Page:Proposals for a missionary alphabet; submitted to the Alphabetical Conferences held at the residence of Chevalier Bunsen in January 1854 (IA cu31924100210388).pdf/27

 to the formation of the vowels as the contraction of the throat, the scale of vowels is a different one. Here the aperture of the lips is largest if we pronounce the a; and it gradually decreases as we go on to the e, i, o, and u.

Hence, if we represent the opening of the lips by Roman, and the opening of the throat by English figures, taking the smallest aperture as our unit, we may, according to Kempelen, represent the five vowels in a mathematical progression:

ì =III. 1. e = IV. 2. a = V. 3. 0 = II. 4. u = I. 5.

It has been remarked by Professor Purkinje, that the conditions for the formation of some of the vowels, particularly of a and e, as heard in far and name, have not been quite correctly stated by Kempelen. The production of both these sounds depends principally on the form of the cavity of the throat between the root of the tongue and the larynx; in both cases this space is large, but largest in the pronunciation of e, The size of the opening of the mouth is the same in the two cases; not different, as Kempelen states. The position which he ascribes to the lips in pronouncing o is also unnecessary.

The experiments of Professor Willis show that, if we look on the instrument by which the vowels are formed as a vibrating membranous tongue, with one tube prefixed, and another added below the tongue, the shortest length of the tube gives i; the longest, u; and an intermediate one, a. But as the human organ of speech is not a regular tube, we must insist on this, that in the mouth the shortest length is indicated by the point of palatal contact, the longest by the point of labial, and the intermediate by the point of guttural contact; and that here, by the simultaneous operation of the guttural and labial aperture, the vowels i, u, and a are formed.

Besides the three vowels struck at the guttural, palatal, and labial points of contact, the Sanskrit, in strict analogy, forms two peculiar vowels as modifications of the lingual and dental semi-vowels. and L, subjected to the same process which changes 'h into a, y into