Page:Manual of the Foochow dialect.pdf/22

8 The fifth, or secondary smooth tone, called ha ping, is a quick forcible enunciation, commencing about two notes above the ordinary key, and suddenly dropping down, at the close, to the key note. It is what is called by elocutionists the falling third, and, when emphatic, the falling fifth. It is sometimes called the scolding tone. It is heard in a petulant enunciation of the emphatic words in the sentence, "No! I'll do no such thing".

The sixth tone is identical with the second, and no words are arranged under it; that is, no secondary high, or rising tone, has yet been invented in this dialect.

The seventh or secondary diminishing tone, called ha k‘ëü, is a guttural downward circumflex. It is, in English, expressive of peculiar emphasis, frequently indicating rebuke, scorn, or contempt, as,


 * "Whence, and what art thou, execrable shape?
 * . . . Back to thy punishment,
 * Fulse fugitive."

"You wrong me every way; you wrong me, Brutus."

The words very many, if spoken with forcible emphasis, would also exhibit the tone under consideration.

This is probably the most difficult tone in the language to enunciate correctly, under all circumstances.

The eighth, or secondary abrupt tone, called ha ik, closes abruptly, like the fourth tone, but differs from it by being enunciated on a uniform pitch, a little above the ordinary key. The eighth tone is an abrupt termination of the first tone, in the same manner as the fourth tone is an abrupt termination of the third."

When words are enunciated singly, the tones appear in their full form and are marked in their elements and distinctive peculiarities. But in compound terms or names, and in phrases whose component words are in regimen, or close construction, they assume striking peculiarities, which in some cases involve a radical change. These peculiarities relate to the first or leading word of the term or phrase. The only exception that we have noticed is when the following word is a mere suffix or unimportant word, in which case the leading word usually retains its ordinary character as to tone.