7. An articulate sound is the sound of the human voice, formed by the organs of speech.

8. Letters are divided into vowels and consonants.

9. A vowel is an articulate sound, that can be PERFECTLY uttered by itself; as, a, e, o; which are formed without the help of any other sound.

10. A consonant is an articulate sound which CANNOT BE PERFECTLY UTTERED WITHOUT THE HELP OF A VOWEL; as, b, d, f, 1; which require vowels to express them fully. A vowel is a PERFECT Sound. A consonant an IMPERFECT sound.

11. The vowels are a, e, i, o, u, and sometimes w and y.

12. W and y are consonants when they begin a word or syllable; but in every other situation they are vowels.

13. Consonants are divided into mutes and semi-vowels.

. 14. The mutes cannot be sounded at all without the aid of a vowel. They are b, p, t, and c and g hard.

d, k,

15. The semi-vowels have an imperfect sound of themselves. They are f, l, m, n, r, v, s, z, x, and c and g soft.

16. Four of the semi-vowels, namely, 1, m, n, r, are distinguished by the name of liquids from their readily uniting with other consonants, and flowing as it were into their sounds.

17. A diphthong is the union of two vowels, pronounced by a single impulse of the voice; as ea in beat.

18. A triphthong is the union of three vowels pronounced in like manner; as, ea in beau.

19. A proper diphthong is that in which both the vowels are sounded; as, oi in voice. An improper diphthong has but one of the vowels sounded, as ea in eagle.

QUESTIONS FOR EXAMINATION.

1. What is English Grammar?
2. How is English Grammar divided?
3. What does Orthography teach?

4. What is a letter?

5. How many letters are there in the English language?

6. What do these letters represent?

7. What is an articulate sound?

8. How are letters divided?

9. What is a vowel?

10. What is a consonant? Which is a perfect sound? Which an imperfect sound?

11. Repeat the vowels? 12, What are w and y?

13, How are consonants divided?

14.

What sound have the mutes, and which letters

are they?

15. What sound have the semi-vowels? and repeat

16.

17.

them.

Which are the liquids, and why are they so called?

What is a diphthong!

18. What is a triphthong?

19. What is a proper diphthong, and what are improper ?

SYLLABLES.

1. A SYLLABLE is a sound either simple or compounded, pronounced by a single impulse of the voice, and constituting a word, or part of a word; as, a, an, ant.

2. SPELLING is the art of rightly dividing words into their syllables; or of expressing a word by its proper letters.

WORDS.

3. WORDS are articulate sounds, used, by common consent, as SIGNS of our ideas.

4. A word of one syllable is termed a monosyllable; a word of two syllables, a dissyllable; a word of three syllables, a trisyllable; and a word of four or more syllables, a polysyllable: mono means one, dis two, tri three, and poly many.

5. All words are either PRIMITIVE or DERI

VATIVE.

6. A PRIMITIVE word is that which CANNOT be reduced to any simple word in the language; as, MAN.

7. A DERIVATIVE Word is that which MAY BE REDUCED to another word in English of greater simplicity; as, MANFUL.

ETYMOLOGY.

8. The second part of Grammar is ETYMOLOGY; which treats of the different sorts of words, their various modifications, and their derivation.

9. There are in English nine sorts of words, or, as they are commonly called, Parts of Speech; namely, the Article, the Substantive, or Noun; the Adjective, the Pronoun, the

Verb, the Adverb, the Preposition, the Conjunction, and the Interjection.

10. An Article is a word prefixed to sub. stantives, TO POINT THEM OUT.

11. A Substantive or noun is the NAME of any thing that exists, or of which we have any notion.

12. A substantive may, in general, be known by its taking AN ARTICLE before it, or by its

MAKING SENSE OF ITSELF.

13. An Adjective is a word added to a substantive, to EXPRESS ITS QUALITY.

14. An adjective may be known by its making sense with the addition of the word thing; as, a good thing.

15. A Pronoun is a word used instead of a noun, to avoid the too frequent repetition of the noun.

16. A Verb is a word which signifies to Be, to Do, or to Suffer, as I am, I rule, I am ruled.

17. A verb may generally be distinguished by its making sense with any of the personal pronouns, or the word To, before it; as, I walk, HE plays, THEY write; or, to walk, TO play, To write.

18. An Adverb is a part of speech joined