152 SPEAKING MACHINES. SECT. XVII. 



joints. Upon drawing out a tube while a column of air from the 

 bellows of an organ is passing through it, the vowels are pro- 

 nounced in the order, ", e, a, o, u. On extending the tube, they 

 are repeated after a certain interval, in the inverted order, 

 , o, a, e, i. After another interval they are again obtained in 

 the direct order, and so on. When the pitch of the reed is very 

 high, it is impossible to sound some of the vowels, which is in 

 perfect correspondence with the human voice, female singers 

 being unable to pronounce u and o in their high notes. From 

 the singular discoveries of M. Savart on the nature of the 

 human voice, and the investigations of Mr. Willis on the me- 

 chanism of the larynx, it may be presumed that ultimately the 

 utterance or pronunciation of modern languages will be conveyed, 

 not only to the eye, but also to the ear of posterity. Had the 

 ancients possessed the means of transmitting such definite sounds, 

 the civilised world would still have responded in sympathetic 

 notes at the distance of many ages. 



