“When the elements are pronounced singly, they may receive a concentration of organic effort, which gives them a clearness of sound, and a definite outline, if I may so speak at their extremes, that makes a fine preparative for a distinct and forcible pronunciation in the compounds of speech."-Philosophy of the Human Voice, Sect. 47, p. 461. TABLE OF THE VOWEL ELEMENTS OF THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE. The same It is to be particularly noticed, that, in using this table, the attention is to be directed to the Elementary Sounds, actually heard in the words which are placed opposite to the letters and not to the names of the letters. letter sometimes stands in different words for several sounds. Attend therefore to the Sounds of the Elements. which are, as the table of words shows, distinct. They are seventeen in number. The Element is separated from the rest of the word by the horrizontal line,-and is always distinguished by an italic letter or letters. TABLE OF THE CONSONANT SOUNDS OF THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE. In this Table, (when the language admits of it,) one word is employed to show the consonant element at its beginning, and another to show the same element at its termination. The Element is distinguished from the other parts of the word in the same manner as in the preceding Table of Vowels. *The elements K T P are mutes. They produce such a degree of occlusion of the organs that no sound can escape until they are united with some other vowel or consonant. It will be useless there, fore to attempt to sound them alone. The ear can clearly perceive the difference of each vocal element in the foregoing tables of vowels and consonants from each other. Each is pointed out in the word or words in which it is found by an italic letter or letters. Such letter, or letters, (where more than one stand for a vocal element,) if pronounced as usually heard in such word or words, will give the true elementary sound in question. Each vocal element, vowel and consonant, is to be exactly sounded, in the order of succession in which they are found in the tables. When no teacher is at hand to demonstrate the sounds of the elements with his voice, the following direction will lead the attentive student to a perception of them. Let each word by which the elementary sound is illustrated in the tables, be pronounced in a very slow drawling manner. During its pronunciation let special notice be taken of the position of the organs of speech, and of the particular sound produced, as the element which is the immediate subject of description, issues from the mouth. This slow drawling pronunciation is to be repeated over and over again, until the element to be illustrated is clearly distinguished by the ear from the rest of the word, and the position of organs by which it is formed can be adopted at pleasure. It is then to be pronounced alone. In this manner all the vocal elements are to be sounded, and to be sounded with such a degree of energy as to come with marked distinctness, force and fullness on the ear. This sounding of all the elements contained in the foregoing table, is to constitute the first exercise of the student of elocution; and it is to be continued until he has acquired precision, facility, force and fullness in uttering them all: nor should he be permitted to proceed farther until this task is accomplished. When a class is formed, each individual should sound each element in his turn, from the table. Afterwards the whole class should sound them together in concert; the teacher requiring the utmost degree of force in their utterance on the part of each student, and carefully watching that there is no deviation by any individual from the appropriate sound. A familiarity with the elementary sounds will show, 1, That the graphic characters called letters, represent two things-the sounds by which they are themselves named; and also the real elementary sounds which enter into the vocal utterance of syllables: 2, That the elementary sounds heard in pronouncing syllables ought to be carefully distinguished from the sounds which constitute the names of the letters. This distinction is important, because the sounds of the names of the letters and the sounds of the elements, (for both of which letters stand as symbols,) are, though sometimes alike, often, entirely different. In the word A-GE, for example, the sound of the element |