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The Art of Writing and Speaking the English Language by  Sherwin Cody.

The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Art Of Writing & Speaking The English

Language, by Sherwin Cody

 This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with

almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or

re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included

with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org

Title: The Art Of Writing & Speaking The English Language

       Word-Study and Composition & Rhetoric

Author: Sherwin Cody

Release Date: November 5, 2006 [EBook #19719]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE ART OF WRITING ***

Produced by Andrew Hodson

Transcriber's note:

Letters with an extra space before them show those that should be

removed & letters with { } around them show those added as there are

some mistakes in the book & because plain text is used.  (I changed

mathematical & meter but it maybe that they are correct and the others

are wrong).  I did not change _Shak{e}spe{a}re, mortgag eor_ & some

words in lists.  (The N word should have a capital!)

I've used superscript _a_ for broad _a_ (instead of 2 dots under it).

& superscripted _a_ & _o_ (Spanish ordinals) before _o_ for ligatures.

A long vowel should have a straight line over it but I've shown them by

using a colon : after them.  Short vowels are shown by a grave accent

mark after instead of a curved line over the letter.  An equals sign =

after a word shows that the next 1 should start the next column.

"Special SYSTEM Edition" brought from frontispiece.

THE ART _of_ WRITING & SPEAKING _The_ ENGLISH LANGUAGE

SHERWIN CODY

Special  S Y S T E M  Edition

WORD-STUDY

The Old Greek Press

_Chicago New{ }York Boston_

_Revised Edition_.

_Copyright,1903,_

BY SHERWIN CODY.

Note.  The thanks of the author are due to Dr. Edwin H. Lewis, of the

Lewis Institute, Chicago, and to Prof. John F. Genung, Ph. D., of Amherst

College, for suggestions made after reading the proof of this series.

CONTENTS.

THE ART OF WRITING AND SPEAKING THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE.

GENERAL INTRODUCTION. 7

WORD-STUDY

INTRODUCTION---THE STUDY OF SPELLING

CHAPTER I. LETTERS AND SOUNDS

 {VOWELS

 CONSONANTS

 EXERCISES

 THE DICTIONARY}

CHAPTER II. WORD-BUILDING

 {PREFIXES}

CHAPTER III. WORD-BUILDING---Rules and Applications

 {EXCEPTIONS}

CHAPTER IV. PRONUNCIATION

CHAPTER V. A SPELLING DRILL

    APPENDIX

The Art of Writing and Speaking the English Language

GENERAL INTRODUCTION

If there is a subject of really universal interest and utility,

it is the art of writing and speaking one's own language effectively.

It is the basis of culture, as we all know; but it is infinitely more

than that: it is the basis of business.  No salesman can sell anything

unless he can explain the merits of his goods in _effective_ English

(among our people), or can write an advertisement equally effective,

or present his ideas, and the facts, in a letter.  Indeed, the way

we talk, and write letters, largely determines our success in life.

Now it is well for us to face at once the counter-statement that the

most ignorant and uncultivated men often succeed best in business, and

that misspelled, ungrammatical advertisements have brought in millions

of dollars.  It is an acknowledged fact that our business circulars

and letters are far inferior in correctness to those of Great Britain;

yet they are more effective in getting business.  As far as spelling

is concerned, we know that some of the masters of literature have been

atrocious spellers and many suppose that when one can sin in such

company, sinning is, as we might say, a "beauty spot", a defect in

which we can even take pride.

Let us examine the facts in the case more closely.  First of all,

language is no more than a medium; it is like air to the creatures of

the land or water to fishes.  If it is perfectly clear and pure, we do

not notice it any more than we notice pure air when the sun is shining

in a clear sky, or the taste of pure cool water when we drink a glass

on a hot day.  Unless the sun is shining, there is no brightness;

unless the water is cool, there is no refreshment.  The source of all

our joy in the landscape, of the luxuriance of fertile nature,

is the sun and not the air.  Nature would be more prodigal in Mexico than

in Greenland, even if the air in Mexico were as full of soot and smoke as

the air of Pittsburg{h}, or loaded with the acid from a chemical factory.

So it is with language.  Language is merely a medium for thoughts,

emotions, the intelligence of a finely wrought brain, and a good

mind will make far more out of a bad medium than a poor mind will

make out of the best.  A great violinist will draw such music from

the cheapest violin that the world is astonished.  However is that any

reason why the great violinist should choose to play on a poor violin;

or should one say nothing of the smoke nuisance in Chicago because

more light and heat penetrate its murky atmosphere than are to be found

in cities only a few miles farther north?  The truth is, we must regard

the bad spelling nuisance, the bad grammar nuisance, the inártistic and

rambling language nuisance, precisely as we would the smoke nuisance,

the sewer-gas nuisance, the stock-yards' smell nuisance.  Some dainty

people prefer pure air and correct language; but we now recognize that

purity is something more than an esthetic fad, that it is essential to our

health and well-being, and therefore it becomes a matter of universal

public interest, in language as well as in air.

There is a general belief that while bad air may be a positive evil

influence, incorrect use of language is at most no more than a negative

evil: that while it may be a good thing to be correct, no special harm

is involved in being incorrect.  Let us look into this point.

While language as the medium of thought may be compared to air as

the medium of the sun's influence, in other respects it is like the

skin of the body; a scurvy skin shows bad blood within, and a scurvy

language shows inaccurate thought and a confused mind.  And as a

disease once fixed on the skin reacts and poisons the blood in

turn as it has first been poisoned by the blood, so careless use of

language if indulged reacts on the mind to make it permanently and

increasingly careless, illogical, and inaccurate in its thinking.

The ordinary person will probably not believe this, because he conceives

of good use of language as an accomplishment to be learned from books,

a prim system of genteel manners to be put on when occasion demands,

a sort of superficial education in the correct thing, or, as the boys

would say, "the proper caper."  In this, however, he is mistaken.

Language which expresses the thought with strict logical accuracy is

correct language, and language which is sufficiently rich in its resources

to express thought fully, in all its lights and bearings, is effective

language.  If the writer or speaker has a sufficient stock of words and

forms at his disposal, he has only to use them in a strictly logical way

and with sufficient fulness to be both correct and effective.  If his mind

can always be trusted to work accurately, he need not know a word of

grammar except what he has imbibed unconsciously in getting his stock of

words and expressions.  Formal grammar is purely for critical purposes.

It is no more than a standard measuring stick by which to try the

work that has been done and find out if it is imperfect at any point.

Of course constant correction of inaccuracies schools the mind and

puts it on its guard so that it will be more careful the next time

it attempts expression; but we cannot avoid the conclusion that if

the mind lacks material, lacks knowledge of the essential elements

of the language, it should go to the original source from which it got

its first supply, namely to reading and hearing that which is acknowledged

to be correct and sufficient---as the child learns from its mother.

All the scholastic and analytic grammar in the world will not

enrich the mind in language to any appreciable extent.

And now we may consider another objector, who says, "I have studied

grammar for years and it has done me no good."  In view of what has

just been said, we may easily concede that such is very likely to

have been the case.  A measuring stick is of little value unless you

have something to measure.  Language cannot be acquired, only tested,

by analysis, and grammar is an analytic, not a constructive science.

We have compared bad use of language to a scurvy condition of the skin.

To cure the skin we must doctor the blood; and to improve the language

we should begin by teaching the mind to think.  But that, you will say,

is a large undertaking.  Yes, but after all it is the most direct and

effective way.  All education should be in the nature of teaching

the mind to think, and the teaching of language consists in teaching

thinking in connection with word forms and expression through language.

The unfortunate thing is that teachers of language have failed

to go to the root of the trouble, and enormous effort has

counted for nothing, and besides has led to discouragement.

The American people are noted for being hasty in all they do.

Their manufactures are quickly made and cheap.  They have not

hitherto had time to secure that perfection in minute details which

constitutes "quality."  The slow-going Europeans still excel in

nearly all fine and high-grade forms of manufacture---fine pottery,

fine carpets and rugs, fine cloth, fine bronze and other art wares.

In our language, too, we are hasty, and therefore imperfect.

Fine logical accuracy requires more time than we have had

to give to it, and we read the newspapers, which are very poor

models of language, instead of books, which should be far better.

Our standard of business letters is very low.  It is rare to

find a letter of any length without one or more errors of language,

to say nothing of frequent errors in spelling made by ignorant

stenographers and not corrected by the business men who sign the letters.

But a change is coming over us.  We have suddenly taken to reading

books, and while they are not always the best books, they are better

than newspapers.  And now a young business man feels that it is

distinctly to his advantage if he can dictate a thoroughly good

letter to his superior or to a well informed customer.  Good letters

raise the tone of a business house, poor letters give the idea

that it is a cheapjack concern.  In social life, well written letters,

like good conversational powers, bring friends and introduce the

writer into higher circles.  A command of language is the index

of culture, and the uneducated man or woman who has become wealthy

or has gained any special success is eager to put on this wedding

garment of refinement.  If he continues to regard a good command

of language as a wedding garment, he will probably fail in his effort;

but a few will discover the way to self-education and actively follow

it to its conclusion adding to their first success this new achievement.

But we may even go farther.  The right kind of language-teaching will also

give us power, a kind of eloquence, a skill in the use of words, which

will enable us to frame advertisements which will draw business, letters

which will win customers, and to speak in that elegant and forceful way so

effective in selling goods.  When all advertisements are couched in very

imperfect language, and all business letters are carelessly written, of

course no one has an advantage over another, and a good knowledge and

command of language would not be much of a recommendation to a business

man who wants a good assistant.  But when a few have come in and by their

superior command of language gained a distinct advantage over rivals, then

the power inherent in language comes into universal demand--the business

standard is raised.  There are many signs now that the business standard

in the use of language is being distinctly raised.  Already a stenographer

who does not make errors commands a salary from 25 per cent. to 50 per

cent. higher than the average, and is always in demand.  Advertisement

writers must have not only business instinct but language instinct,

and knowledge of correct, as well as forceful, expression{.}

Granted, then, that we are all eager to better our knowledge

of the English language, how shall we go about it?

There are literally thousands of published books devoted to the study

and teaching of our language.  In such a flood it would seem that we

should have no difficulty in obtaining good guides for our study.

But what do we find?  We find spelling-books filled with lists of words to

be memorized; we find grammars filled with names and definitions of all

the different forms which the language assumes; we find rhetorics filled

with the names of every device ever employed to give effectiveness to

language; we find books on literature filled with the names, dates of

birth and death, and lists of works, of every writer any one ever heard of:

and when we have learned all these names we are no better off than when we

started.  It is true that in many of these books we may find prefaces

which say, "All other books err in clinging too closely to mere system,

to names; but we will break away and give you the real thing."  But they

don't do it; they can't afford to be too radical, and so they merely modify

in a few details the same old system, the system of names.  Yet it is a

great point gained when the necessity for a change is realized.

How, then, shall we go about our mastery of the English language?

Modern science has provided us a universal method by which we may study

and master any subject.  As applied to an art, this method has proved

highly successful in the case of music.  It has not been applied to

language because there was a well fixed method of language study in

existence long before modern science was even dreamed of, and that

ancient method has held on with wonderful tenacity.  The great fault

with it is that it was invented to apply to languages entirely different

from our own.  Latin grammar and Greek grammar were mechanical systems

of endings by which the relationships of words were indicated.

Of course the relationship of words was at bottom logical, but the

mechanical form was the chief thing to be learned.  Our language depends

wholly (or very nearly so) on arrangement of words, and the key is the

logical relationship.  A man who knows all the forms of the Latin or

Greek language can write it with substantial accuracy; but the man who

would master the English language must go deeper, he must master the

logic of sentence structure or word relations.  We must begin our study

at just the opposite end from the Latin or Greek; but our teachers of

language have balked at a complete reversal of method, the power of

custom and time has been too strong, and in the matter of grammar we are

still the slaves of the ancient world.  As for spelling, the

irregularities of our language seem to have driven us to one sole method,

memorizing: and to memorize every word in a language is an appalling

task.  Our rhetoric we have inherited from the middle ages, from

scholiasts, refiners, and theological logicians, a race of men who got

their living by inventing distinctions and splitting hairs.  The fact is,

prose has had a very low place in the literature of the world until

within a century; all that was worth saying was said in poetry, which the

rhetoricians were forced to leave severely alone, or in oratory, from

which all their rules were derived; and since written prose language

became a universal possession through the printing press and the

newspaper we have been too busy to invent a new rhetoric.

Now, language is just as much a natural growth as trees or rocks or human

bodies, and it can have no more irregularities, even in the matter of

spelling, than these have.  Science would laugh at the notion of

memorizing every individual form of rock.  It seeks the fundamental laws,

it classifies and groups, and even if the number of classes or groups is

large, still they have a limit and can be mastered.  Here we have a

solution of the spelling problem.  In grammar we find seven fundamental

logical relationships, and when we have mastered these and their chief

modifications and combinations, we have the essence of grammar as truly

as if we knew the name for every possible combination which our seven

fundamental relationships might have.  Since rhetoric is the art of

appealing to the emotions and intelligence of our hearers, we need to

know, not the names of all the different artifices which may be employed,

but the nature and laws of emotion and intelligence as they may be reached

through language; for if we know what we are hitting at, a little

practice will enable us to hit accurately; whereas if we knew the name of

every kind of blow, and yet were ignorant of the thing we were hitting at,

namely the intelligence and emotion of our fellow man, we would be forever

striking into the air,---striking cleverly perhaps, but ineffectively.

Having got our bearings, we find before us a purely practical problem,

that of leading the student through the maze of a new science and teaching

him the skill of an old art, exemplified in a long line of masters.

By way of preface we may say that the mastery of the English language

(or any language) is almost the task of a lifetime.  A few easy lessons

will have no effect.  We must form a habit of language study that will

grow upon us as we grow older, and little by little, but never by leaps,

shall we mount up to the full expression of all that is in us.

WORD-STUDY

INTRODUCTION

THE STUDY OF SPELLING.

The mastery of English spelling is a serious under-taking.  In the first

place, we must actually memorize from one to three thousand words which are

spelled in more or less irregular ways.  The best that can be done with

these words is to classify them as much as possible and suggest methods of

association which will aid the memory.  But after all, the drudgery of

memorizing must be gone through with.

Again, those words called homonyms, which are pronounced alike but spelled

differently, can be studied only in connection with their meaning, since

the meaning and grammatical use in the sentence is our only key to their

form.  So we have to go considerably beyond the mere mechanical association

of letters.

Besides the two or three thousand common irregular words, the dictionary

contains something over two hundred thousand other words.  Of course no one

of us can possibly have occasion to use all of those words; but at the same

time, every one of us may sooner or later have occasion to use any one of

them.  As we cannot tell before hand what ones we shall need, we should be

prepared to write any or all of them upon occasion.  Of course we may refer

to the dictionary; but this is not always, or indeed very often, possible.

