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 For instance, although it is a language spoken by savage people, as we said, it is liable to general laws, which produce phonetic alterations; viz: greater facility of pronunciation, and better harmony of sounds:— the former, a physiological principle; — the latter, a euphonical principle.

From these two principles results, that harder sounds pass successively into softer, and unpleasing sounds become sonorous or euphonical.

So far as we can see in the matter, in the phonetic alterations of Brasilian languages, prevail the following rules:

PERMUTATION OF SOUNDS

(a)

17.- The savage tribes of Brasil very often confound certain consonants in pronunciation, especially, when they belong to the same organ, as p, m and b; n, and d; r, s and t.

It is also necessary to note, that the most frequent changes take place in the processes of agglutination (composition and derivation by