Page:History of Corea, ancient and modern; with description of manners and customs, language and geography (1879).djvu/403

 Chapter XIII. THE COREAN LANGUAGK Suppose a clever Bengalee, who knew Hindee well and Chinese biilj, came across a book in Hindee purporting to represent the English of the "Three Character/' or ''Thousand Character Classic/' and suppose him ignorant of any other English language different from this transliteration, it would be a very natural mistake for this clever Bengalee to infer that the English language was monosyllabic like the Chinese. It is in some such manner that the Corean language has been classified among monosyllabic languages in our Cyclopedias, and not later than a year ago by Professor Douglas of London. The mistake is all the more readily fallen into, inasmuch as the Corean pronunciation is so unlike that of northern China^ whether Pekinese or Nankinese Mandarin, — approaching much more nearly to that of Canton. This difference, however, instead of proving the monosyllabic character of the Corean language proper, serves only .to justify the belief of those Sinologists who maintain that Cantonese more nearly resembles the ancient pronunciation than does Mandarin, either northern or southern ; for the Coreans, having an alphabet independent of the Chinese hieroglyphics, were able to stereotype that pronunciation of those Chinese hieroglyphics which they first learned. China, on the other hand, destitute of any such stereotyping process, if we •except the uncertain and inadequate one of hymnal rhythmic terminology, seems to have changed its pronunciation with every succeeding dynasty, and to have changed it less in those regions of the empire remote from the immediate influences of such dynastic changes ; for, as far as memory serves me, no dynasty has ever been given to China from the south of the Tangt-su.