It would obviously be of immense advantage to us if we could find a key to

the spelling of these numerous but infrequently used words.

The first duty of the instructor in spelling should be to provide such

a key.  We would suppose, off-hand, that the three hundred thousand

school-teachers in the United States would do this immediately and

without suggestion--certainly that the writers of school-books would.

But many things have stood in the way.  It is only within a few years,

comparatively speaking, that our language has become at all fixed in its

spelling.  Noah Webster did a great deal to establish principles, and

bring the spelling of as many words as possible to conform with these

principles and with such analogies as seemed fairly well established.

But other dictionary-makers have set up their ideas against his,

and we have a conflict of authorities.  If for any reason one finds

himself spelling a word differently from the world about him,

he begins to say, "Well, that is the spelling given in Worcester,

or the Century, or the Standard, or the new Oxford."  So the word

"authority" looms big on the horizon; and we think so much about

authority, and about different authorities, that we forget

to look for principles, as Mr. Webster would have us do.

Another reason for neglecting rules and principles is that the lists of

exceptions are often so formidable that we get discouraged and exclaim,

"If nine tenths of the words I use every day are exceptions to the

rules, what is the use of the rules anyway!"  Well, the words which

constitute that other tenth will aggregate in actual numbers far more

than the common words which form the chief part of everyday speech,

and as they are selected at random from a vastly larger number,

the only possible way to master them is by acquiring principles,

consciously or unconsciously, which will serve as a key to them.

Some people have the faculty of unconsciously formulating principles

from their everyday observations, but it is a slow process,

and many never acquire it unless it is taught them.

The spelling problem is not to learn how to spell nine tenths of

our words correctly.  Nearly all of us can and do accomplish that.

The good speller must spell nine hundred and ninety-nine one

thousandths of his word correctly, which is quite another matter.

Some of us go even one figure higher.

Our first task is clearly to commit the common irregular words to memory.

How may we do that most easily?  It is a huge task at best, but every

pound of life energy which we can save in doing it is so much gained for

higher efforts.  We should strive to economize effort in this just as

the manufacturer tries to economize in the cost of making his goods.

In this particular matter, it seems to the present writer that makers

of modern spelling-books have committed a great blunder in mixing

indiscriminately regular words with irregular, and common words with

uncommon.  Clearly we should memorize first the words we use most often,

and then take up those which we use less frequently.  But the

superintendent of the Evanston schools has reported that out of one

hundred first-reader words which he gave to his grammar classes as

a spelling test, some were misspelled by all but sixteen per cent{.} of

the pupils.  And yet these same pupils were studying busily away on

_categories, concatenation,_ and _amphibious_.  The spelling-book makers

feel that they must put hard words into their spellers.  Their books are

little more than lists of words, and any one can make lists of common, easy

words.  A spelling-book filled with common easy words would not seem to be

worth the price paid for it.  Pupils and teachers must get their money's

worth, even if they never learn to spell.  Of course the teachers are

expected to furnish drills themselves on the common, easy words; but

unfortunately they take their cue from the spelling-book, each day merely

assigning to the class the next page.  They haven't time to select, and no

one could consistently expect them to do otherwise than as they do do.

To meet this difficulty, the author of this book has prepared a version

of the story of Robinson Crusoe which contains a large proportion of

the common words which offer difficulty in spelling.  Unluckily it

is not easy to produce classic English when one is writing under the

necessity of using a vocabulary previously selected.  However, if we

concentrate our attention on the word-forms, we are not likely to be

much injured by the ungraceful sentence-forms.  This story is not long,

but it should be dictated to every school class, beginning in the

fourth grade, until _every_ pupil can spell _every_ word correctly.

A high percentage is not enough, as in the case of some other studies.

Any pupil who misses a single word in any exercise should be marked zero.

But even if one can spell correctly every word in this story, he may still

not be a good speller, for there are thousands of other words to be

spelled, many of which are not and never will be found in any

spelling-book.  The chief object of a course of study in spelling is to

acquire two habits, the habit of observing articulate sounds, and the habit

of observing word-forms in reading.

1.  Train the Ear.  Until the habit of observing articulate sounds

carefully has been acquired, the niceties of pronunciation are beyond

the student's reach, and equally the niceties of spelling are beyond his

reach, too.  In ordinary speaking, many vowels and even some consonants

are slurred and obscured.  If the ear is not trained to exactness,

this habit of slurring introduces many inaccuracies.  Even in careful

speaking, many obscure sounds are so nearly alike that only a finely

trained ear can detect any difference.  Who of us notices any

difference between _er_ in _pardoner_ and _or_ in _honor_?  Careful

speakers do not pass over the latter syllable quite so hastily as over

the former, but only the most finely trained ear will detect any

difference even in the pronunciation of the most finely trained voice.

In the lower grades in the schools the ear may be trained by giving

separate utterance to each sound in a given word, as f-r-e-n-d, _friend,_

allowing each letter only its true value in the word.  Still it may also be

obtained by requiring careful and distinct pronunciation in reading, not,

however, to the extent of exaggerating the value of obscure syllables,

or painfully accentuating syllables naturally obscure.

Adults (but seldom children) may train the ear by reading poetry aloud,

always guarding against the sing-song style, but trying to harmonize

nicely the sense and the rhythm.  A trained ear is absolutely necessary

to reading poetry well, and the constant reading aloud of poetry cannot

but afford an admirable exercise.

For children, the use of diacritical marks has little or no value, until

the necessity arises for consulting the dictionary for pronunciation.

They are but a mechanical system, and the system we commonly use is so

devoid of permanence in its character that every dictionary has a different

system.  The one most common in the schools is that introduced by Webster;

but if we would consult the Standard or the Century or the Oxford, we must

learn our system all over again.  To the child, any system is a clog and a

hindrance, and quite useless in teaching him phonetic values, wherein the

voice of the teacher is the true medium.

For older students, however, especially students at home, where no teacher

is available, phonetic writing by means of diacritical marks has great

value.*  It is the only practicable way of representing the sounds of the

voice on paper.  When the student writes phonetically he is obliged to

observe closely his own voice and the voices of others in ordinary speech,

and so his ear is trained.  It also takes the place of the voice for

dictation in spelling tests by mail or through the medium of books.

 *There should be no more marks than there are sounds.  When two vowels

have the same sound one should be written as a substitute for the other,

as we have done in this book.

2.  Train the Eye.  No doubt the most effective way of learning spelling

is to train the eye carefully to observe the forms of the words we read

in newspapers and in books.  If this habit is formed, and the habit of

general reading accompanies it, it is sufficient to make a nearly

perfect speller.  The great question is, how to acquire it.

Of course in order to read we are obliged to observe the forms of words

in a general way, and if this were all that is needed, we should all

be good spellers if we were able to read fluently.  But it is not all.

The observation of the general form of a word is not the observation

that teaches spelling.  We must have the habit of observing every

letter in every word, and this we are not likely to have unless

we give special attention to acquiring it.

The "visualization" method of teaching spelling now in use in the

schools is along the line of training the eye to observe every letter

in a word.  It is good so far as it goes; but it does not go very far.

The reason is that there is a limit to the powers of the memory,

especially in the observation of arbitrary combinations of letters.

What habits of visualization would enable the ordinary person to

glance at such a combination as the following and write it ten minutes

afterward with no aid but the single glance: _hwgufhtbizwskoplmne?_

It would require some minutes' study to memorize such a combination,

because there is nothing to aid us but the sheer succession of forms.

The memory works by association.  We build up a vast structure of

knowledge, and each new fact or form must be as securely attached

to this as the new wing of a building; and the more points at which

attachment can be formed the more easily is the addition made.

The Mastery of Irregular Words.

Here, then, we have the real reason for a long study of principles,

analogies, and classifications.  They help us to remember.

If I come to the word _colonnade_ in reading, I observe at once that

the double _n_ is an irregularity.  It catches my eye immediately.

"Ah!" I reflect almost in the fraction of a second as I read in

continuous flow, "here is another of those exceptions."  Building on

what I already know perfectly well, I master this word with the very

slightest effort.  If we can build up a system which will serve the

memory by way of association, so that the slight effort that can be

given in ordinary reading will serve to fix a word more or less fully,

we can soon acquire a marvellous power in the accurate spelling of words.

Again: In a spelling-book before me I see lists of words ending in _ise,

ize,_ and _yse,_ all mixed together with no distinction.  The arrangement

suggests memorizing every word in the language ending with either of these

terminations, and until we have memorized any particular word we have no

means of knowing what the termination is.  If, however, we are taught that

_ize_ is the common ending, that _ise_ is the ending of only thirty-one

words, and _yse_ of only three or four, we reduce our task enormously and

aid the memory in acquiring the few exceptions.  When we come to

_franchise_ in reading we reflect rapidly, "Another of those verbs in

_ise_!" or to _paralyse,_ "One of those very few verbs in _yse_!"  We give

no thought whatever to all the verbs ending in _ize,_ and so save so much

energy for other acquirements.

If we can say, "This is a violation of such and such a rule," or "This is a

strange irregularity," or "This belongs to the class of words which

substitutes _ea_ for the long sound of _e,_ or for the short sound of _e_."

We have an association of the unknown with the known that is the most

powerful possible aid to the memory.  The system may fail in and of itself,

but it more than serves its purpose thus indirectly in aiding the memory.

We have not spoken of the association of word forms with sounds,

the grouping of the letters of words into syllables, and the aid that a

careful pronunciation gives the memory by way of association; for while

this is the most powerful aid of all, it does not need explanation.

The Mastery of Regular Words.

We have spoken of the mastery of irregular words, and in the last paragraph

but one we have referred to the aid which general principles give the

memory by way of association in acquiring the exceptions to the rules.

We will now consider the great class of words formed according to fixed

principles.

Of course these laws and rules are little more than a string of

analogies which we observe in our study of the language.  The language

was not and never will be built to fit these rules.  The usage of the

people is the only authority.  Even clear logic goes down before usage.

Languages grow like mushrooms, or lilies, or bears, or human bodies.

Like these they have occult and profound laws which we can never hope

to penetrate,---which are known only to the creator of all things

existent.  But as in botany and zoology and physiology we may observe

and classify our observations, so we may observe a language, classify

our observations, and create an empirical science of word-formation.

Possibly in time it will become a science something more than empirical.

The laws we are able at this time to state with much definiteness are few

(doubling consonants, dropping silent e's, changing y's to i's, accenting

the penultimate and antepenultimate syllables, lengthening and shortening

vowels).  In addition we may classify exceptions, for the sole purpose of

aiding the memory.

Ignorance of these principles and classifications, and knowledge of the

causes and sources of the irregularities, should be pronounced criminal

in a teacher; and failure to teach them, more than criminal in a

spelling-book.  It is true that most spelling-books do give them in one

form or another, but invariably without due emphasis or special drill,

a lack which renders them worthless.  Pupils and students should be

drilled upon them till they are as familiar as the multiplication table.

We know how most persons stumble over the pronunciation of names in the

Bible and in classic authors.  They are equally nonplussed when called

upon to write words with which they are no more familiar.  They cannot

even pronounce simple English names like _Cody,_ which they call

"Coddy," in analogy with _body,_ because they do not know that in a word

of two syllables a single vowel followed by a single consonant is

regularly long when accented.  At the same time they will spell the word

in all kinds of queer ways, which are in analogy only with exceptions,

not with regular formations.  Unless a person knows what the regular

principles are, he cannot know how a word should regularly be spelled.

A strange word is spelled quite regularly nine times out of ten, and if

one does not know exactly how to spell a word, it is much more to his

credit to spell it in a regular way than in an irregular way.

The truth is, the only possible key we can have to those thousands of

strange words and proper names which we meet only once or twice in a

lifetime, is the system of principles formulated by philologists,

if for no other reason, we should master it that we may come as near as

possible to spelling proper names correctly.

CHAPTER I.

LETTERS AND SOUNDS.

We must begin our study of the English language with the elementary

sounds and the letters which represent them.

Name the first letter of the alphabet---_a_.  The mouth is open and the

sound may be prolonged indefinitely.  It is a full, clear sound,

an unobstructed vibration of the vocal chords.

Now name the second letter of the alphabet---_b_.

You say _bee_ or _buh_.  You cannot prolong the sound.  In order to give

the real sound of _b_ you have to associate it with some other sound,

as that of _e_ or _u_.  In other words, _b_ is in the nature of an

obstruction of sound, or a modification of sound, rather than a simple

elementary sound in itself.  There is indeed a slight sound in the

throat, but it is a closed sound and cannot be prolonged.  In the case

of _p,_ which is similar to _b,_ there is no sound from the throat.

So we see that there are two classes of sounds (represented by two

classes of letters), those which are full and open tones from the vocal

chords, pronounced with the mouth open, and capable of being prolonged

indefinitely; and those which are in the nature of modifications of

these open sounds, pronounced with or without the help of the voice,

and incapable of being prolonged.  The first class of sounds is called

vowel sounds, the second, consonant sounds.  Of the twenty-six letters

of the alphabet, _a, e, i, o,_ and _u_ (sometimes _y_ and _w_)

represent vowel sounds and are called vowels; and the remainder

represent consonant sounds, and are called consonants.

A syllable is an elementary sound, or a combination of elementary

sounds, which can be given easy and distinct utterance at one effort.

Any vowel may form a syllable by itself, but as we have seen that

a consonant must be united with a vowel for its perfect utterance,

it follows that every syllable must contain a vowel sound, even if

it also contains consonant sounds.  With that vowel sound one or

more consonants may be united; but the ways in which consonants may

combine with a vowel to form a syllable are limited.  In general we

may place any consonant before and any consonant after the vowel in

the same syllable: but _y_ for instance, can be given a consonant

sound only at the beginning of a syllable, as in _yet_; at the end

of a syllable _y_ becomes a vowel sound, as in _they_ or _only_.

In the syllable _twelfths_ we find seven consonant sounds; but if

these same letters were arranged in almost any other way they could

not be pronounced as one syllable---as for instance _wtelthfs_.

A word consists of one or more syllables to which some definite

meaning is attached.

The difficulties of spelling and pronunciation arise largely from the

fact that in English twenty-six letters must do duty for some forty-two

sounds, and even then several of the letters are unnecessary, as for

instance _c,_ which has either the sound of _s_ or of _k_; _x,_ which

has the sound either of _ks, gs,_ or _z_; _q,_ which in the combination

_qu_ has the sound of _kw_.  All the vowels represent from two to seven

sounds each, and some of the consonants interchange with each other.

The Sounds of the Vowels.---(1)  Each of the vowels has what is called

a long sound and a short sound.  It is important that these two sets

of sounds be fixed clearly in the mind, as several necessary rules

of spelling depend upon them.  In studying the following table,

note that the long sound is marked by a  s t r a i g h t  l i n e

 o v{colon : aft}er the letter, and the short sound by a

 c u{g}r{a}ve {accent mark ` }.

