The ph, of like sound, remains, on the other hand mute at the beginning of Greek words: phthisis, phthisic, phthisical; and in the compounds: ápophthegm (pronounced ápothem), which is also spelt apothegm. Upon v see the rejection of vowels and consonants. Otherwise its rejection is indicated in writing, as in e'er, ne'er, o'er and the like. w is in many ways extinct in pronunciation. At the beginning of a syllable it is silent before r: wrinkle, rap, wrong, wry; of course in compounds, as awry, bewray &c.; before h in words in which h is followed by o (also by 00): who, whose, whole, whore, whoop (also spelt hoop) Except whop c. der. and whorl. According to Walker and It is mute after t in two and its compounds; after s in sword. In composition w is silent after an initial s in answer, Anglosaxon and-svarjan, an-svarjan; analogously in common life in boatswain (pronounced bos'n) and cóckswain (pronounced coxen = cócksn) from the Anglosaxon svân = bubulcus, juvenis. Thus also a single is rejected after a consonant, when the single consonant after a short Vowel seems reduplicated: gúnwale, commonly pronounced and even spelt gunnel, and especially in names of places compounded of the Anglosaxon vic=portus and vic-habitatio, also vica-castellum; Greenwich, Nortwich, Droitwich, Shéldwich, Dúlwich, Dúnwich. Alnwick (pronounced Annick), Berwick (pronounced Berrick), Hárwick (pronounced Hárrick). Sedgwick &c. Thus the pronunciation of housewife huzzif“ otherwise also hús-wif and the spelling hússy (pronounced húzzy) has arisen. After th an initial is silent in the negligent pronunciation of southward (pronounced suthard) and southernwood (pronounced suthernwood) as well as in the vulgar pronunciation of aukward and Southwark, which is almost corrupted into Sóddrick. w is extinguished between vowels in toward, towards c. der., wherein ōw is taken as the vowel. Upon the silence of an originally consonantal w at the beginning and the end of a word, by which the vowel signs ew, aw, ow &c. partly arise, see below, (the origin of the vowels.) 3) The toothsounds t. d. th, s, c, z. t is frequently silent betwixt consonants, particularly in the collision of stl whistle, thistle, mistletoe, wrestle, péstle, castle, Câstlebar, Castleton, hóstler, thróstle, bústle; and stn (commonly with a preceding mute or rather glib e): chestnut, listen, listener, hásten, moisten, and analogously with stn: often, sóften; seldom in the muting of stm: Christmas; or stc in common life: waistcoat; also in the combination rtg in: mortgage, which also appears a matter of course with ptc in bankruptcy. In the popular boatswain (bōs'n) it is lost before sn. Where t stands before ch, it is as idle in pronunciation as every other final reduplication: fetch, catch &c. At the end of French words, not assimilated to the English pronunciation, it is silent, in the French manner: billetdoux, trait, eclat, gout, hautboy and many more. d is silent at the beginning before n: Dnieper, Dniester. In the compound handkerchief d is rejected and n becomes nasal (= n). In careless utterance it is readily rejected between n and s as in: Windsor, handsome, handsel, groundsel, although this is not approved by orthoepists. On the otherhand wednesday is universally pronounced wenzday. Fieldfare is commonly pronounced without a d, and in Kirkcudbright (say kirkkobry) it likewise does not sound. At the end of a word d after n is often not pronounced dialectically: riband is pronounced like ribbon, which is the better style, also weasand, Anglosaxon vâsend, væsend, is here and there pronounced like vēz'n. The reduplication of g after a short vowel by d with a dental g (= dzh) is to be treated like that of t before ch. th is, perhaps, silent in clothes (pronounced cloze) only. See above, th before s. s is not silent at the beginning of a word, unless we consider it mute when combined with the dental c, as in science where, however, e may with the same reason pass for mute. In the middle of some simple and compound words s (partly inorganic) is silent, particularly l, n, and m: isle, ísland, Íslay (pronounced îla), aisle, Carlisle, Lisle (pronounced Lisle, Lille), mesne (middle), demesne also spelt demain (Old-French demaine), púisne (pronounced pùny), disme (pronounced deme, OldFrench disme, dixme), as well as in viscount, Lewis d'ór and Grosvenor. At the end of many French words not assimilated, s, as in French, is rejected: avís, vis-a-vis, pas, chamois, shámois (pronounced shammy, as it is also spelt) sous, rendezvous, corps and