign. Without the Circumflex Sign. 



Torre (tor-rai), to take, seize (for Tom (tor-rai), tower. 



iogliere). 

 C6rre (kor-rai), to gather (for Cone (kor-rai), he runs. 



coyliere). 

 Amdro (ah-mah-ro), they loved (for Ammo (ah-mah-ro), bitter. 



amorono). 



FSro (fai-ro), they did. Fero (fe-ro), fierce, wild. 



Ora (6-rah), breeze, zephyr. Ora (6-rah), now. 



AllSr (ahl-lor), laurel (for aUoro or Allora (ahl-16-rah), then. 



allori). 

 Udtr (oo-dee"r), they heard (for Udire (oo-dee"-rai), to hear. 



udlrono). 



The reader will have remarked that the circumflex 6 in the 

 above examples has the open sound ; and thus this marking of 

 those words on the part of modern Italian authors agrees with 

 the sign that I have uniformly adopted to mark the open or 

 second sound of o. 



I cannot begin my exposition of the grammar of the language 

 without first offering some remarks or the use of the apostrophe 

 in Italian, which, with the general table, will conclude for the 

 present my lessons on pronunciation. Some supplementary and 

 important pronouncing tables will be given at the end of the 

 grammar. 



VIII. THE APOSTROPHE. 



The apostrophe is essentially different from accent, and 

 indicates that the word on which it is placed has been deprived 

 of a vowel or of a syllable. Where, therefore, for the sake of 

 harmony, at the beginning or end of a word, a vowel is omitted 

 because the preceding word terminates with a vowel or the 

 subsequent word begins with one, the apostrophe must be placed. 

 It can never be used in the middle, and all omissions and con- 

 tractions in the middle of words must be written without this 

 sign. For example : V amore (pronounced lah-md-rai), love (for 

 Io amore) ; dell' anima (del-lah-nee-mah), of the soul (for della 

 anima) ; doll' uomo (dahl-loo6-tno), from man (for dallo uomo}. ; 

 capo d' opera (kah-po d6-pai-rah), a masterpiece, an odd man 

 (for capo di opera) ; s' io posso (see-o-p6s-so), if I can (for se Io 

 posso) ; pens' io (pen-see-o), I think (for penso io) ; sopra 'I letto 

 (sd-prahllet-to), upon the bed (for sopra il letto) ; sotto 'I eieZo 

 (sdt-toltche-lo), under the sky (for sotto il cielo) ; e 'n questo, e 'n 

 quello (en qwai-sto, en quel-lo), as well in the latter as the former 