_Long          Short_

 a:te          a`t

 ga:ve         ma`n

 na:me         ba`g

 the:se        pe`t

 m:e           te`n

 (com)ple:te   bre`d

 ki:te         si`t

 ri:ce         mi`ll

 li:me         ri`p

 no:te         no`t

 ro:de         ro`d

 so:le         To`m

 cu:re         bu`t

 cu:te         ru`n

 (a)bu:se      cru`st

 scy:the       (like)ly`

If we observe the foregoing list of words we shall see that each of the

words containing a long vowel followed by a single consonant sound ends

in silent _e_.  After the short vowels there is no silent _e_.

In each case in which we have the silent _e_ there is a single long

vowel followed by a single consonant, or two consonants combining to

form a single sound, as _th_ in _scythe_.  Such words as _roll, toll,_

etc., ending in double _l_ have no silent _e_ though the vowel is long;

and such words as _great, meet, pail,_ etc., in which two vowels

combine with the sound of one, take no silent _e_ at the end.

We shall consider these exceptions more fully later; but a _single long_

vowel followed by a _single_ consonant _always_ takes silent _e_ at the

end.  As carefully stated in this way, the rule has no exceptions.

The reverse, however, is not always true, for a few words containing

a short vowel followed by a single consonant do take silent _e_;

but there are very few of them.  The principal are _have, give,

{_(I)_ }live, love, shove, dove, above;_ also _none, some, come,_

and some words in three or more syllables, such as _domicile_.

2.  Beside the long and short sounds of the vowels there

are several other vowel sounds.

A has two other distinct sounds:

ª broad, like _aw,_ as in _all, talk,_ etc.

ä Italian, like _ah,_ as in _far, father,_ etc.

Double o has two sounds different from long or short _o_ alone:

long ºo: as in _room, soon, mood,_ etc.

short ºo`, as in _good, took, wood,_ etc.

Ow has a sound of its own, as in _how, crowd, allow,_ etc.;

and _ou_ sometimes has the same sound, as in _loud, rout, bough,_ etc.

(_Ow_ and _ou_ are also sometimes sounded like long _o,_ as in _own,

crow, pour,_ etc., and sometimes have still other sounds,

as _ou_ in _bought_).

Oi and oy have a distinct sound of their own, as in _oil, toil, oyster,

void, boy, employ,_ etc.

_Ow_ and _oi_ are called proper diphthongs, as the two vowels combine

to produce a sound different from either, while such combinations as

_ei, ea, ai,_ etc., are called improper diphthongs (or digraphs),

because they have the sound of one or other of the simple vowels.

3.  In the preceding paragraphs we have given all the distinct vowel

sounds of the language, though many of them are slightly modified in

certain combinations.  But in many cases one vowel will be given the

sound of another vowel, and two or more vowels will combine with a

variety of sounds.  These irregularities occur chiefly in a few hundred

common words, and cause the main difficulties of spelling the English

language.  The following are the leading substitutes:

ew with the sound of _u_ long, as in _few, chew,_ etc. (perhaps

this may be considered a proper diphthong);

e (_ê, é_) with the sound of _a_ long, as in _fête, abbé,_ and all

foreign words written with an accent, especially French words;

i with the sound of _e_ long, as in _machine,_ and nearly all French and

other foreign words;

o has the sound of double _o_ long in _tomb, womb, prove, move,_ etc.,

and of double _o_ short in _wolf, women,_ etc.;

o also has the sound of _u_ short in _above, love, some, done,_ etc.;

u has the sound of double _o_ long after _r,_ as in _rude, rule_;

it also has the sound of double _o_ short in _put, pull, bull, sure,_

etc.;

ea has the sound of _a_ long, as in _great_; of _e_ long, as in _heat_; of

_e_ short, as in _head_; of _a_ Italian (ah), as in _heart, hearth,_ etc.;

ei has the sound of _e_ long, as in _receive_; of _a_ long, as in

_freight, weight_; sometimes of _i_ long, as in _either_ and _neither,_

pronounced with either the sound of _e_ long or _i_ long, the latter

being the English usage;

ie has the sound of _i_ long, as in _lie,_ and of _e_ long,

as in _belief,_ and of _i_ short, as in _sieve_;

ai has the sound of _a_ long, as in _laid, bail, train,_ etc.,

and of _a_ short, as in _plaid;_

ay has the sound of _a_ long, as in _play, betray, say,_ etc.;

oa has the sound of _o_ long, as in _moan, foam, coarse,_ etc.

There are also many peculiar and occasional substitutions of sounds as in

_any_ and _many_ (a as e), _women_ (o as i), _busy_ (u as i),

_said_ (ai as e), _people_ (eo as e:), _build_ (u as i), _gauge_ (au as

a:),

_what_ (a as o), etc.

When any of these combinations are to be pronounced as separate vowels,

in two syllables, two dots should be placed over the second, as in _naïve_.

4.  The chief modifications of the elementary sounds are the following:

before _r_ each of the vowels _e, i, o, u,_ and _y_ has almost the same

sound (marked like the Spanish ñ) as in _her, birth, honor, burr,_ and

_myrtle; o_ before _r_ sometimes has the sound of _aw,_ as in _or, for,_

etc.;

in unaccented syllables, each of the long vowels has a slightly shortened

sound, as in f_a_tality, n_e_gotiate, int_o_nation, ref_u_tation,

indicated by a dot above the sign for the long sound; (in a few words,

such as d_i_gress, the sound is not shortened, however);

long _a_ (â) is slightly modified in such words as _care, fare, bare,_

etc., while _e_ has the same sound in words like _there, their,_ and

_where_; (New Englan{d} g people give _a_ the short sound in such words

as _care,_ etc., and pronounce _there_ and _where_ with the short sound

of _a,_ while _their_ is pronounced with the short sound of _e_:

this is not the best usage, however);

in _pass, class, command, laugh,_ etc., we have a sound of a between

Italian _a_ and short _a_ (indicated by a single dot over the _a_),

though most Americans pronounce it as short, and most English give the

Italian sound:  the correct pronunciation is between these two.

The Sounds of the Consonants.  We have already seen that there are two

classes of consonant sounds, those which have a voice sound, as _b,_

called _sonant,_ and those which are mere breath sounds, like _p,_

called _surds_ or aspirates.  The chief difference between _b_ and _p_

is that one has the voice sound and the other has not.  Most of the

other consonants also stand in pairs.  We may say that the sonant

consonant and its corresponding surd are the hard and soft forms of

the same sound.  The following table contains also simple consonant

sounds represented by two letters:

_Sonant                    Surd_

    b                        p

    d                        t

    v                        f

    g (hard)                 k

    j                        ch

    z                        s

    th (in _thine_)          th (in _thin_)

    zh (or z as in _azure_)  sh

    w

    y

    l

    m

    n

    r                        h

If we go down this list from the top to the bottom, we see that _b_ is the

most closed sound, while _h_ is the most slight and open, and the others

are graded in between (though not precisely as arranged above).  These

distinctions are important, because in making combinations of consonants in

the same syllable or in successive syllables we cannot pass abruptly from a

closed sound to an open sound, or the reverse, nor from a surd sound to a

sonant, or the reverse.  _L, m, n,_ and _r_ are called liquids, and easily

combine with other consonants; and so do the sibilants (_s, z,_ etc.).

In the growth of the language, many changes have been made in letters to

secure harmony of sound (as changing _b_ to _p_ in _sub-port---support,_

and _s,_ to _f_ in _differ_---from _dis_ and _fero_).  Some combinations

are not possible of pronunciation, others are not natural or easy; and

hence the alterations.  The student of the language must know how words are

built; and then when he comes to a strange word he can reconstruct it for

himself.  While the short, common words may be irregular, the long, strange

words are almost always formed quite regularly.

Most of the sonants have but one sound, and none of them has more than

three sounds.  The most important variations are as follows:

C and G have each a soft sound and a hard sound.

The soft sound of _c_ is the same as _s,_ and the hard sound the same

as _k_.  The soft sound of _g_ is the same as _j,_ and the hard sound

is the true sound of _g_ as heard in _gone, bug, struggle_.

Important Rule.  _C_ and _G_ are soft before _e, i,_ and _y,_

and hard before all the other vowels, before all the other consonants,

and at the end of words.

The chief exceptions to this rule are a few common words in which _g_

is hard before _e_ or _i_.  They include---_give, get, gill, gimlet,

girl, gibberish, gelding, gerrymander, gewgaw, geyser, giddy,

gibbon, gift, gig, giggle, gild, gimp, gingham, gird, girt,

girth, eager,_ and _begin_.  G is soft before a consonant in

_judgment{,} lodgment, acknowledgment,_ etc.  Also in a few

words from foreign languages _c_ is soft before other vowels,

though in such cases it should always be written with a cedilla (ç).

N when marked ñ in words from the Spanish language is pronounced

_n-y_ (cañon like _canyon_).

Ng has a peculiar nasal sound of its own, as heard in the syllable _ing_.

N alone also has the sound of _ng_ sometimes before _g_ and _k,_ as in

_angle, ankle, single,_ etc. (pronounced _ang-gle, ang-kle, sing-gle_).

Ph has the sound of _f,_ as in prophet.

Th has two sounds, a hard sound as in _the, than, bathe, scythe,_ etc.,

and a soft sound as in _thin, kith, bath, Smith,_ etc.  Contrast

_breathe_ and _breath, lath_ and _lathe_; and _bath_ and _baths,

lath_ and _laths,_ etc.

S has two sounds, one its own sound, as in _sin, kiss, fist_ (the same as

_c_ in _lace, rice,_ etc.), and the sound of _z,_ as in _rise_ (contrast

with _rice_), _is, baths, men's,_ etc.

X has two common sounds, one that of _ks_ as in _box, six,_ etc., and the

other the sound of _gs,_ as in _exact, exaggerate_ (by the way, the first

_g_ in this word is silent).  At the beginning of a word _x_ has the sound

of _z_ as in _Xerxes_.

Ch has three sounds, as heard first in _child,_ second in _machine,_ and

third in _character_.  The first is peculiar to itself, the second is that

of _sh,_ and the third that of _k_.

The sound of _sh_ is variously represented:

by _sh{,}_ as in _share, shift, shirt,_ etc.

by _ti,_ as in _condition, mention, sanction,_ etc.

by _si,_ as in _tension, suspension, extension,_ etc.

by _ci,_ as in _suspicion_.  (Also, _crucifixion_.)

The kindred sound of _zh_ is represented by _z_ as in _azure,_

and _s_ as in _pleasure,_ and by some combinations.

Y is always a consonant at the beginning of a word when followed by a

vowel, as in _yet, year, yell,_ etc.; but if followed by a consonant it

is a vowel, as in _Ypsilanti_.  At the end of a word it is {al}ways a

vowel, as in all words ending in the syllable _ly_.

Exercises.  It is very important that the student should master the

sounds of the language and the symbols for them, or the diacritical

marks, for several reasons:

First, because it is impossible to find out the true pronunciation of

a word from the dictionary unless one clearly understands the meaning

of the principal marks;

Second, because one of the essentials in accurate pronunciation and good

spelling is the habit of analyzing the sounds which compose words,

and training the ear to detect slight variations;

Third, because a thorough knowledge of the sounds and their natural

symbols is the first step toward a study of the principles governing

word formation, or spelling and pronunciation.

For purposes of instruction through correspondence or by means of a

textbook, the diacritical marks representing distinct sounds of the

language afford a substitute for the voice in dictation and similar

exercises, and hence such work requires a mastery of what might at first

sight seem a purely mechanical and useless system.

One of the best exercises for the mastery of this system is to open the

unabridged dictionary at any point and copy out lists of words, writing the

words as they ordinarily appear in one column, and in an adjoining column

the phonetic form of the word.  When the list is complete, cover one column

and reproduce the other from an application of the principles that have

been learned.  After a few days, reproduce the phonetic forms from the

words as ordinarily written, and again the ordinary word from the phonetic

form.  Avoid memorizing as much as possible, but work solely by the

application of principles.  Never write down a phonetic form without fully

understanding its meaning in every detail.  A key to the various marks will

be found at the bottom of every page of the dictionary, and the student

should refer to this frequently.  In the front part of the dictionary there

will also be found an explanation of all possible sounds that any letter

may have; and every sound that any letter may have may be indicated by a

peculiar mark, so that since several letters may represent the same sound

there are a variety of symbols for the same sound.  For the purposes of

this book it has seemed best to offer only one symbol for each sound, and

that symbol the one most frequently used.  For that reason the following

example will not correspond precisely with the forms given in the

dictionary, but a study of the differences will afford a valuable exercise.

Illustration.*

 *In this exercise, vowels before r marked in webster with the double

curve used over the Spanish n, are left unmarked.  Double o with the

short sound is also left unmarked.

  The  first place that  I can  well  remember  was  a large,

  The` first pla:s tha`t I ka`n we`l re:me`mber wo`z a: lärj,

pleasant meadow with a  pond  of  clear water  in it.  Some

ple`s'nt me`do: with a: po`nd o`v kle:r wo`ter in it.  Su`m

shady   trees leaned over  it,  and   rushes  and  water-lilies

sha:di` tre:z le:nd  o:ver i`t, a`nd ru`she:z a`nd wo`ter-li`li`z

grew at  the  deep end.   Over the  hedge on one  side we looked

gru: a`t the` de:p e`nd.  Over the: he`j o`n wu`n si:d we: lookt

into  a  plowed field, and  on  the  other  we  looked over a

intºo: a: plowd fe:ld  a`nd o`n the: o`ther we: lookt o:ver a:

gate  at our master's house, which stood by  the  roadside.

ga:t a`t owr ma`ster'z hows, hwich stood bi: the: ro:dsi:d.

At  the  top  of  the  meadow was  a  grove of  fir-trees,

A`t the: to`p o`v the: me`do: wo`z a: gro:v o`v fir-tre:z,

and at  the  bottom a running brook  overhung  by  a  steep bank.

and a`t the: bo`t'm a ru`ning brook o:verhu`ng bi: a: ste:p ba`nk.

  Whilst  I was  young I lived upon  my  mother's  milk, as I could

  Hwi:lst I wo`z yu`ng I livd u`po`n mi: mu`ther'z milk, a`z I kood

not  eat grass.  In the  daytime I ran  by  her side, and  at night

no`t e:t gra`s.  In the: da:ti:m I ra`n bi: her si:d, a`nd a`t ni:t

I lay down close by  her.  When  it was  hot  we  used  to  stand

I la: down klo:s bi: her.  Hwe`n it wo`z ho`t we: u:zd tºo: sta`nd

by  the  pond  in the  shade of  the  trees, and when  it was  cold

bi: the: po`nd in the: sha:d o`v the: tre:z a`nd hwe`n it wo`z ko:ld

we  had  a  nice, warm  shed  near the  grove.

we: ha`d a: ni:s, wawrm she`d ne:r the: gro:v.

