Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 9.djvu/540

514 to place. The Chinese invariably substitute the soft for the hard trill, and this substitution is common among other nations. The Polynesians put gutturals in the place of dentals, and the missionaries who are educating the youth of the Hawaiian Islands have had to abandon sounds that the people are unable to pronounce. It is almost as difficult rightly to hear as it is correctly to imitate articulations foreign to one's own tongue: travelers hardly ever agree in their representations of names that they have heard pronounced by natives. Are differences of voice and of auditory perception the result to a small extent of organization, but to a greater extent of early education? One is tempted to believe that such is the case. But experiment and observation, hitherto very limited, have not yet thrown upon this subject the light of scientific truth.

Words are formed by the combination of vowels and consonants; the voice gives utterance to them; this is language which is at first governed by convention, and then by grammar. Pronunciation results from the emission of articulate sounds; its range in pitch is usually about one-half of an octave. Commonly the voice rises or falls a little at the end of a phrase, producing accent, or marking affirmation or interrogation. The adult man, as a rule, speaks in the lower register, children and women in the upper register, but to this there are many exceptions.

Though we all employ speech, yet we differ in ease and agreeableness of utterance. The voice is weak or powerful, as determined by the mode of action of the respiratory organs. The timbre is sharp, harsh, sweet, or harmonious; this is determined by the conformation of the resonant cavities. Whatever quality of voice we happen to have naturally, is to be preserved, though it may be improved by constant attention to the ear, by steady observation, finally by training. Speech does not flow from its source with the same ease in all cases: here the mind is master, and mental qualities differ from one another to a far greater extent than physical aptitudes. Some persons express themselves without difficulty or hesitation—their thinking faculty acts as a continuous force; others seem to grasp a word or a phrase here and there—their thinking faculty is fluctuating, confused, undecided. A certain feeling of constraint produces stuttering, stammering. It used to be supposed that stuttering is the result of grave defects of the vocal organs, but such is not the case at all; this infirmity has its seat in the mind, and it may be cured or mitigated by systematic effort. It is shown by statistics that Provence, Languedoc, and Guienne, contain a greater proportion of stammerers in their population than any other portions of France. This statement, when