g is mute in legs, legacy; poing, fist; faubourg, suburb; étang, pond; vingt, twenty; hareng, herring; sang, blood; seing, signature; long; rang, rank; doigt, finger. gn has a liquid sound, as in champagne; gagner, to gain; ligne, line; agneau, lamb; Bourgogne, Burgundy; incognito; assignation; compagnie, company. Except the following words, in which gn is sounded hard: stagnant, regnicole, inexpugnable, ignée, magnétique, magnésie, impregnation, diagnostique, agnat, cognat. (Signet is pronounced sinet.) h is either mute, as in l'habit, the coat; les hommes, the men; or aspirated, as in la haine, the hatred; les héros, the heroes. h is mute in more than half of the words beginning with that letter, and is aspirated in the remainder. The h aspirate (from the Latin aspiro, to breathe), so called on account of the full and hard breathing with which that letter is pronounced in some languages, gives, however, a false notion of the nature of the French h aspirée, the breathing being very slight. This letter merely prevents the elision of the e (11.), or the union of the preceding consonant (26.), as in the following examples : h, called aspirated. Le héros, the hero. Les héros, the heroes. Le grand héros, the great hero. h mute. L'homme, the man. Les hommes, the men. Le grand homme, the great man. Les grands hommes, the great men. (See Union of Words, p. 16.) The following are the words in which his aspirated:-Ha! hableur (and its derivatives), hache (and its derivatives), hagard, haha, hahé, haie, haïe, la Haie, haillon, haine, haineux, haïr, haire, halage, halbran, halbrené, hâle, halener, haler, hâler, haletant, hallage, halle, hallebarde, hallebreda, hallier, haloir, halot, halte, hamac, hameau, hampe, han, hanap, hanche, hangar, hanneton, hanse, hanscrit, hansière, hanter, hantise, happe, happelourde, happer, haquenée, haquet, harangue (and its derivatives), haras, harasser, harceler, harder, hardes, hardiesse (and its derivatives), harem, hareng, harengaison, harengère, hargneux, haricot, haridelle, harnacher, harnais, haro, harpailler, harpe, harper, harpie, harpin, harpon, harponner, hart, hasard (and its derivatives), hase, hâte, hâter (and its derivatives), haubans, haubert, hausse, hausse-col, hausser, hautain, haut, haute (and its derivatives), hâve, havir, Havre, havresac, hé! heaume, héler, hem! hennir, hennissement, hé raut, hère, hérisser, hérisson, hernie, hernieux, héron, héros*, hersage, herse (and its derivatives), hêtre, heurt, heurter, heurtoir, hibou, hic, hideusement, hideux, hie, hiérarchie, hisser, ho! hobereau, hoc, hoche, hocher (and its derivatives), holà! Hollande (and its derivatives), homard, hongre, Hongrie, honnir, honte (and its derivatives), hoquet, hoqueton, horde, horion, hors, hors-d'œuvre, hotte, Hottentot, houblon (and its derivatives), houe, houille, houlette, houle, houppe, houppelande, houpper, hourdage, houret, houri, hourvari, housard, hussard, houspiller, houssage, houssaie, housse (and its derivatives), houssine, houssoir, houx, hoyau, huche, hucher, huées (and its derivatives), Huguenot, huit (and its derivatives), humer, hune, hunier, huppe (and its derivatives), hure, hurhau, hurlement, hurler, hutte, hutter. jis articulated like s in the English word pleasure, as in je, I; joyeux, joyful. 7 is generally sounded at the end of words, as in il, he; fil, thread; aïeul, ancestor; seul, alone. 7 final is not sounded in fusil, gun; baril, cask; sourcil, eyebrow; outil, tool; gentil, pretty; nor in fils, son. I liquid, much resembling the gl in the English word seraglio: soleil, sun; feuille, leaf; dépouille, spoil; avril†, April; péril; bail, lease; écueil, shoal; paille, straw; bouteille, bottle; œil, eye; famille, family. See APPENDICE. 7 is not liquid in the following words: ville, mille, tranquille, imbécille, camomille, codicille, Achille, armillaire, distiller, idylle, pupille, syllabe, vaciller, subtil; nor in all words beginning with ill, as illégitime, illustre, etc. p is sounded in cap; cep, vine (except cep de vigne). p is not sounded in corps, exempt, compter, indomptable, baptême, sept, exempter, dompter, sculpture, temps, champ, camp, drap, loup, sirop, galop, trop, coup; nor the last p in prompt. ph is sounded like f, as in philosophe, phosphore; phare, lighthouse. q is sounded like k, as in quitter, to quit; question; quatorze, fourteen; acquérir, to acquire; qualité; quadrille. *In the derivatives of héros, such as héroïne, héroïque, héroïquement, and héroïsme, the h is mute. †The dictionary of the French Academy is the authority for the liquid pronunciation of il in avril and péril. qua is sounded coua in quadrupède, aquatique, équation, équateur, loquacité, liquation, quadruple, fourfold. que is sounded cuè in équestre, equestrian: qué is sounded cué in liquéfier. qui is sounded cui in équilatéral; équitation, horsemanship; équiangle, ubiquiste. Quintuple is pronounced cu-intuple. r is sounded as in rat; route, road: also after a vowel, or at the end of words, as in art, garçon, tour; finir, to finish; voir, to see; hier, yesterday; fier, proud; cher, dear; tiers, third. r final is mute,-1st, in verbs which have their infinitive mood ending in er; as aimer, to love; fier, to trust; prier, to pray, except however when, in elevated style, the verbs in the infinitive mood are followed by a word beginning with a vowel, as Aller au combat, to go to battle;-2nd, in words of more