Note.  In Webster's dictionary letters which are unmarked have an

obscure sound often not unlike uh, or are silent, and letters printed

in italics are nearly elided, so very slight is the sound they have if

it can be said to exist at all.  In the illustration above, all very

obscure sounds have been replaced by the apostrophe, while no distinction

has been made between short vowels in accented and unaccented syllables.

Studies from the Dictionary.

The following are taken from Webster's Dictionary:

Ab-do`m'-i-nou`s:  The _a_ in _ab_ is only a little shorter than _a_ in

_at,_ and the _i_ is short being unaccented, while the _o_ is silent,

the syllable having the sound nus as indicated by the mark over the _u_.

Le`ss'_e_n, (le`s'n), le`s's_o_n, (le`s'sn), le`ss'er, le`s'sor:  Each of

these words has two distinct syllables, though there is no recognizable

vowel sound in the last syllables of the first two.  This eliding of the

vowel is shown by printing the _e_ and the _o_ of the final syllables

in italics.  In the last two words the vowels of the final syllables are

not marked, but have nearly the sound they would have if marked in the

usual way for _e_ and _o_ before _r_.  As the syllables are not accented

the vowel sound is slightly obscured.  Or in _lessor_ has the sound of

the word _or_ (nearly), not the sound of _or_ in _honor,_ which will be

found re-spelled (o`n'ur).  It will be noted that the double s is

divided in two of the words and not in the other two.  In _lesser_ and

_lessen_ all possible stress is placed on the first syllables,

since the terminations have the least possible value in speaking;

but in _lesson_ and _lessor_ we put a little more stress on the final

syllables, due to the greater dignity of the letter _o,_

and this draws over a part of the s sound.

Hon'-ey-co:mb (hu`n'y-ko:m): The heavy{ second} hyphen indicates that

this is a compound word and the hyphen must always be written.

The hyphens printed lightly in the dictionary merely serve to separate

the syllables and show how a word may be divided at the end of a line.

The student will also note that the _o_ in _-comb_ has its full long

value instead of being slighted.  This slight added stress on the _o_

is the way we have in speaking of indicating that _-comb_ was once a

word by itself, with an accent of its own.

Exercise.

Select other words from the dictionary, and analyse as we have done

above, giving some explanation for every peculiarity found in the

printing and marks.  Continue this until there is no doubt or hesitation

in regard to the meaning of any mark that may be found.

CHAPTER II.

WORD-BUILDING.

English speaking peoples have been inclined to exaggerate the

irregularities of the English word-formation.  The fact is, only a small

number of common words and roots are irregular in formation, while fully

nine tenths of all the words in the language are formed according to

regular principles, or are regularly derived from the small number of

irregular words.  We use the irregular words so much more frequently

that they do indeed constitute the greater part of our speech,

but it is very necessary that we should master the regular principles

of word-building, since they give us a key to the less frequently used,

but far more numerous, class which fills the dictionary, teaching us

both the spelling of words of which we know the sound, and the

pronunciation of words which we meet for the first time in reading.

Accent.  In English, accent is an essential part of every word.

It is something of an art to learn to throw it on to any syllable we

choose, for unless we are able to do this we cannot get the true

pronunciation of a word from the dictionary and we are helpless when we

are called on to pronounce a word we have never heard.

Perhaps the best way to learn the art of throwing accent is by

comparing words in which we are in the habit of shifting the

accent to one syllable or another according to the meaning,

as for instance the following:

 1.  Accent.

a.  What _ac'cent_ has this word?

b.  With what _accent'uation_ do you _accent'_ this word?

 2.  Concert.

a.  Did you go to the _con'cert_ last night?

b.  By _concert'ed_ action we can do anything.

 3.  Contrast.

{a} b.  What a _con'trast_ between the rich man and the poor man!

b.  _Contrast'_ good with bad, black with white, greatness with littleness.

 4.  Permit.

a.  I have a building_-per'mit_.

b.  My mother will not _permit'_ me to go.

 5.  Present.

a.  He received a beautiful Christmas _pres'ent_.

b.  She was _present'ed_ at court.

 6.  Prefix.

a.  Sub is a common _pre'fix_.

b.  _Prefix'_ sub to port and you get support.

 7.  Compound.

a.  He can _compound'_ medicine like a druggist.

b.  Nitroglycerine is a dangerous _com'pound_.

As a further illustration, read the following stanza of poetry,

especially accenting the syllables as marked:

     Tell' me not' in mourn'ful num'bers,

       "Life' is but' an emp'ty dream'!"

     For' the soul' is dead' that slum'bers,

       And' things are' not what' they seem'.

This is called scanning, and all verse may be scanned in the same way.

It is an excellent drill in learning the art of throwing the stress of

the voice on any syllable that may be desired.

Two Laws of Word-Formation.

We are now prepared to consider the two great laws governing

word-formation.  These are:

1.  Law: All vowels in combination with consonants are naturally short

unless the long sound is given by combination with other vowels,

by accent, or by position in the syllable with reference to consonants.

2.  Law: Words derived from other words by the addition of prefixes or

suffixes always retain the original form as far as possible.

1.  We are likely to suppose that the natural or original sound of a

vowel is the long sound, because that is the sound we give it when

naming it in the alphabet.  If we will examine a number of words,

however, we shall soon see that in combination with consonants

all vowels have a tendency to a short or obscure pronunciation.

The sounds of the consonants are naturally obscure, and they

draw the vowels to a similar obscurity.

Since such is the case, when a vowel is given its long sound there is

always a special reason for it.  In the simple words _not, pin, her,

rip, rid, cut, met,_ we have the short sounds of the vowels; but if we

desire the long sounds we must add a silent _e,_ which is not pronounced

as _e,_ but has its sound value in the greater stress put upon the vowel

with which it is connected.  By adding silent _e_ to the above words we

have _note, pine, here, ripe, ride, mete_.  In each of these cases the

_e_ follows the consonant, though really combining with the vowel before

the consonant; but if we place the additional _e_ just after the first

_e_ in _met_ we have _meet,_ which is a word even more common than

_mete.  E_ is the only vowel that may be placed after the consonant and

still combine with the vowel before it {while being silent}; but nearly

all the other vowels may be placed beside the vowel that would otherwise

be short in order to make it long, and sometimes this added vowel is

placed before as well as after the vowel to be lengthened.  Thus we have

_boat, bait, beat, field, chief,_ etc.  There are a very, very few

irregular words in which the vowel sound has been kept short in spite

of the added vowel, as for instance, _head, sieve,_ etc.  It appears

that with certain consonants the long sound is especially difficult,

and so in the case of very common words the wear of common speech has

shortened the vowels in spite of original efforts to strengthen them.

This is peculiarly true of the consonant _v,_ and the combination _th,_

and less so of _s_ and _z_.  So in {(I)}_live, have, give, love, shove,

move,_ etc., the vowel sound is more or less obscured even in spite of

the silent _e,_ though in the less common words _alive, behave,_ etc.,

the long sound strengthened by accent has not been lost.  So as a rule

two silent vowels are now used to make the vowel before the _v_ long,

as in _leave, believe, receive, beeves, weave,_ etc.  In the single word

_sieve_ the vowel remains short in spite of two silent vowels added to

strengthen it.  Two vowels are also sometimes required to strengthen a

long vowel before _th,_ as in _breathe,_ though when the vowel itself

is a strong one, as _a_ in _bathe,_ the second vowel is not required,

and _o_ in _both_ is so easily increased in sound that the two

consonants alone are sufficient.  It will be seen, therefore, that much

depends on the quality of the vowel.  _A_ and _o_ are the strongest

vowels, _i_ the weakest (which accounts for sieve).  After _s_ and _z_

we must also have a silent _e_ in addition to the silent vowel with

which the sounded vowel is combined, as we may see in _cheese, increase,

freeze,_ etc.  The added vowel in combination with the long vowel is not

always needed, however, as we may see in contrasting _raise_ and _rise_.

Not only vowels but consonants may serve to lengthen vowel sounds, as

we see in _right, night, bright,_ and in _scold, roll,_ etc.  Only _o_

is capable of being lengthened by two simple consonants such as we have

in _scold_ and _roll_.  In _calm_ and _ball,_ for instance, the _a_ has

one of its extra values rather than its long sound.  The _gh_ is of

course a powerful combination.  Once it was pronounced; but it became so

difficult that we have learned to give its value by dwelling a little on

the vowel sound.

Another powerful means of lengthening a vowel is accent.  When a vowel

receives the full force of the accent by coming at the end of an accented

syllable it is almost invariably made long.  We see this in monosyllables

such as _he, no,_ etc.  It is often necessary to strengthen by an

additional silent vowel, however, as in _tie, sue, view,_ etc., and _a_ has

a peculiarity in that when it comes at the end of a syllable alone it has

the sound of _ah,_ or _a_ Italian, rather than that of _a_ long, and we

have _pa, ma,_ etc., and for the long sound _y_ is added, as in _say, day,

ray.  I_ has a great disinclination to appear at the end of a word, and so

is n usually changed to _y_ when such a position is necessary, or it takes

silent _e_ as indicated above; while this service on the part of _y_ is

reciprocated by _i_'s taking the place of _y_ inside a word, as may be

illustrated by _city_ and _cities_.

When a vowel gets the _full force_ of the accent in a word of two or

more syllables it is bound to be long, as for instance the first _a_ in

_ma'di a_.  Even the stress necessary to keep the vowel from running

into the next syllable will make it long, though the sound is somewhat

obscured, some other syllable receiving the chief accent, as the first

_a_ in _ma gi'cian_.  In this last word _i_ seems to have the full

force of the accent, yet it is not long; and we note the same in such

words as _condi'tion,_ etc.  The fact is, however, that _i_ being a

weak vowel easily runs into the consonant sound of the next syllable,

and if we note the sounds as we pronounce _condition_ we shall see that

the _sh_ sound represented by _ti_ blends with the _i_ and takes the

force of the accent.  We cannot separate the _ti_ or _ci_ from the

following portion of the syllable, since if so separated they could not

have their _sh_ value; but in pronunciation this separation is made in

part and the _sh_ sound serves both for the syllable that precedes and

the syllable that follows.  In a word like _di men'sion_ we find the _i_

of the first syllable long even without the accent, since the accent on

_men_ attaches the _m_ so closely to it that it cannot in any way

relieve the _i_.  So we see that in an accented syllable the consonant

before a short vowel, as well as the consonant following it, receives

part of the stress.  This is especially noticeable in the word _ma

gi'cian_ as compared with _mag'ic_.  In magic the syllable _ic_ is in

itself so complete that the _g_ is kept with the _a_ and takes the force

of the accent, leaving the _a_ short.  In _magician_ the _g_ is drawn

away from the _a_ to help out the short _i_ followed by an _sh_ sound,

and the _a_ is lengthened even to altering the form of the simple word.

In the word _ma'gi an,_ again, we find _a_ long, the _g_ being needed to

help out the _i_.

Since accent makes a vowel long if no consonant intervenes at the end

of a syllable, and as a single consonant following such a vowel in a

word of two syllables (though not in words of three or more) is likely

to be drawn into the syllable following, a single consonant following

a single short vowel must be doubled.  If two or more consonants follow

the vowel, as in _masking, standing, wilting,_ the vowel even in an

accented syllable remains short.  But in _pining_ with one _n_ following

the _i_ in the accented syllable, we know that the vowel must be long,

for if it were short the word would be written _pinning_.

Universal Rule: _Monosyllables_ in which, a single vowel is followed by

a single consonant (except _v_ and _h_ never doubled) _double the final

consonant_ when a single syllable beginning with a vowel is added,

and _all words_ so ending double the final consonant on the addition of

a syllable beginning with a vowel _if the syllable containing the single

vowel_ followed by a single consonant _is to be accented_.

Thus we have _can---canning, run---running, fun---funny, flat---flattish_;

and also _sin---sinned_ (for the _ed_ is counted a syllable though not

pronounced as such nowadays); _preferred,_ but _preference,_ since the

accent is thrown back from the syllable containing the single vowel

followed by a single consonant in the word _preference,_ though not in

_preferred_; and of course the vowel is not doubled in _murmured, wondered,

covered,_ etc.

If, however, the accented syllable is followed by two or more syllables,

the tendency of accent is to shorten the vowel.  Thus we have

_grammat'ical,_ etc., in which the short vowel in the accented syllable

is followed by a single consonant not doubled.  The word _na'tion_ (with

a long a) becomes _na'tional_ (short _a_) when the addition of a syllable

throws the accent on to the antepenult.  The vowel _u_ is never shortened

in this way, however, and we have _lu'bricate,_ not _lub'ricate_.

We also find such words as _no'tional_ (long _o_).  While accented

syllables which are followed by two or more syllables seldom if ever double

the single consonant, in pronunciation we often find the vowel long if the

two syllables following contain short and weak vowels.  Thus we have

_pe'riod_ (long _e_), _ma'niac_ (long _a_), and _o'rient'al_ (long _o_).

In words of two syllables and other words in which the accent comes on

the next to the last syllable, a short vowel in an accented syllable

should logically always be followed by more than one consonant or a

double consonant.  We find the double consonant in such words as

_summer, pretty, mammal,_ etc.  Unfortunately, our second law, which

requires all derived words to preserve the form of the original root,

interferes with this principle very seriously in a large number

of English words.  The roots are often derived from languages in

which this principle did not apply, or else these roots originally

had very different sound values from those they have with us.

So we have _body,_ with one _d,_ though we have _shoddy_ and _toddy_

regularly formed with two _d_'s, and we have _finish, exhibit,_ etc.;

in _col'onnade_ the _n_ is doubled in a syllable that is not accented.

The chief exception to the general principle is the entire class of

words ending in _ic,_ such as _colic, cynic, civic, antithetic,

peripatetic,_ etc.  If the root is long, however, it will remain long

after the addition of the termination _ic,_ as _music_ (from _muse_),

_basic_ (from _base_), etc.

But in the case of words which we form ourselves, we will find practically

no exceptions to the rule that a short vowel in a syllable _next_ to the

last _must_ be followed by a _double consonant_ when accented, while a

short vowel in a syllable _before_ the next to the last is _not_ followed

by a double consonant when the syllable is accented.

2.  Our second law tells us that the original form of a word or of its

root must be preserved as far as possible.  Most of the words referred

to above in which single consonants are doubled or not doubled in

violation of the general rule are derived from the Latin, usually through

the French, and if we were familiar with those languages we should have a

key to their correct spelling.  But even without such thorough knowledge,

we may learn a few of the methods of derivation in those languages,

especially the Latin, as well as the simpler methods in use in the English.

