DIACRITICAL MARKS CONTINUED. 121 



completely open, a portion of the sounding breath 

 merely being at the same time thrown through the 

 nose. In the utterance of the French an (ah n ), the 

 organs of the throat and mouth are as completely 

 open as in pronouncing a (ah), and the slight n- 

 quality which is heard with the vowel comes of the 

 surplus of sounding breath thrown at the same in- 

 stant into the nasal passages, or into the head and 

 nose. The French un (uh n ) is merely a slight grunt, 

 often heard in English, not as a recognized part of lan- 

 guage, but as a sort of involuntary interjection. For 

 a full account of these Nasalized Vowel-Sounds, as 

 they occur in French, see Andrews' and Batchelor's 

 "French Instructor," Introduction, p. 47; and " The 

 Key " to the same. 1 



154. The Vowel-Scale of Eight Vowels, Table No. 1, 

 (94) leaves the Length, Stress, and Peculiar Ictus of 

 which those sounds are susceptible to be determined, 

 as may be necessary, by Additional Marks (called 

 Diacritical.) These are mostly such as are already 

 of familiar use in English for similar purposes ; 

 namely the " Long Mark " (a), the "Short Mark" 

 (a), and the "Accent Mark " ('), already noticed (151.) 

 The so-called Grave-Accent (a) is used to mark 

 " Stopped Vowels," or such as are both Short and 

 characterized by Ictus, or a sudden and abrupt style 

 of utterance, as i, e, a, in pit, pet, pat, etc. These 

 words are, therefore, represented, Alwali, thus : pit, 

 pet, pat ; while peet, pate, pare, are printed as pit, 



1 New York : D. Appleton & Co. 

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