others. Yet it is pronounced in glacis and here and there in other words. z is silent in the French rendezvous. The throatsounds c, k, ch, g, gh, h, y c is mute at the beginning of foreign words before other consonants, as in Cnéus, Ctésilas, czar, czarina c. der. In the middle of the word it is mute betwixt s and 7: muscle, árbuscle, córpuscle; yet not in derivatives, as corpúscular and many such. The rejection of c before t is also usual in víctual (pronounced vitt'l), compare Old-French vitaille, Latin victualia; indict, indictable, indictment and other derivatives alongside of which indîte, indîter is written. c is likewise silent in Connecticut; cf. Póntefract and Pomfret. k is always mute before n at the beginning of a word: knee, know, knuckle, knight. ch is silent after an initial s in schism c. der; in schedule sch is pronounced like sh; it is also mute in yacht and drachm (also spelt dram). g is mute. like k. before n at the beginning of a word: gnat, gnome, gnoff. In the middle of the word the silence of ༡ before m and n occurs: before m, when it concludes the syllable: phlegm, ápophthegm, paradigm, párapegm; but not with the augmentation of the word, when it becomes the initial sound before a vowel: phlegmátic, paradigmatical. Before n, likewise, when this concludes the syllable: impregn, féign, expugn, oppúgn, propúgn, design, malign, foreign, sovereign; in derivatives, only when their forms begin with a consonaut, as ment, ness, ly. ty, cy: designment, fóreignness, malignly, sovereignty, ensigncy. Among the derivational forms. beginning with a vowel, those in ing and er alone make the g mute : feigning, designing, oppúgner, fóreigner. Before all others beginning with vowels g becomes the final and n the initial sound: imprégnate, signal. benignity. Moreover, g is not sounded in poignant; cógnizance (in the legal sense) cónnizance, and cocágne is, according to Smart, pronounced cockane. In the encounter of gl and gn with an unaccented i after it and another vowel arise forms of the iota and n, in which g before I and n may in English be considered as cast out and i as having passed into a semiconsonant y: intaglio, seráglio, óglio, bágnio, séignior, signior. The silence of g in the verbal form is provincial, for instance, in Derbyshire and Scotland. gh is silent in the middle of the word, where gh stands before both an initial and a final t: eight, straight, sought, bought, fought, night, might, right, flight, fright, sight, Connaught, mighty, rightly, slaughter, daughter, dóughty, as also in the long (or diphthong) accented syllables ending in gh: weigh, neigh, neighbour, though, dough (pronounced doe), although, through, úsquebaugh (Erse, whence whisky), pugh! nigh, sigh, high, bough, plough; Annagh, Armagh, Nenägh. But this happens also in unaccented final syllables: Raleigh, Chúmleigh, Hadleigh, Denbigh, Keogh, Conemaugh, borough, thorough c. der., fúrlough. Even in Old-English we certainly find u and w substituted for gh: plou, plow glough. In the compounds, of burgh this word is often made to sound like borough (burro); Édinburgh, Jédburgh and others. With the silence of gh is connected its rejection (together with u) at the end tho', altho and even bro' instead borough. h is by general consent, silent only in a few words not originally Germanic: heir, honest, hónour, hóstler (also spelt ostler), hour, humble and all their derivatives and compounds; but, of course, not in merely related words not immediately betraying an English stem; as héritage, hóral &c. Many also add herb and hospital to the above list. The inclination is, however, universal to regard h as mute in the unaccented syllable, beginning with h at the commencement of a word, on which account the article an instead of a is wont to be put before adjectives of that sort; for instance héro and an heróical &c. About h before i see above. In Greek words beginning with rh, h is mute: rhétoric, rhúbarb, rheum, also in rhyme; so too in the combination dh in Búddha Even where h begins an unaccented syllable after one closed with a consonant, a proneness exists to drop the aspiration, as in ípecácuanha, in shepherd, dúnghill and others, for which reason also in names of place, as Amherst, Dúrham, Haverhill (pronounced haver), the remains disregarded in the mouth of the people. Otherwise in an accented syllable, as abhór. Before another final consonant it has likewise no phonetic value: John, Johnson, compare Old-Engl. Jon; buhl, búhlwork. At the end it is mute after vowels and consonants: