16 BUREAU OF AMERICAISr ETHNOLOGY [bull. 40 



accented on some one syllable), it takes on one of two or three musical 

 inflections : 



(1) A simple pitch distinctly higher than the normal pitch of 

 unstressed speech (-) . 



(2) A rising inflection that starts at, or a trifle above, the normal 

 pitch, and gradually slides up to the same higher pitch referred to 

 above (=^). 



(3) A falling inflection that starts at, or general!}'- somewhat 

 higher than, the raised pitch of (1) and (2), and gradually slides 

 down to fall either in the same or immediately following syllable, to 

 a pitch somewhat lower than the normal (-). 



The ''raised" pitch (^) is employed only in the case of final short 

 vowels or shortened diphthongs (i. e., diphthongs that, owing to 

 speed of utterance, are pronounced so rapidly as to have a quanti- 

 tative value hardly greater than that of short vowels; also sec- 

 ondary diphthongs involving an inorganic a); if a short vowel 

 spoken on a raised pitch be immediately followed by an unac- 

 cented syllable (as will always happen, if it is not the final 

 vowel of the word), there will evidently ensue a fall in pitch in the 

 unaccented syllable, and the general acoustic effect of the two 

 syllables wUl be equivalent to a "falling" inflection (-) within one 

 syllable; i. e. (if — be employed to denote an unaccented syllable), 



(-) H =(-)• The following illustration will make this clearer: 



YOU SANG is regularly accented lielelaY, the a^ being sung on an 

 interval of a (minor, sometimes even major) third above the two 

 unaccented e- vowels. The acoustic effect to an American ear is very 

 much the same as that of a curt query requiring a positive or nega- 

 tive answer, did he go ? where the i of did and e of he correspond in 

 pitch to the two e's of the Takelma word, while the o of go is equiva- 

 lent to the Takelma a\ The Takelma word, of course, has no 

 interrogative connotation. If, now, we wish to make a question out 

 of JielelaH', we add the interrogative particle di, and obtain the 

 form lielela'Vidi did he sing? (The i is a weak vowel inserted to 

 keep the V and d apart.) Here the a' has about the same pitch as 

 in the preceding word, but the I sinks to about the level of the e- 

 vowels, and the di is pronoimced approximately a third below the 

 normal level. The Takelma interrogative form thus bears an acoustic 

 resemblance to a rapid English reply: so he did go, the o of so and 



§ 5 