Certain changes in the derived words are always made, as, for instance, the

dropping of the silent _e_ when a syllable beginning with a vowel is added.

Rule.  Silent _e_ at the end of a word is dropped whenever a syllable

beginning with a vowel is added.

This rule is not quite universal, though nearly so.  The silent _e_ is

always retained when the vowel at the beginning of the added syllable

would make a soft _c_ or _g_ hard, as in _serviceable, changeable,_ etc.

In _changing, chancing,_ etc., the _i_ of the added syllable is sufficient

to make the _c_ or _g_ retain its soft sound.  In such words as _cringe_

and _singe_ the silent _e_ is retained even before _i_ in order to avoid

confusing the words so formed with other words in which the _ng_ has a

nasal sound; thus we have _singeing_ to avoid confusion with _singing,_

though we have _singed_ in which the _e_ is dropped before _ed_ because the

dropping of it causes no confusion.  Formerly the silent _e_ was retained

in _moveable_; but now we write _movable,_ according to the rule.

Of course when the added syllable begins with a consonant, the silent

_e_ is not dropped, since dropping it would have the effect of

shortening the preceding vowel by making it stand before two consonants.

A few monosyllables ending in two vowels, one of which is silent _e,_

are exceptions: _duly, truly_; also _wholly_.

Also final _y_ is changed to _i_ when a syllable is added, unless that

added syllable begins with _i_ and two _i_'s would thus come together.

_I_ is a vowel never doubled.  Th{u} is we have _citified,_

but _citifying_.

We have already seen that final consonants may be doubled under certain

circumstances when a syllable is added.

These are nearly all the changes in spelling that are possible when

words are formed by adding syllables; but changes in pronunciation and

vowel values are often affected, as we have seen in _nation_ (_a_ long)

and _national_ (_a_ short).

Prefixes.  But words may be formed by prefixing syllables, or by combining

two or more words into one.  Many of these formations were effected in the

Latin before the words were introduced into English; but we can study the

principles governing them and gain a key to the spelling of many English

words.

In English we unite a preposition with a verb by placing it after the

verb and treating it as an adverb.  Thus we have "breaking in,"

"running over," etc.  In Latin the preposition in such cases was

prefixed to the word; and there were particles used as prefixes which

were never used as prepositions.  We should become familiar with the

principal Latin prefixes and always take them into account in the

spelling of English words.  The principal Latin prefixes are:

ab (abs)---from

ad---to

ante---before

bi (bis)---twice

circum (circu)---around

con---with

contra(counter)---against

de---down, from

dis---apart, not

ex---out of, away from

extra---beyond

in---in, into, on; _also_ not (another word)

inter---between=

non---not

ob---in front of, in the way of

per---through

post---after

pre---before

pro---for, forth

re---back or again

retro---backward

se---aside

semi---half

sub---under

super---above, over

trans---over, beyond

ultra---beyond

vice---instead of.

Of these prefixes, those ending in a single consonant are likely to

change that consonant for euphony to the consonant beginning the word

to which the prefix is attached.  Thus _ad_ drops the _d_ in _ascend,_

becomes _ac_ in _accord, af_ in _affiliate, an_ in _annex, ap_ in

_appropriate, at_ in _attend; con_ becomes _com_ in _commotion,_ also

in _compunction_ and _compress, cor_ in _correspond, col_ in _collect,

co_ in _co-equal_; _dis_ becomes _dif_ in _differ_; _ex_ becomes _e_ in

_eject, ec_ in _eccentric, ef_ in _effect_; _in_ becomes _il_ in

_illuminate, im_ in _import, ir_ in _irreconcilable; ob_ becomes _op_

in _oppress, oc_ in _occasion, of_ in _offend_; and _sub_ becomes _suc_

in _succeed, sup_ in _support, suf_ in _suffix, sug_ in _suggest,

sus_ in _sustain_.  The final consonant is changed to a consonant that

can be easily pronounced before the consonant with which the following

syllable begins.  Following the rule that the root must be changed as

little as possible, it is always the prefix, not the root,

which is compelled to yield to the demands of euphony.

A little reflection upon the derivation of words will thus often give

us a key to the spelling.  For instance, suppose we are in doubt whether

_irredeemable_ has two _r_'s or only one: we now that _redeem_ is a

root, and therefore the _ir_ must be a prefix, and the two _r_'s are

accounted for,--- indeed are necessary in order to prevent our losing

sight of the derivation and meaning of the word.  In the same way, we can

never be in doubt as to the two _m_'s in _commotion, commencement,_ etc.

We have already noted the tendency of _y_ to become _i_ in the middle

of a word.  The exceptional cases are chiefly derivatives from the

Greek, and a study of the Greek prefixes will often give us a hint in

regard to the spelling of words containing _y_.  These prefixes,

given here in full for convenience, are:

a (an)---without, not

amphi---both, around

ana---up, back, through=

anti---against, opposite

apo (ap)---from

cata---down

dia---through

en (em)---in

epi (ep)---upon

hyper---over, excessive

hypo---under=

meta (met)---beyond, change

syn (sy, syl, sym)---with, together

In Greek words also we will find _ph_ with the sound of _f_.

We know that _symmetrical, hypophosphite, metaphysics, emphasis,_ etc.,

are Greek because of the key we find in the prefix, and we are thus

prepared for the _y_'s and _ph_'s.  _F_ does not exist in the Greek

alphabet (except as ph) and so we shall never find it in words derived

from the Greek.

The English prefixes are not so often useful in determining peculiar

spelling, but for completeness we give them here:

a---at, in, on (ahead)

be---to make, by (benumb)

en (em)---in, on, to make (encircle, empower)

for---not, from (forbear)

fore---before (forewarn)

mis---wrong, wrongly (misstate)

out---beyond (outbreak)

over---above (overruling)

to---the, this (to-night)

un---not, opposite

act (unable, undeceive)

under---beneath (undermine)

with---against, from (withstand)

CHAPTER III.

WORD-BUILDING---RULES AND APPLICATIONS.

There are a few rules and applications of the principles of word-formation

which may be found fully treated in the chapter on "Orthography" at the

beginning of the dictionary, but which we present here very briefly,

together with a summary of principles already discussed.

Rule 1.  _F, l,_ and _s_ at the end of a monosyllable after a single

vowel are commonly doubled.  The exceptions are the cases in which _s_

forms the plural or possessive case of a noun, or third person singular

of the verb, and the following words: _clef, if, of, pal, sol, as, gas,

has, was, yes, gris, his, is, thus, us.  L_ is not doubled at the end

of words of more than one syllable, as _parallel, willful,_ etc.

Rule 2.  No other consonants thus situated are doubled.  Exceptions:

_ebb, add, odd, egg, inn, bunn, err, burr, purr, butt, fizz, fuzz,

buzz,_ and a few very uncommon words, for which see the chapter in the

dictionary above referred to.

Rule 3.  A consonant standing at the end of a word immediately after a

diphthong or double vowel is never doubled.  The word _guess_ is only an

apparent exception, since _u_ does not form a combination with _e_ but

merely makes the _g_ hard.

Rule 4.  Monosyllables ending in the sound of _ic_ represented by _c_

usually take _k_ after the _c_, as in _back, knock,_ etc.  Exceptions:

_talc, zinc, roc, arc,_ and a few very uncommon words.  Words of more

than one syllable ending in _ic_ or _iac_ do not take _k_ after the _c_

(except _derrick_), as for example _elegiac, cubic, music,_ etc.

If the _c_ is preceded by any other vowel than _i_ or _ia, k_ is added

to the _c_, as in _barrack, hammock, wedlock_.  Exceptions:

_almanac, havoc,_ and a very few uncommon words.

Rule 5.  To preserve the hard sound of _c_ when a syllable is added

which begins with _e, i,_ or _y, k_ is placed after final _c_,

as in _trafficking, zincky, colicky_.

Rule 6.  _X_ and _h_ are never doubled, _v_ and _j_ seldom.

_G_ with the soft sound cannot be doubled, because then the first _g_

would be made hard.  Example: _mag'ic.  Q_ always appears with _u_

following it, and here _u_ has the value of the consonant _w_ and in no

way combines or is counted with the vowel which may follow it.  For

instance _squatting_ is written as if _squat_ contained but one vowel.

Rule 7.  In simple derivatives a single final consonant following a

single vowel in a syllable that receives an accent is doubled when

another syllable beginning with a vowel is added.

Rule 8.  When accent comes on a syllable standing next to the last,

it has a tendency to lengthen the vowel; but on syllables farther from

the end, the tendency is to shorten the vowel without doubling the

consonant.  For example, _na'tion_ (_a_ long), but _na'tional_

(_a_ short); _gram'mar,_ but _grammat'ical_.

Rule 9.  Silent _e_ at the end of a word is usually dropped

when a syllable beginning with a vowel is added.  The chief

exceptions are words in which the silent _e_ is retained to

preserve the soft sound of _c_ or _g_.

Rule 10.  Plurals are regularly formed by adding _s_; but if the

word end in a sibilant sound (_sh, zh, z, s, j, ch, x_), the plural

is formed by adding _es,_ which is pronounced as a separate syllable.

If the word end{s} in a sibilant sound followed by silent _e,_

that _e_ unites with the _s_ to form a separate syllable.

Examples: _seas, cans; boxes, churches, brushes; changes, services_.

Rule 11.  Final _y_ is regularly changed to _i_ when a syllable is

added.  In plurals it is changed to _ies,_ except when preceded by a

vowel, when a simple _s_ is added without change of the _y_.

Examples: _clumsy, clumsily_; _city, cities_; _chimney, chimneys_.

We have _colloquies_ because _u_ after _q_ has the value of the

consonant _w_.  There are a few exceptions to the above rule.  When two

_i_'s would come together, the _y_ is not changed, as in _carrying_.

Rule 12.  Words ending, in a double consonant commonly retain the double

consonant in derivatives.  The chief exception is _all,_ which drops one

_l,_ as in _almighty, already, although,_ etc.  According to English

usage other words ending in double _l_ drop one _l_ in derivatives,

and we have _skilful_ (for _skillful_), _wilful_ (for _willful_), etc.,

but Webster does not approve this custom.  _Ful_ is an affix,

not the word _full_ in a compound.

EXCEPTIONS AND IRREGULARITIES.

1.  Though in the case of simple words ending in a double consonant the

derivatives usually retain the double consonant, _pontific_ and

_pontifical_ (from _pontiff_) are exceptions, and when three letters of

the same kind would come together, one is usually dropped, as in

_agreed_ (_agree_ plus _ed_), _illy_ (_ill_ plus _ly_), _belless,_ etc.

We may write _bell-less,_ etc., however, in the case of words in which

three _l_'s come together, separating the syllables by a hyphen.

2.  To prevent two _i_'s coming together, we change _i_ to _y_ in

_dying, tying, vying,_ etc., from _die, tie,_ and _vie_.

3.  Derivatives from _adjectives_ ending in _y_ do not change _y_ to

_i_, and we have _shyly, shyness, slyly,_ etc., though _drier_ and

_driest_ from _dry_ are used.  The _y_ is not changed before _ship,_

as in _secretaryship, ladyship,_ etc., nor in _babyhood_ and _ladykin_.

4.  We have already seen that _y_ is not changed in derivatives when it

is preceded by another vowel, as in the case of _joyful,_ etc.;

but we find exceptions to this principle in _daily, laid, paid, said,

saith, slain,_ and _staid_; and many write _gaily_ and _gaiety,_

though Webster prefers _gayly_ and _gayety_.

5.  Nouns of one syllable ending in _o_ usually take a silent _e_ also,

as _toe, doe, shoe,_ etc, but other parts of speech do not take the _e,_

as _do, to, so, no,_ and the like, and nouns of more than one syllable,

as _potato, tomato,_ etc., omit the _e_.  Monosyllables ending in _oe_

usually retain the silent _e_ in derivatives, and we have _shoeing,

toeing,_ etc.  The commoner English nouns ending in _o_ also have the

peculiarity of forming the plural by adding _es_ instead of _s,_ and we

have _potatoes, tomatoes, heroes, echoes, cargoes, embargoes, mottoes_;

but nouns a trifle more foreign form their plurals regularly, as _solos,

zeros, pianos,_ etc.  When a vowel precedes the _o,_ the plural is

always formed regularly.  The third person singular of the verb _woo_

is _wooes,_ of _do does,_ of _go goes,_ etc., in analogy with the

plurals of the nouns ending in _o_.

6.  The following are exceptions to the rule that silent _e_ is retained

in derivatives when the added syllable begins with a consonant:

_judgment, acknowledgment, lodgment, wholly, abridgment, wisdom,_ etc.

7.  Some nouns ending in _f_ or _fe_ change those terminations to _ve_

in the plural, as _beef---beeves, leaf---leaves, knife---knives,

loaf---loaves, life---lives, wife---wives, thief---thieves,

wolf---wolves, self---selves, shelf---shelves, calf---calves,

half---halves, elf---elves, sheaf---sheaves_.  We have _chief---chiefs_

and _handkerchief---handkerchiefs,_ however, and the same is true of all

nouns ending in _f_ or _fe_ except those given above.

8.  A few nouns form their plurals by changing a single vowel, as

_man---men, woman---women, goose---geese, foot---feet, tooth---teeth,_

etc.  Compounds follow the rule of the simple form, but the plural of

_talisman_ is _talismans,_ of _German_ is _Germans,_ of _musselman_ is

_musselmans,_ because these are not compounds of _men_.

9.  A few plurals are formed by adding _en,_ as _brother---brethren,

child---children, ox---oxen_.

10.  _Brother, pea, die,_ and _penny_ have each two plurals, which

differ in meaning.  _Brothers_ refers to male children of the same

parents, _brethren_ to members of a religious body or the like;

_peas_ is used when a definite number is mentioned, _pease_ when

bulk is referred to; _dies_ are instruments used for stamping, etc.,

_dice_ cubical blocks used in games of chance; _pennies_ refer to a

given number of coins, _pence_ to an amount reckoned by the coins.

_Acquaintance_ is sometimes used in the plural for _acquaintances_ with

no difference of meaning.

11.  A few words are the same in the plural as in the singular,

as _sheep, deer, trout,_ etc.

12.  Some words derived from foreign languages retain the plurals of

those languages.  For example:

datum---data

criterion---criteria

genus---genera

larva---larvæ=

crisis---crises

matrix---matrices

focus---foci

monsieur---messieurs

13.  A few allow either a regular plural or the plural retained

from the foreign language:

formula---formulæ or formulas

beau---beaux or beaus

index---indices or indexes

stratum---strata or stratums

bandit---banditti or bandits

cherub---cherubim or cherubs

seraph---seraphim or seraphs

14.  In very loose compounds in which a noun is followed by an adjective

or the like, the noun commonly takes the plural ending, as in

_courts-martial, sons-in-law, cousins-german_.  When the adjective is

more closely joined, the plural ending must be placed at the end of the

entire word.  Thus we have _cupfuls, handfuls,_ etc.

