Indian Lansuas^es in J^orth America, 



3C9 



F. 



The letter F, whenever it shall be wanted, will have ifs usual 



r _ 



power. But probably there will not be much use for it in many 



of the Indian dialects ; for Mr. Heckewelder observes of the 



Delaware language, which is the basis of many others, that it 



has ^( no such consonants as the German ic, or English v, F, 

 or rJ'^ 



G, GH, GS. 



The letter 6r, whatever vowel may happen to follow it, should 

 invariably have the sound, which we call in English its hard 

 sound ; and which it generally has before a^ o and «, in the 

 European languages as well as our own. This power of G is 



F 



commonly traced back no farther than the times of our Saxon 

 ancestors ; but scholars have supposed, and upon 



no slight 



§ 



J 



that this was also its common 



d, or a very near 



approximation to its common sound among the Romans, when it 

 was followed by either of the vowels. 



Gh may be used to denote the fat guttural of the Irish, 

 which is the corresponding sound to the sharj) guttural, or Ger- 

 man ch $ which last I should prefer designating by M, as Sir 

 William Jones reconimends in the Oriental languages, and as will 

 presently be more particularly considered under the letter JT. 



Gs will be wanted to denote the flat sound of x, in our word 



pU and other words of that form 



? 



th 



cedes the accented sijllahle ; as Ics will be wanted 

 skavv sound which. a? 



xpr 



;ss the 



has in our 



d 



nd 



which have the Xin the accented syllable 



* Correspondence with Mr. Du Ponceau, p. 396. See also the J\hte on the 

 letter Wm the present communication. 



