Chap, vii.] SOME SPECIAL MECHANISMS. 1093 



is easy to say which is a vowel and which is a consonant, it is 

 difficult to frame a definition which shall be free from all objec- 

 tions. It has been said that vowels are formed by the voice, 

 that is by the vibrations of the vocal cords (hence the name 

 vowel, vocalis), and consonants by the mouth, lips or other parts 

 of the chamber above the larynx ; but as we shall see, on the 

 one hand the vowels, as indeed the name which we have adopted 

 for the chamber indicates, are formed by help of that chamber, 

 and on the other hand many consonants are formed by help of 

 the voice. The word 'consonant' expresses the view that what 

 we call consonants are always sounded with some vowel or other 

 and cannot be sounded alone by themselves ; but several conso- 

 nants can be so sounded ; hence the name is inappropriate. We 

 may make the distinction that whereas in a vowel the form 

 assumed by the resonance tube merely modifies the sound pro- 

 duced by the larynx, in a consonant a change of form in the 

 same tube creates a noise which may exist by itself or may 

 mingle with the sound produced by the larynx ; but this is not 

 exact, since as we shall see such a consonant as M may be used 

 (as for instance in 'bottom,' in which though we write we do 

 not sound the second o) in such a way that the form of the 

 mouth only modifies a laryngeal sound, and the utterance may 

 be continued indefinitely, like that of a vowel. Indeed we 

 employ iJf and certain other consonants in two ways; we use M 

 as a true consonant in company with a vowel as in ' my ' or, as 

 in the above instance, we may use it by itself, it alone forming 

 a syllable. In this latter function M may conveniently be called 

 a sonant, the sounds of speech being divided into ' sonants ' and 

 true ' consonants.' We may however leave these definitions and 

 turn at once to the mode of formation of the several vowels 

 and consonants, or rather to the more common of these, since 

 each language has its own vowels and sounds, and while some 

 are common to all, some are special to a few, or even to one. 

 We may merely remark that in speech the vowels bear the brunt 

 of the work, they carry the ' accent,' and the consonants are, so 

 to speak, built upon them as on a foundation. Some consonants 

 (sonants) however may be used like vowels to carry accent. 



§ 680. Vowels. With the utterance, either in singing or 

 speaking, of each vowel the vowel chamber is moulded into a 

 particular shape. Taking the most common vowels U, O, A, E, I 

 pronounced in the way in which most nations pronounce them 

 and so corresponding to our oo, o, broad a (a/t), e as in bet, and 

 ee, we find the following. 



In U the vowel chamber is large with a narrow opening at 

 the mouth. The larynx is depressed, or at least not raised above 

 the position of rest, the tongue is flattened, especially in front, 

 and the lips are protruded so as to reduce the mouth to a narrow 

 round opening. The form of the vowel chamber, with a wide 