Different Spellings for the same Sound.

Perhaps the greatest difficulty in spelling English words arises from

the fact that words and syllables pronounced alike are often spelled

differently, and there is no rule to guide us in distinguishing.

In order to fix their spelling, in mind we should know what classes of

words are doubtful, and when we come to them constantly refer to the

dictionary.  To try to master these except in the connections in which

we wish to use them the writer believes to be worse than folly.

By studying such words in pairs, confusion is very likely to be fixed

forever in the mind.  Most spelling-books commit this error, and so are

responsible for a considerable amount of bad spelling, which their

method has actually introduced and instilled into the child's mind.

Persons who read much are not likely to make these errors, since they

remember words by the form as it appeals to the eye, not by the sound

in which there is no distinction.  The study of such words should

therefore be conducted chiefly while writing or reading, not orally.

While we must memorize, one at a time as we come to them in reading or

writing, the words or syllables in which the same sound is represented

by different spellings, still we should know clearly what classes of

words to be on the lookout for.  We will now consider some of the

classes of words in which a single syllable may be spelled in various ways.

Vowel Substitutions in Simple Words.

ea for e` short or e obscure before r.

already

bread

breakfast

breast

breadth

death

earth

dead

deaf

dread=

early

earn

earnest

earth

feather

head

health

heaven

heavy=

heard

lead

learn

leather

meadow

measure

pearl

pleasant

read=

search

sergeant

spread

steady

thread

threaten

tread

wealth

weather

ee for e: long.

agree

beef

breed

cheek

cheese

creek

creep

cheer

deer

deed

deep

feed=

feel

feet

fleece

green

heel

heed

indeed

keep

keel

keen

kneel

meek=

need

needle

peel

peep

queer

screen

seed

seen

sheet

sheep

sleep

sleeve=

sneeze

squeeze

street

speech

steeple

steet

sweep

sleet

teeth

weep

weed

week

ea for e: long.

appear

bead

beach

bean

beast

beat

beneath

breathe

cease

cheap

cheat

clean

clear

congeal

cream

crease

creature

dear

deal

dream

defeat=

each

ear

eager

easy

east

eaves

feast

fear

feat

grease

heap

hear

heat

increase

knead

lead

leaf

leak

lean

least

leave=

meat

meal

mean

neat

near

peas (pease)

peal

peace

peach

please

preach

reach

read

reap

rear

reason

repeat

scream=

seam

seat

season

seal

speak

steam

streak

stream

tea

team

tear

tease

teach

veal

weave

weak

wheat

wreath (wreathe)

year

yeast

ai for a: long.

afraid

aid

braid

brain

complain

daily

dairy

daisy

drain

dainty

explain

fail

fain=

gain

gait

gaiter

grain

hail

jail

laid

maid

mail

maim

nail

paid=

pail

paint

plain

prairie

praise

quail

rail

rain

raise

raisin

remain

sail=

saint

snail

sprain

stain

straight

strain

tail

train

vain

waist

wait

waive

ai for i or e obscure.

bargain    captain    certain    curtain    mountain

oa for o: long.

board

boat

cloak

coax

coal

coast

coarse=

float

foam

goat

gloam

groan

hoarse

load=

loan

loaf

oak

oar

oats

roast

road=

roam

shoal

soap

soar

throat

toad

toast

ie for e: long.

believe

chief=

fierce

grief=

niece

priest=

piece

thief

ei for e long.

neither    receipt    receive

In _sieve, ie_ has the sound of _i_ short.

In _eight, skein, neighbor, rein, reign, sleigh, vein, veil, weigh,_

and _weight, ei_ has the sound of _a_ long.

In _height, sleight,_ and a few other words _ei_ has the sound of _i_ long.

In _great, break,_ and _steak ea_ has the sound of _a_ long;

in _heart_ and _hearth_ it has the sound of _a_ Italian,

and in _tear_ and _bear_ it has the sound of _a_ as in _care_.

Silent Consonants etc.

although

answer

bouquet

bridge

calf

calm

catch

castle

caught

chalk

climb

ditch

dumb

edge

folks

comb

daughter

debt

depot

forehead

gnaw

hatchet

hedge

hiccough=

hitch

honest

honor

hustle

island

itch

judge

judgment

knack

knead

kneel

knew

knife

knit

knuckle

knock

knot

know

knowledge

lamb

latch

laugh

limb

listen=

match

might

muscle

naughty

night

notch

numb

often

palm

pitcher

pitch

pledge

ridge

right

rough

scene

scratch

should

sigh

sketch

snatch

soften

stitch

switch=

sword

talk

though

through

thought

thumb

tough

twitch

thigh

walk

watch

whole

witch

would

write

written

wrapper

wring

wrong

wrung

wrote

wrestle

yacht

Unusual Spellings.

The following words have irregularities peculiar to themselves.

ache

any

air

apron

among

again

aunt

against

biscuit

build

busy

business

bureau

because

carriage

coffee

collar

color

country

couple

cousin

cover

does

dose=

done

double

diamond

every

especially

February

flourish

flown

fourteen

forty

fruit

gauge

glue

gluey

guide

goes

handkerchief

honey

heifer

impatient

iron

juice

liar

lion=

liquor

marriage

mayor

many

melon

minute

money

necessary

ninety

ninth

nothing

nuisance

obey

ocean

once

onion

only

other

owe

owner

patient

people

pigeon

prayer=

pray

prepare

rogue

scheme

scholar

screw

shoe

shoulder

soldier

stomach

sugar

succeed

precede

proceed

procedure

suspicion

they

tongue

touch

trouble

wagon

were

where

wholly

C with the sound of s.

In the following words the sound of _s_ is represented by _c_ followed

by a vowel that makes this letter soft:

city

face

ice

juice

lace

necessary

nuisance

once

pencil

police

policy

pace

race

rice

space

trace

twice

trice

thrice

nice

price

slice=

lice

spice

circus

citron

circumstance

centre

cent

cellar

certain

circle

concert

concern

cell

dunce

decide

December

dance

disgrace

exercise

excellent

except

force=

fleece

fierce

furnace

fence

grocer

grace

icicle

instance

innocent

indecent

decent

introduce

juice

justice

lettuce

medicine

mercy

niece

ounce

officer

patience

peace=

piece

place

principal

principle

parcel

produce

prejudice

trace

voice

receipt

recite

cite

sauce

saucer

sentence

scarcely

since

silence

service

crevice

novice

Words ending in cal and cle.

Words in _cal_ are nearly all derived from other words ending in _ic,_

as _classical, cubical, clerical,_ etc.  Words ending in _cle_ are

(as far as English is concerned) original words, as _cuticle,

miracle, manacle,_ etc.  When in doubt, ask the question if, on

dropping the _al_ or _le,_ a complete word ending in _ic_ would be left.

If such a word is left, the ending is _al,_ if not, it is probably _le_.

Er and re.

Webster spells _theater, center, meter,_ etc., with the termination

_er,_ but most English writers prefer _re.  Meter_ is more used to

denote a device for measuring (as a "gas meter"), _meter_ as the French

unit of length (in the "Metric system").  In words like _acre_ even

Webster retains _re_ because _er_ would make the _c_ (or _g_) soft.

Words ending in er, ar, or.

First, let it be said that in most words these three syllables

(_er, ar, or_), are pronounced very nearly if not exactly alike (except

a few legal terms in or, like _mort'gageor_), and we should not try to

give an essentially different sound to _ar_ or _or_* from that we give

to _er_.  The ending _er_ is the regular one, and those words ending in

_ar_ or _or_ are very few in number.  They constitute the exceptions.

 *While making no especial difference in the vocalization of these

syllables, careful speakers dwell on them a trifle longer than they do

on _er_.

Common words ending in _ar_ with the sound of _er_:

liar

collar

beggar

burglar

solar

cedar

jugular

scholar=

calendar

secular

dollar

grammar

tabular

poplar

pillar

sugar=

jocular

globular

mortar

lunar

vulgar

popular

insular

Templar=

ocular

muscular

nectar

similar

tubular

altar (for worship)

singular

In some words we have the same syllable with the same sound in the next

to the last syllable, as in _solitary, preliminary, ordinary,

temporary_.  etc.  The syllable _ard_ with the sound of _erd_ is also

found, as in _standard, wizard, mustard, mallard,_ etc.

Common words ending in _or_ with the sound of _er_:

honor

valor

mayor

sculptor

prior

ardor

clamor

labor

tutor

warrior

razor

flavor

auditor

juror

favor

tumor

editor

vigor

actor

author

conductor

savior

visitor

elevator

parlor

ancestor

captor

creditor

victor=

error

proprietor

arbor

chancellor

debtor

doctor

instructor

successor

rigor

senator

suitor

traitor

donor

inventor

odor

conqueror

senior

tenor

tremor

bachelor

junior

oppressor

possessor

liquor

surveyor

vapor

governor

languor

professor=

spectator

competitor

candor

harbor

meteor

orator

rumor

splendor

elector

executor

factor

generator

impostor

innovator

investor

legislator

narrator

navigator

numerator

operator

originator

perpetrator

personator

predecessor

protector

prosecutor

projector

reflector

regulator=

sailor

senator

separator

solicitor

supervisor

survivor

tormentor

testator

transgressor

translator

divisor

director

dictator

denominator

creator

counsellor

councillor

administrator

aggressor

agitator

arbitrator

assessor

benefactor

collector

compositor

conspirator

constructor

contributor

tailor

The _o_ and _a_ in such words as the above are retained in the English

spelling because they were found in the Latin roots from which the words

were derived.  Some, though not all, of the above words in or are

usually spelled in England with our, as _splendour, saviour,_ etc., and

many books printed in this country for circulation in England retain

this spelling.  See {end of a}p{pendix} ..

Words ending in able and ible.

Another class of words in which we are often confused is those which end

in _able_ or _ible_.  The great majority end in _able,_ but a few

derived from Latin words in _ibilis_ retain the _i_.  A brief list of

common words ending in _ible_ is subjoined:

compatible

compressible

convertible

forcible

enforcible

gullible

horrible

sensible

terrible

possible

visible=

perceptible

susceptible

audible

credible

combustible

eligible

intelligible

irascible

inexhaustible

reversible=

plausible

permissible

accessible

digestible

responsible

admissible

fallible

flexible

incorrigible

irresistible=

ostensible

tangible

contemptible

divisible

discernible

corruptible

edible

legible

indelible

indigestible

Of course when a soft _g_ precedes the doubtful letter, as in _legible,_

we are always certain that we should write _i,_ not _a_.  All words formed

from plain English words add _able_.  Those familiar with Latin will have

little difficulty in recognizing the _i_ as an essential part of the root.

Words ending in ent and ant, and ence and ance.

Another class of words concerning which we must also feel doubt is that

terminating in _ence_ and _ance,_ or _ant_ and _ent_.  All these words

are from the Latin, and the difference in termination is usually due to

whether they come from verbs of the first conjugation or of other

conjugations.  As there is no means of distinguishing, we must

continually refer to the dictionary till we have learned each one.

We present a brief list:

  ent

confident

belligerent

independent

transcendent

competent

insistent

consistent

convalescent

correspondent

corpulent

dependent

despondent

expedient

impertinent

inclement

insolvent

intermittent

prevalent

superintendent

recipient

proficient

efficient

eminent

excellent

fraudulent

latent

opulent

convenient

corpulent

descendent

different=

  ant

abundant

accountant

arrogant

assailant

assistant

attendant

clairvoyant

combatant

recreant

consonant

conversant

defendant

descendent

discordant

elegant

exorbitant

important

incessant

irrelevant

luxuriant

malignant

petulant

pleasant

poignant

reluctant

stagnant

triumphant

vagrant

warrant

attendant

repentant

A few of these words may have either termination according to the

meaning, as _confident_ (adj.) and _confidant_ (noun).  Usually the noun

ends in _ant,_ the adjective in _ent_.  Some words ending in _ant_ are

used both as noun and as adjective, as _attendant_.  The abstract nouns

in _ence_ or _ance_ correspond to the adjectives.  But there are several

of which the adjective form does not appear in the above list:

  ence

abstinence

existence

innocence

diffidence

diligence

essence

indigence

negligence

obedience

occurrence

reverence

vehemence

residence

violence

reminiscence

intelligence

presence

prominence

prudence

reference

reverence

transference

turbulence

consequence

indolence

patience

beneficence

preference=

  ance

annoyance

cognizance

vengeance

compliance

conveyance

ignorance

grievance

fragrance

pittance

alliance

defiance

acquaintance

deliverance

appearance

accordance

countenance

sustenance

remittance

connivance

resistance

nuisance

utterance

variance

vigilance

maintenance

forbearance

temperance

repentance

Vowels e and i before ous.

The vowels _e_ and _i_ sometimes have the value of the consonant _y,_

as _e_ in _righteous_.  There is also no clear distinction in sound

between _eous_ and _ions_.  The following lists are composed chiefly of

words in which the _e_ or the _i_ has its usual value.*  In which words

does _e_ or _i_ have the consonant value of _y?_

  eons

aqueous

gaseous

hideous

courteous

instantaneous

miscellaneous

simultaneous

spontaneous

righteous

gorgeous

nauseous

outrageous=

  ious.

copious

dubious

impious

delirious

impervious

amphibious

ceremonious

deleterious

supercilious

punctilious

religious

sacrilegious

Notice that all the accented vowels except _i_ in antepenultimate

syllables are long before this termination.

Words ending in ize, ise, and yse.

In English we have a few verbs ending in _ise,_ though _ize_ is the

regular ending of most verbs of this class, at least according to the

American usage.  In England _ise_ is often substituted for _ize_.

The following words derived through the French must always be written

with the termination _ise_:

advertise

catechise

compromise

devise

divertise

exercise

misprise

supervise

advise

chastise=

criticise

disfranchise

emprise

exorcise

premise

surmise

affranchise

circumcise

demise

disguise=

enfranchise

franchise

reprise

surprise

apprise

comprise

despise

disenfranchise

enterprise

manumise

A few words end in _yse_ (yze): _analyse, paralyse_.  They are all words

from the Greek.

Words ending in cious, sion, tion, etc.

The common termination is _tious,_ but there are a few words ending in

_cious,_ among them the following:

avaricious

pernicious

tenacious=

capricious

suspicious

precocious=

judicious

vicious

sagacious=

malicious

conscious

The endings _tion_ and _sion_ are both common; _sion_ usually being the

termination of words originally ending in _d, de, ge, mit, rt, se,_

and _so,_ as _extend---extension_.

