Page:Proposals for a missionary alphabet; submitted to the Alphabetical Conferences held at the residence of Chevalier Bunsen in January 1854 (IA cu31924100210388).pdf/51

 retain their orthography in spite of changes in pronunciation, have no scruple in expressing different sounds by the same sign; or, where two originally different vowels have sunk down to one and the same intermediate sound, we see this same sound expressed often by two different vowels. In the selection, therefore, of letters to express the general vowel sounds of our physiological alpbabet, we can pay less attention to the present value of each vowel sign in the spoken languages of Europe than we did even with the consonants. And as there it was impossible, without creating an unwieldy mass of consonantal signs, to express all the slight shades of pronunciation by distinct letters, we shall have to make still greater allowance for dialectical varieties in the representation of vowels, where it would be hopeless should we attempt to depict in writing every minute degree in the sliding scale of native or foreign pronunciation.

The reason why, in most systems of phonetic transcription, the Italian pronunciation of vowels has been taken as normal, is, no doubt, that in Italian most vowel signs have but one sound, and the same sound is generally expressed by one and the same vowel. We propose, therefore, as in Italian, to represent the pure guttural vowel by a, the pure palatal vowel by i, and the pure labial vowel by u.

Besides the short a, we want one, or according to others, two graphic signs to represent the unmodified sound of the vocal breathing, which may be deflected from its purity by a slight and almost imperceptible palatal or labial pressure. These are the sounds which we have in "birch" and "work," and which, where they must be distinguished, we propose to write ĕ and ŏ. As we do not want the signs of and ¯ to mark the quantity of vowels, we may here be allowed to use this sign to indicate indistinctness rather than brevity.

In most languages, however, one sign will be sufficient to express this primitive vowel; and in this case the figure 0 has been recommended as a fit representative of this undetermined vowel.

Among the languages which have an alphabet of their own, some, as, for instance, Sanskrit, do not express these sounds by any peculiar sign, but use the short a instead. Other languages express both sounds by one sign; for instance, the Hebrew Shewa, the pronunciation of which would naturally be influenced, or, so to say, coloured either by the preceding or the following letter. Other idioms again,