How to express the Flatus (Sibilants)?

As the unmodified flatus, or, as it should more properly be called, the spiritus asper and lenis, can only occur before a vowel, the printer will find no difficulty in representing these two sounds by the usual signs 'and ' placed before or over the vowel which follows. At the beginning of words there could be no reasonable objection to this mode of representing the very slight and hardly consonantal sound of the spiritus asper and lenis. But it will take some time before our eyes are accustomed to it in the middle of words. In such cases the Greeks did not mark it. They wrote , chariot, page 37 but , with beautiful chariots; they wrote , man, but , manliness. Nor in fact does there seem to be any necessity for marking the spiritus lenis in the middle of words. Every vowel beginning a syllable has necessarily the spiritus lenis; as going, seeing. As to the spiritus asper, which we have in "vehement," "vehicle," I fear that "ve'ement," "ve'icle," will be objected to by the printer. If so, we have still the h as a last resource to express the spiritus asper in this position.

The guttural flatus asper, as heard in loch, might be expressed by an Italic h. The flatus lenis cannot be distinguished in pronunciation from the guttural semi-vowel, and has therefore never received an alphabetical exponent. If it.should be necessary, however, to assign a type to this physiological category, we should be obliged to write the flatus asper by 'h, and the flatus lenis by 'h.

The dental flatus sibilans, pronounced sharp as in "sin" or "grass," has, of course, the best claims on the letter s as its representative. Its corresponding soft sound, as heard in please or zeal, is best expressed by z; only we must take care not to pronounce it like the German z. The more consistent way of expressing the sonant flatus would be to put a spiritus lenis over the s. This, however, would hardly be tolerated, and would be against the Third Resolution of our alphabetical conferences, where it was agreed that only after the Roman types, and the modifications of Roman types as supplied by common fonts (capitals, italics, &c.), had been exhausted, diacritical signs should be admitted into the standard alphabet.

As all palatals are represented by italics, the palatal sibilant would naturally be written with an italic s. This would represent the sharp sound as heard in "sharp " or "chose." The soft palatal sibilant would have the same exponent as the soft dental sibilant, only changed into italics (z). This would be the proper sign for the French sound in "je," "genou," and for the African soft palatal sibilant, which, as Dr. Krapf, Mr. Tutschek, and Mr. Boyce remark, will never be properly pronounced by an adult European.

Where it is necessary to express the original, not yet assibilated, palatal flatus, which is heard in könig and kön'ge, an italic y, with the spiritus asper arrd lenis, would answer the purpose ('y and y)

The labial flatus should be written by f. This is the shap flatus, page 38 as heard in "life" and "find." The soft labial flatus ought consistently to be written as f with a spiritus lenis. But here again I fear we must sacrifice consistency to expediency, and adopt that sign with which we are familiar, the Latin v. As we express the labial semivowel by w, the v is still at our disposal, and will probably be preferred by the unanimous votes of missionaries and printers.

The lingual flatus is a sound peculiar to Sanskrit, and, owing to its hollow guttural pronunciation, it may be expressed there, as it has been hitherto, by s followed by the guttural h (sh). The Sanskrit knows no soft sibilants; hence we require but one representation for the lingual sh.

Spiritus asper:'.

Spiritus lenis: '.

Although these exponents of the physiological categories of articulated sound have not been chosen because their present pronunciation in English, or French, or German is nearest to that physiological category which each has to represent, still, as we have avoided letters of which the pronunciation fluctuates very much (such as c, j, x, q), it will be found, on the whole, that little violence is done by this alphabet to the genius of any of these languages, and that neither an Englishman, nor a German, nor a Frenchman will ever feel much hesitation as to how any one of our letters should be pronounced.