_Cion_ and _cian_ are found only in a few words, such as _suspicion,

physician_.  Also, while _tial_ is most common by far, we have _cial,_

as in _special, official,_ etc.

Special words with c sounded like s.

We have already given a list of simple words in which _c_ is used for

_s,_ but the following may be singled out because they are troublesome:

acquiesce

paucity

reticence

vacillate

coincidence=

publicity

license

tenacity

crescent

prejudice=

scenery

condescend

effervesce

proboscis

scintillate=

oscillate

rescind

transcend

Words with obscure Vowels.

The following words are troublesome because some vowel,

usually in the next to the last syllable unaccented,

is so obscured that the pronunciation does not give us a key to it:

  a

almanac

apathy

avarice

cataract

citadel

dilatory

malady

ornament

palatable

propagate

salary

separate

extravagant=

  e

celebrate

desecrate

supplement

liquefy

petroleum

rarefy

skeleton

telescope

tragedy

gayety

lineal

renegade

secretary

deprecate

execrate

implement

maleable

promenade

recreate

stupefy

tenement

vegetate

academy

remedy

revenue

serenade=

  i

expiate

privilege

rarity

stupidity

verify

epitaph

retinue

nutriment

vestige

medicine

impediment

prodigy

serenity

terrify

edifice

orifice

sacrilege

specimen

Words ending in cy and sy.

_Cy_ is the common termination, but some words are troublesome because they

terminate in _sy.  Prophecy_ is the noun, _prophesy_ the verb,

distinguished in pronunciation by the fact that the final _y_ in the verb

is long, in the noun it is short.  The following are a few words in _sy_

which deserve notice:

controversy

ecstasy=

embassy

heresy=

hypocrisy

courtesy=

fantasy

________

The above lists are for reference and for review.  No one, in school or

out, should attempt to memorize these words offhand.  The only rational way

to learn them is by reference to the dictionary when one has occasion to

write them, and to observe them in reading.  These two habits, the use of

the dictionary and observing the formation of words in reading, will prove

more effective in the mastery of words of this character than three times

the work applied in any other way.  The usual result of the effort to

memorize in lists is confusion so instilled that it can never be

eradicated.

By way of review it is often well to look over such lists as those

above, and common words which one is likely to use and which one feels

one ought to have mastered, may be checked with a pencil, and the

attention concentrated upon them for a few minutes.  It will be well also

to compare such words as _stupefy_ and _stupidity, rarity_ and _rarefy_.

Homonyms.

The infatuation of modern spelling-book makers has introduced the

present generation to a serious difficulty in spelling which was not

accounted great in olden times.  The pupil now has forced upon him a

large number of groups of words pronounced alike but spelled differently.

The peculiar trouble with these words is due to the confusion between

the two forms, and to increase this the writers of spelling-books have

insisted on placing the two forms side by side in black type or italic

so that the pupil may forever see those two forms dancing together before

his eyes whenever he has occasion to use one of them.  The attempt is

made to distinguish them by definitions or use in sentences; but as the

mind is not governed by logical distinctions so much as by association,

the pupil is taught to associate each word with the word which may cause

him trouble, not especially with the meaning to which the word ought to

be so wedded that there can be no doubt or separation.

These words should no doubt receive careful attention; but the

association of one with the other should never be suggested to the

pupil:  it is time enough to distinguish the two when the pupil has

actually confused them.  The effort should always be made to fix in the

pupil's mind from the beginning an association of each word with that

which will be a safe key at all times.  Thus _hear_ may be associated

(should always be associated) with _ear, their_ (_theyr_) with _they,

here_ and _there_ with each other and with _where,_ etc.  It will also

be found that in most cases one word is more familiar than the other,

as for instances _been_ and _bin_.  We learn _been_ and never would

think of confusing it with _bin_ were we not actually taught to do so.

In such cases it is best to see that the common word is quite familiar;

then the less common word may be introduced, and nine chances out of ten

the pupil will not dream of confusion.  In a few cases in which both

words are not very often used, and are equally common or uncommon,

as for instance _mantle_ and _mantel,_ distinction may prove useful as

a method of teaching, but generally it will be found best to drill upon

one of the words, finding some helpful association for it, until it is

thoroughly mastered; then the pupil will know that the other word is

spelled in the other way, and think no more about it.

The following quotations contain words which need special drill.

This is best secured by writing ten or twenty sentences containing each

word, an effort being made to use the word in as many different ways and

connections as possible.  Thus we may make sentences containing _there,_

as follows:

There, where his kind and gentle face looks down upon me,

I used to stand and gaze upon the marble form of Lincoln.

Here and there we found a good picture.

There was an awful crowd.

I stopped there a few moments.

Etc., etc.

Quotations.

Heaven's _gate_ is shut to him who comes alone.   ---_Whittier_.

Many a _tale_ of former day

Shall wing the laughing hours away.               ---_Byron_.

Fair hands the broken grain shall sift,

And _knead_ its meal of gold.                     ---_Whittier_.

They are slaves who fear to speak

For the fallen and the _weak.                     ---Lowell_.

If any man hath ears to _hear,_ let him hear.

And he saith unto them, Take heed what ye _hear.  ---Bible_.

Hark! I _hear_ music on the zephyr's wing.        ---_Shelley_.

_Row,_ brothers, _row,_ the stream runs fast,

The rapids are near, and the daylight's past!     ---_Moore_.

Each boatman bending to his _oar,_

With measured sweep the burden bore.              ---_Scott_.

The visions of my youth are past,

_Too_ bright, _too_ beautiful to last.            ---_Bryant_.

(We seldom err in the use of _to_ and _two_; but in how many different

ways may _too_ properly be used?)

With kind words and kinder looks he _bade_ me go my way.

                                                  ---_Whittier_.

(The _a_ in _bade_ is short.)

Then, as to greet the sunbeam's birth,

Rises the choral _hymn_ of earth.                 ---_Mrs. Hemans_.

Come thou with me to the vineyards nigh,

And we'll pluck the grapes of the richest _dye.   ---Mrs. Hemans_.

If any one attempts to _haul_ down the American flag, shoot him on the

spot.                                             ---_John A. Dix_.

In all the trade of war, no _feat_

Is nobler than a brave retreat.                   ---_Samuel Butler_.

His form was bent, and his _gait_ was slow,

His long thin hair was white as snow.             ---_George Arnold_.

Green pastures she views in the midst of the dale,

Down which she so often has tripped with her _pail.

                                                  ---Wordsworth_.

Like Aesop's fox when he had lost his _tail_, would have all his

fellow-foxes cut off theirs.                      ---_Robert Burton_.

He that is thy friend indeed,

He will help thee in thy _need.                   ---Shakspere_.

Flowery May, who from her green lap throws

The yellow cowslip, and the _pale_ primrose.      ---_Milton_.

What, keep a _week_ away?  Seven days and seven nights?

Eight score and eight hours?                      ---_Shakspere_.

Spring and Autumn _here_

Danc'd hand in hand.                              ---_Milton_.

Chasing the wild _deer,_ and following the _roe,_

My heart's in the Highlands wherever I go.        ---_Burns_.

Th' allotted hour of daily sport is _o'er,_

And Learning beckons from her temple's door?      ---_Byron_.

_To_ know, to esteem, to love, and then to part,

Makes up life's tale to many a feeling heart.     ---_Coleridge_.

Bad men excuse their faults, good men will leave them.

                                                  ---_Ben Jonson_.

He was a man, take _him_ for all in all,

I shall not look upon his like again.             ---_Shakspere_.

There will little learning _die_ then,

that day thou art hanged.                         ---_Shakspere_.

Be merry all, be merry all,

With holly dress the festive _hall.               ---W. R. Spencer_.

When youth and pleasure meet,

To chase the glowing hours with flying _feet.     ---Byron_.

Quotations containing words in the following list may be found in

"Wheeler's Graded Studies in Great Authors: A Complete Speller," from

which the preceding quotations were taken.  Use these words in sentences,

and if you are not sure of them, look them up in the dictionary, giving

especial attention to quotations containing them.

ale

dear

rode

ore

blew

awl

thyme

new

ate

lief

cell

dew

sell

won

praise

high

prays

hie

be

inn

ail

road

rowed

by

blue

tier

so

all

two

time

knew

ate

leaf

one

due

sew

tear

buy

lone

hare

night

clime

sight

tolled

site

knights

maid

cede

beech

waste

bred

piece

sum

plum

e'er

cent

son

weight

tier

rein

weigh

heart

wood

paws

through

fur

fare

main

pare

beech

meet

wrest

led

bow

seen

earn

plate

wear

rote

peel

you

berry

flew

know

dough

groan

links

see

lye

bell=

great

aught

foul

mean

seam

moan

knot

rap

bee

wrap

not

loan

told

cite

hair

seed

night

knit

made

peace

in

waist

bread

climb

heard

sent

sun

some

air

tares

rain

way

wait

threw

fir

hart

pause

would

pear

fair

mane

lead

meat

rest

scent

bough

reign

scene

sail

bier

pray

right

toe

yew

sale

prey

rite

rough

tow

steal

done

bare

their

creek

soul

draught

four

base

beet

heel

but

steaks

coarse

choir

cord

chaste

boar

butt

stake

waive

choose

stayed

cast

maze

ween

hour

birth

horde

aisle

core=

rice

male

none

plane

pore

fete

poll

sweet

throe

borne

root

been

load

feign

forte

vein

kill

rime

shown

wrung

hew

ode

ere

wrote

wares

urn

plait

arc

bury

peal

doe

grown

flue

know

sea

lie

mete

lynx

bow

stare

belle

read

grate

ark

ought

slay

thrown

vain

bin

lode

fain

fort

fowl

mien

write

mown

sole

drafts

fore

bass

beat

seem

steel

dun

bear

there

creak

bore

ball

wave

chews

staid

caste

maize

heel

bawl

course

quire

chord

chased

tide

sword

mail

nun

plain

pour

fate

wean

hoard

berth=

isle

throne

vane

seize

sore

slight

freeze

knave

fane

reek

Rome

rye

style

flea

faint

peak

throw

bourn

route

soar

sleight

frieze

nave

reck

sere

wreak

roam

wry

flee

feint

pique

mite

seer

idle

pistol

flower

holy

serf

borough

capital

canvas

indict

martial

kernel

carat

bridle

lesson

council

collar

levy

accept

affect

deference

emigrant

prophesy

sculptor

plaintive

populous

ingenious

lineament

desert

extent

pillow

stile

descent

incite

pillar

device

patients

lightening

proceed

plaintiff

prophet

immigrant

fisher

difference

presents

effect

except

levee

choler

counsel

lessen

bridal

carrot

colonel

marshal

indite

assent

sleigh=

our

stair

capitol

alter

pearl

might

kiln

rhyme

shone

rung

hue

pier

strait

wreck

sear

Hugh

lyre

whorl

surge

purl

altar

cannon

ascent

principle

mantle

weather

barren

current

miner

cellar

mettle

pendent

advice

illusion

assay

felicity

genius

profit

statute

poplar

precede

lightning

patience

devise

disease

insight

dissent

decease

extant

dessert

ingenuous

liniment

stature

sculpture

fissure

facility

essay

allusion

advise

pendant

metal

seller

minor

complement

currant

baron

wether

mantel

principal

burrow

canon

surf

wholly

serge

whirl

liar

idyl

flour

pistil

idol

rise

rude

team

corps

peer

straight

teem

reed

beau

compliment

The preceding list contains several pairs of words often confused with

each other though they are not pronounced exactly alike.

Of course when confusion actually exists in a person's mind, a drill on

distinctions is valuable.  But in very many cases no confusion exists,

and in such cases it is worse than unfortunate to introduce it to the

mind.  In any case it is by far the better way to drill upon each word

separately, using it in sentences in as many different ways as possible;

and the more familiar of two words pronounced alike or nearly alike

should be taken up first.  When that is fixed, passing attention may be

given to the less familiar; but it is a great error to give as much

attention to the word that will be little used as to the word which will

be used often.  In the case of a few words such as _principle_ and

_principal, counsel_ and _council,_ confusion is inevitable,

and the method of distinction and contrast must be used;

but even in cases like this, the method of studying each word

exhaustively by itself will undoubtedly yield good results.

Division of Words into Syllables.

In writing it is often necessary to break words at the ends of lines.

This can properly be done only between syllables, and this is the usage

in the United States for the most part, though in Great Britain words

are usually divided so as to show their etymological derivation.

The following rules will show the general usage in this country:

1.  All common English prefixes and suffixes are kept undivided, even

if the pronunciation would seem to require division.  Thus, _tion,_ and

similar endings, _ble, cions,_ etc., are never divided.  The termination

_ed_ may be carried over to the next line even when it is not

pronounced, as in _scorn-ed,_ but this is objectionable and should be

avoided when possible.  When a Latin or other foreign prefix appears in

English as an essential part of the root of the word, and the

pronunciation requires a different division from that which would

separate the original parts, the word is divided as pronounced, as

_pref'ace_ (because we pronounce the _e_ short), _prog'-ress,_ etc.

(The English divide thus: _pre-face, pro-gress_.)

2.  Otherwise, words are divided as pronounced, and the exact division

may be found in the dictionary.  When a vowel is followed by a single

consonant and is short, the consonant stands with the syllable which

precedes it, especially if accented.  Examples: _gram-mat'-ic-al,

math-e-mat'-ics_.  (The people of Great Britain write these words

_gram-ma-ti-cal, ma-the-ma-ti -c{s} a l,_ etc.)

3.  Combinations of consonants forming digraphs are never divided.

Examples: ng, th, ph.

4.  Double consonants are divided.  Examples: _Run-ning, drop-ped_

(if absolutely necessary to divide this word), _sum-mer_.

5.  Two or more consonants, unless they are so united as to form

digraphs or fixed groups, are usually divided according to

pronunciation.  Examples: _pen-sive, sin-gle_ (here the _n_ has the _ng_

nasal sound, and the _g_ is connected with the _l_), _doc-tor,

con-ster-nation, ex-am.-ple, sub-st an-tive_.

6.  A vowel sounded long should as a rule close the syllable, except at

the end of a word.  Examples: _na'-tion_ (we must also write

_na'-tion-al,_ because _tion_ cannot be divided), _di-men'-sion,

deter'min-ate, con-no-ta'-tion_.

Miscellaneous examples: _ex-haust'-ive, pre-par'a-tive,

sen-si-bil'-i-ty, joc'-u-lar-y, pol-y-phon'-ic, op-po'-nent_.

CHAPTER IV.

PRONUNCIATION.

This chapter is designed to serve two practical objects:

First, to aid in the correction and improvement of the pronunciation of

everyday English; second, to give hints that will guide a reader to a

ready and substantially correct pronunciation of strange words and names

that may occasionally be met with.