than one syllable ending in ier, iers, cher, and ger; as jardinier, gardener; volontiers, willingly; boucher, butcher; boulanger, baker. s has two articulations, the first like s in the English word soldier; as in sage; séjour, abode; sucre, sugar; semaine, week; si, if; sonner, to ring; sur, upon; estime, esteem; parasol; converser, to converse; vraisemblance, likelihood; monosyllabe; persister, to persist; the second like %, occurring generally when s is placed between two vowels s; as in user, to use; résumé, summary; risible, laughable; transitif ; rose; misère, misery; vésicatoire, blister. s final is silent in most words; pas, bas, etc.; in Christian names, Thomas, Nicolas, and in Paris (city): it is sounded in hélas; jadis, in former times; vis, screw; as, ace; lis, lily; atlas; est, east; ouest, west; also in proper names, as Lesbos, Joas, Gil-Blas, Ménélas, Pâris. t has also two articulations, the first as in the English word tact: tentative, attempt; totalité, total; amitié, friendship; inimitié, enmity; bastion; indigestion; mixtion; partie, part; soutien, support; chátier, to chastise; the second as in the French syllable ci: patient, partial, essentiel, perfection, ration, Dioclétien, Vénitien, minutie, démocratie, satiété, initier; balbutier, to stutter. th* is always sounded like t: thé, tea; théière, teapot; théatre; thème, exercise; Athènes, Panthéon, arithmétique, Elisabeth, orthographe. t final is sounded in brut, dot, alert, fat, rapt;-ct are sounded in tact, exact, direct, correct, abject; but the e only is sounded in aspect, suspect, circonspect, pronounced aspek, suspek, circonspek. a has the five following different sounds like ks, as in Alexandre, maxime, index, excuse, extréme. gz, as in exercice, examen, examination; exorbitant, exact. ss, as in Bruxelles, Auxerre, soixante, sixty: like s, six; dix, ten. k, as in excepter, to except; excellent, excès, excep tion. z, as in deuxième, second; sixième, sixth. ON QUANTITY, AND ACCENT OR STRESS. 22. "English sounds are fixedly long or short in different words: a is long in father, fall, pale, and short in fat; i is long in machine, lives, and short in to live, pin; o is long in no, and short in got. "Sounds, in French, are neither fixedly long nor short, but either in the same words according to the speaker's feeling. The positive or natural quantity of French sounds is equality; there are few exceptions. "In English words of several sounds one is pronounced louder than the rest, which rising of the voice is called accent or stress: in indiscriminately the accent is on crim. "French words have no necessary and fixed accent. The stress may be laid on any sound in a word or sentence by sentiment and meaning alone. "It is an adage in France, that to speak French well, *The articulation TH, peculiar to the Greek and the English languages, has not been adopted in the French tongue. In France a child, learning the Greek alphabet, is taught to pronounce 0, teta: Ocòs, teos, etc. we must speak without accent, that is, without fixed accent. The peculiar quality (an eminent one) of its pronunciation consists in being free, even, flexible, open as well to every natural accent of the speaker as to any note of the musician."-A. Roy. In admitting generally the above excellent observations, it must be acknowledged that if we listen attentively to a French conversation, we shall find that there is in most instances a slight rising or stress of the voice on the last syllable of a word, or on the penultimate if the last syllable end with an e mute or unaccented. Examples: Produit, product; progrès, progress; nécessaire, necessary. In support of this opinion, we quote the words of one of the most distinguished living grammarians of France: "L'accent tonique n'est pas entièrement étranger à la langue française. En effet, si l'on écoute parler, avec attention, on sentira qu'il se fait un léger repos tantôt sur la dernière syllabe, si elle est sonore ou masculine: l'esprit, la vertu, je devançai, tu devanças, il devança; tantôt sur la pénultième ou avant-dernière syllabe, si la dernière est sourde ou féminine: la téte, l'incendie, le marbre, nous devançâmes, vous devançátes; dans tous ces derniers exemples les syllabes finales étant sourdes ou muettes, puisqu'elles se composent d'e sans accent, servent seulement d'appui à la consonne ou à la voyelle précédente.”—Mme DUPUIS, Traité de Prononciation. It should be observed however that the accent or stress of the voice on some particular syllable of a word is not so powerfully marked in French as it is in the English language. For instance, we have no example in French of the accent indicating, with so much precision, the difference in the meaning of words of similar orthography, as is expressed in the English words gallant and gallant. In French these two words are pronounced alike-galant, according to the general rule mentioned above, and the difference in the meaning can only be indicated by the context, or by the position of the word either before or after a substantive: thus, in the sentence un galant officier, the adjective galant has the meaning of the English word pronounced gallant, and in un officier galant, the same word means gallant. (See APPENDICE.) Exercise in French Pronunciation. 23. Note. Most words having the following terminations are spelt alike in both languages. al ......cardinal, principal, original, fatal. |