OF ARTICULATE SOUNDS. 309 



nite article to such words,) whilst others regard it as a peculiar vowel. A 

 slight attention to the position of the vocal organs during its pronunciation, 

 makes it very clear, that its sound in such words really corresponds with that 

 of the long (English) e ; the pronunciation of the word yawl being the same 

 as that of eaul, when the first sound is not prolonged, but rapidly transformed 

 into the second. The sound of the letter w, moreover, is really of the vowel 

 character, being formed in the rapid transition from oo to the succeeding 

 vowel; thus wall might be spelt ooall. Many similar difficulties might be 

 removed, and the conformity between spoken and written language might be 

 greatly increased (so as to render far more easy the acquirement of the former 

 from the latter), by due attention to the state of the vocal organs in the pro- 

 duction of the simple sounds. 



416. It is not very difficult to produce a tolerably good artificial imitation 

 of the Vowel sounds. This was accomplished by Kempelen, by means of an 

 India-rubber ball, with an orifice at each end, of which the lower one was 

 attached to a reed; by modifying the form of the ball, the different vowels 

 could be sounded during the action of the reed. He also employed a short 

 funnel-like tube, and obtained the different sounds by covering its wide open- 

 ing to a greater or less extent. This last experiment has been repeated by 

 Mr. Willis ; who has also found that the vowel sounds might be imitated, by 

 drawing out a long straight tube from the reed. In this experiment he arrived 

 at a curious result: with a tube of a certain length, the series of vowels, 

 i, e, a, 0, u, was obtained, by gradually drawing it out; but, if the length was 

 increased to a certain point, a further gradual increase would produce the 

 same sequence in an inverted order, u, o, , e, i; a still further increase would 

 produce a return to the first scale, and so on. When the pitch of the reed 

 was high, and the pipe short, it was found that the vowels o and u could not 

 be distinctly formed, the proper tone being injured by the elongation of the 

 pipe necessary to produce them ; and this, Mr. Willis remarks, is exactly the 

 case with the Human voice, most singers being unable to pronounce u and o 

 upon their highest notes. 



417. The most natural primary division of the Consonants is into those 

 which require a total stoppage of the breath at the moment previous to their 

 being pronounced, and which, therefore, cannot be prolonged ; and those in 

 pronouncing which the interruption is partial, and which can, like the vowel 

 sounds, be prolonged ad libitum. The former have received the designation 

 of explosive; and the latter of continuous. In pronouncing the explosive con- 

 sonants, the posterior nares are completely closed, so that the exit of air through 

 the nose is altogether prevented ; and the current may be checked in the 

 mouth in three ways, by the approximation of the lips, by the approxima- 

 tion of the point of the tongue to the front of the palate, and by the approxi- 

 mation of the middle of the tongue to the arch of the palate. In the first of 

 these modes, we pronounce the letters b, and p; in the second, </, and t; in 

 the third, the hard g, and k. The difference between &, </, and g, on the one 

 hand, and jo, , and k,* on the other, seems to depend on this ; that in the 

 former group the approximating surfaces are larger, and the breath is sent 

 through them more strongly at the moment of opening, than in the latter. 

 The continuous consonants may be again subdivided, according to the degree 

 of freedom with which the air is allowed to make its exit, and the compression 

 which it consequently experiences. 1. The first class includes those in 

 which no passage of air takes place through the nose, and in which the parts 

 of the mouth that produce the sound are nearly approximated together, so that 



* For the sake of proper comparison, this letter should be sounded not as kay but 

 as key. 