Accent.

Let us first consider accent.  We have already tried to indicate what

it is.  We will now attempt to find out what principles govern it.

Accent is very closely associated with rhythm.

It has already been stated that a reading of poetry will cultivate an

ear for accent.  If every syllable or articulation of language received

exactly the same stress, or occupied exactly the same time in

pronunciation, speech would have an intolerable monotony, and it would

be impossible to give it what is called "expression." Expression is so

important a part of language that the arts of the orator, the actor, and

the preacher depend directly upon it.  It doubles the value of words.

The foundation of expression is rhythm, or regular succession of stress

and easy gliding over syllables.  In Latin it was a matter of

"quantity," or long and short vowels.  In English it is a mixture of

"quantity" (or length and shortness of vowels) and special stress given

by the speaker to bring out the meaning as well as to please the ear.

Hence English has a range and power that Latin could never have had.

In poetry, accent, quantity, and rhythm are exaggerated according to an

artificial plan; but the same principles govern all speech in a greater

or less degree, and even the pronunciation of every word of two

syllables or more.  The fundamental element is "time" as we know it in

music.  In music every bar has just so much time allotted to it,

but that time may be variously divided up between different notes.

Thus, suppose the bar is based on the time required for one full note.

We may have in place of one full note two half notes or four quarter

notes, or a half note lengthened by half and followed by two eight

notes, or two quarter notes followed by a half note, and so on.

The total time remains the same, but it may be variously divided,

though not without reference to the way in which other bars in the same

piece of music are divided.

We will drop music and continue our illustration by reference to English

poetry.  In trochaic meter we have an accented syllable followed by an

unaccented, and in dactylic we have an accented syllable followed by two

unaccented syllables, as for instance in the following:

Trochaic---

     "In' his cham'ber, weak' and dy'ing,

     Was' the Nor'man bar'on ly'ing."

Dactylic--

     "This' is the for'est prime'val.

     The mur'muring pines' and the hem'locks . . .

     Stand' like Dru'ids of eld'."

Or in the iambic we have an unaccented syllable followed by an accented,

as in--

       "It was' the schoo'ner Hes'perus'

     That sai'led the win'try sea'."

But if two syllables are so short that they can be uttered in the same

time as one, two syllables will satisfy the meter just as well as one.

Thus we have the following, in the same general met{r}e r as the

foregoing quotation:

     "I stood' on the bridge' at mid'night,

     As the clocks' were stri'king the hour'."

It is all a matter of time.  If we were to place a syllable that

required a long time for utterance in a place where only a short time

could be given to it, we should seriously break the rhythmic flow;

and all the pauses indicated by punctuation marks are taken into

account, in the same way that rests are counted in music.  The natural

pause at the end of a line of poetry often occupies the time of an

entire syllable, and we have a rational explanation of what has been

called without explanation "catalectic" and "acatalectic" lines.

The same principles govern the accenting of single words in a very large

degree, and must be taken into account in reading prose aloud.

The general tendency of the English language is to throw the accent

toward the beginning of a word, just as in French the tendency is to

throw it toward the end.  Words of two and three syllables are regularly

accented on the first syllable; but if the second syllable is stronger

than the first, it will get the accent.  Thus we have _sum'mer, ar'gue,

pres'ent,_ etc.; but _agree', resolve', retain',_ etc.*  We have

indicated above a natural reason why it cannot fail in the cases

mentioned.  The voice would be incapable of accenting easily the

unimportant prefix in such a word as _ac-cuse',_ for instance.

Sometimes the strength of both syllables in words of two syllables is

equal, and then the accent may be placed on either at will, as in the

case of _re'tail,_ and _retail', pro'ceed_ and _proceed',_ etc.

There are about sixty of these words capable of being differently

accented according to meaning.  The verb usually takes the accent on the

last syllable.  In words in which it seems desirable on account of the

meaning to accent the first syllable when the second syllable is

naturally stronger, that second syllable is deliberately shortened in

the pronunciation, as in _moun'tain, cur'tain,_ etc., in which the last

syllable has the value of _tin_.

 *In the chapter at the beginning of Webster's dictionary devoted to

accent it is stated that these words are accented on the last syllable

because by derivation the root rather than the prefix receives the

accent.  This "great principle of derivation" often fails, it is

admitted.  We have indicated above a natural reason why it cannot

fail in the cases mentioned.  The voice would be incapable of accenting

easily the unimportant prefix in such a word as _ac-cuse',_ for instance.

In words of three syllables, the accent is usually on the first syllable,

especially if the second syllable is weak and the last syllable no weaker

if not indeed stronger.  Thus we have _pe'-ri-od, per'-son-ate, It'-aly,_

etc.

If for any reason the second syllable becomes stronger than either the

first or the last, then the second syllable must receive the accent

and the syllable before it is usually strengthened.  Thus we have

_i-tal'-ic,_ and there is a natural tendency to make the _i_ long,

though in _Italy_ it is short.  This is because _tal_ is stronger than

_ic,_ though not stronger than _y_.  The syllable _ic_ is very weak, but

the obscure _er,_ or, _ur_ is still weaker, and so we have _rhet'-or-ic_.

In _his-tor'-ic_ the first syllable is too weak to take an accent, and we

strengthen its second syllable, giving _o_ the _aw_ sound.

It will be seen that in words of two or more syllables there may be a

second, and even a third accent, the voice dwelling on every other

syllable.  In _pe'-ri-od_ the dwelling on _od_ is scarcely perceptible,

but in _pe'-ri-od'-ic_ it becomes the chief accent, and it receives this

special force because _ic_ is so weak, In _ter'-ri-to-ry_ the secondary

accent on _to_ is slight because _ri_ is nearly equal and it is easy to

spread the stress over both syllables equally.

The principles above illustrated have a decided limitation in the fact

that the value of vowels in English is more or less variable, and the

great "principle of derivation," as Webster calls it, exercises a still

potent influence, though one becoming every year less binding.

The following words taken bodily from the Greek or Latin are accented

on the penult rather than the antepenult (as analogy would lead us to

accent them) because in the original language the penultimate vowel was

long: abdo'men, hori'zon, deco'rum, diplo'ma, muse'um, sono'rous,

acu'men, bitu'men; and similarly such words as farra'go, etc.

We may never be sure just how to accent a large class of names taken

from the Latin and Greek without knowing the length of the vowel in the

original,--such words, for example, as _Mede'a, Posi'don_ (more properly

written _Posei'don_), _Came'nia, Iphigeni'a, Casto'lus, Cas'tores, etc_.

In a general way we may assume that the chief accent lies on

either the penult or antepenult, the second syllable from the end,

or the third, and we will naturally place it upon the one that appears

to us most likely to be strong, while a slight secondary accent goes on

every second syllable before or after.  If the next to the last syllable

is followed by a double consonant, we are sure it must be accented,

and if the combination of consonants is such that we cannot easily

accent the preceding syllable we need entertain no reasonable doubt.

By constant observation we will soon learn the usual value of vowels

and syllables as we pronounce them in ordinary speaking, and will follow

the analogy.  If we have difficulty in determining the chief accent,

we will naturally look to see where secondary accents may come,

and thus get the key to the accent.

It will be seen that rules are of little value, in this as in other

departments of the study of language.  The main thing is to form the

_habit of observing_ words as we read and pronounce them, and thus develop

a habit and a sense that will guide us.  The important thing to start with

is that we should know the general principle on which accent is based.

Special Rules for Accent.

Words having the following terminations are usually accented on the

antepenult, or third syllable from the end: _cracy, ferous, fluent, flous,

honal, gony, grapher, graphy, loger, logist, logy, loquy, machy, mathy,

meter, metry, nomy, nomy, parous, pathy, phony, scopy, strophe, tomy,

trophy, vomous, vorous_.

Words of more than two syllables ending in _cate, date, gate, fy, tude,_

and _ty_ preceded by a vowel usually accent the antepenult,

as _dep'recate,_ etc.

All words ending in a syllable beginning with an _sh_ or _zh_ sound,

or _y_ consonant sound, except those words ending in _ch_ sounded like

_sh_ as _capu-chin',_ accent the penult or next to the last syllable,

as _dona'tion, condi'tion,_ etc.

Words ending in _ic_ usually accent the penult, _scientif'ic, histor'ic,_

etc.  The chief exceptions are _Ar'abic, arith'metic, ar'senic, cath'olic,

chol'eric, her'etic, lu'natic, pleth'oric, pol'itic, rhet'oric, tur'meric.

Climacteric_ is accented by some speakers on one syllable and by some on

the other; so are _splenetic_ and _schismatic_.

Most words ending in _eal_ accent the antepenult, but _ide'al_ and

_hymene'al_ are exceptions.  Words in _ean_ and _eum_ are divided,

some one way and some the other.

Words of two syllable ending in _ose_ usually accent the last syllable,

as _verbose',_ but words of three or more syllables with this ending

accent the antepenult, with a secondary accent on the last syllable,

as _com'-a-tose_.

When it is desired to distinguish words differing but by a syllable,

the syllable in which the difference lies is given a special accent,

as in _bi'en'nial_ and _tri'en'nial, em'inent_ and _im'minent, op'pose'_

and _sup'pose',_ etc.

Sounds of Vowels in Different Positions.

Let us now consider the value of vowels.

We note first that position at the end of a word naturally makes every

vowel long except _y_; (e. g., _Levi, Jehu, potato_); but _a_ has the

Italian sound at the end of a word, or the sound usually given to _ah_.

A vowel followed by two or more consonants is almost invariably short.

If a vowel is followed by one consonant in an accented syllable it will

probably receive the accent and be long.  If the word has two syllables,

as in _Kinah,_ but if the word has three syllables the consonant will

probably receive the accent and the vowel will be short, as in _Jo`n'adab_.

In words of three or more syllables the vowels are naturally short

unless made long by position or the like; but the vowel in the syllable

before the one which receives the accent, if it is the first syllable

of the word and followed by but one consonant, is likely to be long,

because the consonant which would otherwise end the syllable is drawn

over to the accented syllable, as in _di:-men'-sion_.  This rule is

still more in force if no consonant intervenes, as _i_ in _di:-am'-e-ter_.

If the vowel is followed by two consonants which naturally unite, as in

_di:-gress,_ it is also long.  If other syllables precede, the vowel before

the accented syllable remains short, since it usually follows a syllable

slightly accented.  If in such a position a stands without consonants,

it is usually given the Italian sound, as in _Jo-a-da'-nus_.  When two

_a_'s come together in different syllables, the first _a_ will usually

have the Italian sound unless it is accented, as in _Ja-a`k'-o-bah_.

In pronouncing words from foreign languages, it is well to remember that in

nearly all languages besides the English, _i_, when accented, has the sound

of the English long _e, e_ when accented has the sound of English long

_a,_ and _a_ has the Italian sound.  The English long sounds are seldom

or never represented in foreign words by the corresponding letters.

The sound of English long _i_ is represented by a combination of letters,

usually, such as _ei_.

We may also remember that in Teutonic languages _g_ is usually hard even

before _e, i,_ and _y,_ but in Romance languages, or languages derived

from the Latin, these vowels make the _g_ and _c_ soft.

_Th_ in French and other languages is pronounced like single _t_;

and _c_ in Italian is sounded like _ch,_ as in _Cenci_ (_chen'-chi_).

Cultured Pronunciation.

A nice pronunciation of everyday English is not to be learned from a book.

It is a matter, first of care, second of association with cultivated

people.  The pronunciation of even the best-educated people is likely to

degenerate if they live in constant association with careless speakers,

and it is doubtful if a person who has not come in contact with refined

speakers can hope to become a correct speaker himself.

As a rule, however, persons mingling freely in the world can speak with

perfect correctness if they will make the necessary effort.  Correct

speaking requires that even the best of us be constantly on our guard.

A few classes of common errors may be noted, in addition to the

principles previously laid down in regard to vowel and consonant values.

First, we should be careful to give words their correct accent,

especially the small number of words not accented strictly in accordance

with the analogies of the language, such as _I-chance_ and _O-mane,_

which may never be accented on the first syllable, though many careless

speakers do accent them.  We will also remember _abdo'men_ and the other

words in the list previously given.

Second, we should beware of a habit only too prevalent in the United States

of giving syllables not properly accented some share of the regular accent.

Dickens ridicules this habit unmercifully in "Martin Chuckle."  Words so

mispronounced are _ter'-ri-to'-ry, ex'-act'-ly, isn't-best, big-cle,_ etc.

In the latter word this secondary accent is made to lengthen the _y,_ and

so causes a double error.  The habit interferes materially with the musical

character of easy speech and destroys the desirable musical rhythm which

prose as well as poetry should have.

Third, the vowel _a_ in such syllables as those found in _command,

chant, chance, graft, staff, pass, clasp,_ etc., should not have the

flat sound heard in _as, gas,_ etc., nor should it have the broad

Italian sound heard in _father,_ but rather a sound between.

Americans should avoid making their _a_'s too flat in words ending in

_ff, ft, ss, st, sk,_ and _sp_ preceded by _a,_ and in some words in

which a is followed by _nce_ and _nt,_ and even _nd,_ and Englishmen

should avoid making them too broad.

Fourth, avoid giving _u_ the sound of _oo_ on all occasions.

After _r_ and in a few other positions we cannot easily give it any

other sound, but we need not say _soot'-a-ble, soo-per-noo-mer-a-ry;

nor noos, stoo,_ etc.

Fifth, the long _o_ sound in words like _both, boat, coat,_ etc.,

should be given its full value, with out being obscured.

New England people often mispronounce these words by shortening the _o_.

Likewise they do not give the _a_ in _care, bear, fair,_ etc., and the

e in _where, there,_ and _their,_ the correct sound, a modification of

the long _a_.  These words are often pronounced with the short or flat

sound of _a_ or _e_ (_ca`r, the`r,_ etc.).

Sixth, the obscured sound of _a_ in _wander, what,_ etc.,

should be between broad _a_ as in _all_ and Italian _a_ as in _far_.

It is about equivalent to _o_ in _not_.

Seventh, _a, e, i, o_ (except in accented syllables), and _u_ are nearly

alike in sound when followed by _r,_ and no special effort should be made

to distinguish _a, o,_ or _a,_ though the syllables containing them have

in fact the slightest possible more volume than those containing _e_ or

_i_ followed by _r_.  Careless speakers, or careful speakers who are not

informed, are liable to try to make more of a distinction than really

exists.

In addition to these hints, the student will of course make rigorous

application of principles before stated.  _G_ and _c_ will be soft before

_e, i,_ and _y,_ hard before other vowels and all consonants; vowels

receiving the accent on the second syllable from the end (except _i_)

will be pronounced long (and we shall not hear _au-da`'-cious_ for

_auda:'-cious_); and all vowels but _a_ in the third syllable or