eh! ah! hah! buh! oh! foh! sírrah! Messíah, Sárah, hallelujah; brámah, dahlia; catárrh. Silence of vowels with consonants. The rejection of consonants with a previous or a subsequent vowel is ordinarily speedily exhibited also in writing; yet the speech of the people has sanctioned abbreviations of this sort, not acknowledged by the written language, particularly in proper names. Thus in the unaccented syllable a consonant with a mute e at the end is cast out as be in Buncombe (pronounced bunkum) and Edgecombe (pronounced éj'kům). In the middle of words re in the common pronunciation of twelvemonth, Haverford also Havreford; te in lútestring (also spelt lustring); de in the vulgar pronunciation of Hydepark; ce in names compounded with cester: Leicester, Gloucester, Worcester (commonly also pronounced with an elided r) and others. Conversely both vowel and consonant are lost in: Léominster (pronounced lemster); av; Abergavenny (pronounced åberghénny). Two consonants with the included vowel in an unaccented syllable are cast out, like ven in sécennight (pronounced sénnit) cf. sennet (SKELTON I. 107), Sevenoaks is pronounced in Kent: Súnnuck; cf. fortnight fourteen night; ver in Wavertree (pronounced wâtry); ren in Cirencester (pronounced cis-e-ter), wherein at the same time s falls out before t. Compare Exeter in ROB, OF GLOUCESTER Exetre and Excestre I, 5 and 4. fourteennight; Upon a similar glibness of the speech of common life rest rejections indicated by a mark of elision, like gi'me (give), I'll (will, shall), I'd (would), thou'dst (hadst, wouldst), he'd (had, would) and many more, which remain foreign to the more solemn language. The syllable and the division of syllables. The syllable consists either of a single vowel or diphthong, or of a combination of a consonant with a vowel, or conversely; or of a vowel surrounded by consonants. We recognize them as such by that all sounds constituting them are produced with an impulse. A word, the sensuous expression of an image, may consist of one or of several syllables. The number of its syllables is articulated for the ear according to the number of sounds produced at one impulse. The division of syllables in writing is especially evident by the interruption of the word at the end of the line, and has, besides, a theoretical interest. But by the peculiar influence of the accent in English upon the totality of the syllables of a polysyllabic word, and the proneness towards the attraction (see above) of the initial consonant of a subsequent syllable, as well as by the glibness of many final syllables, the division of syllables is hardened for apprehension by the ear, and often rendered still more difficult for the written language. The parting of syllables is most obvious where several consonants between Vowels encounter each other which are separated by physiological conditions of the organs of speech, as in ac-com-plish; less decided, where a simple consonant appears between vowels, so that after a long vowel, as in apparent, with the glibness of the final syllable the division appar-ent or appa-rent may more readily catch the ear, and, after a short, attracted consonant, as in epic, the divisions ep-ic and ě-pic seem to correspond alike ill to the phonetic relations. With respect therefore to the division of syllables in writing, there is no complete agreement either among grammarians or in its employment in common life and in typography. But with the principle which appears so natural, to consider in the division of syllables the sensuous articulation of the word as the standard, is associated the theoretical interest to render evident the stem and the termination, and, in the compounding of words, to render the separate stems manifest. But in this is also to be considered, that in English many derived and even compound words are no more present, as such, to the linguistic consciousness. In the exposition of the principles for the division of syllables upon which authority is pretty well agreed must therefore be stated a) the general and leading points of view and b) their limitations conditioned by etymological considerations. a) General Rules. 1) Two vowels, not serving to represent one simple sound or diphthong, are separable: di-al, deni-able, soci-ety, préviously, perspicu-ous, destroy-ing, knów-ing, apprópriate, superi-órity. 2) If a consonant (with which, of course, must be reckoned the signs of simple sounds ph, th, sh, ch) stands between two vowels or diphthongs. then, apart from the inflectional and derivational |