the word on. To sound it like short u at the end of a sentence or before any of the above-mentioned pronouns, when they have no emphasis, is a practice altogether inadmissible. By has two sounds; a long one rhyming with try, and a short one like be. The pronunciation of this word seems to be unsettled, and it is left to the ear in many instances to choose between them. The long sound, however, is generally preferable, and should always be used before a vowel, or an aspirate h; before an unaccented syllable; when at the end of a sentence, or member of a sentence; or when used as an adverb. EXERCISE 15. The convent of the Great St. Bernard is situated near the top of the mountain known by that name, near one of the most dangerous passages of the Alps, between Switzerland and Savoy. In these regions the traveller is often overtaken by the most severe weather, even after days of cloudless beauty, when the glaciers glitter in the sunshine, and the pink flowers of the rhododendron appear as if they were never to be sullied by the tempest. But a storm suddenly comes on; the roads are rendered impassable by drifts of snow; the avalanches, which are huge loosened masses of snow or ice, are swept from the heights into the valleys, carrying trees and crags of rock before them. The hospitable monks, though their revenue is scanty, open their doors to every stranger that presents himself. To be cold, to be weary, to be benighted, constitute the title to their comfortable shelter, their cheering meal, and their agreeable converse. But their attention to the distressed does not end here; they devote themselves to the dangerous task of searching for those unhappy persons who may have been overtaken by the sudden storm, and would perish but for their charitable succour. Most remarkably are they assisted in these truly Christian offices. They have a breed of noble dogs in their establishment, whose extraordinary sagacity often enables them to rescue the traveller from destruction. Benumbed with cold, weary in search of a lost track, his senses yielding to the stupefying influence of frost, which betrays the exhausted sufferer into a deep sleep; the unhappy man sinks upon the ground, and the snow drift covers him from human sight. It is then that the keen scent and exquisite docility of these admirable dogs are called into action. Though the perishing man lie ten or even twenty feet beneath the snow, the delicacy of smell with which they can trace him offers a chance of escape. They scratch away the snow with their feet, they set up a continued hoarse and solemn bark, which brings the monks and labourers of the convent to their assistance. To provide for the chance that the dogs, without human help, may succeed in discovering the unfortunate traveller, one of them has a flask of spirits round his neck, to which the fainting man may apply for support; and another has a cloak over him. These wonderful exertions are often successful; and even where they fail of restoring him who has perished, the dogs discover the body, so that it may be secured for the recognition of friends; and such is the effect of the temperature, that the dead features generally preserve their firmness for the two years. space of LESSON 16. ON THE SOUND OF THE WORD not. THIS negative is often improperly pronounced as if written nut, more especially when not emphatic. This practice is not in accordance with reputable usage, and should be as much avoided as the vulgar contractions shan't and won't, which are fast disappearing from the language of polite society. One or two of these contractions, such as didn't and don't, have gained too firm a footing to be ejected; but in the use of the latter, care must be taken not to violate established rules of syntax. Don't is a contraction of do not. "He don't," therefore, is an incorrect expression, when used in a leading member of a sentence, and is only allowable in a subjunctive clause: as, "If he don't," &c. Whether the emphasis fall on not or the word that precedes it, the sound of the o must be the same, viz., as heard in the word got. The word that requires emphasis in the following exercise is printed in italics. E EXERCISE 16. PROVERBS XXVII. 1. Boast not thyself of to-morrow; for thou knowest not what a day may bring forth. 2. Let another man praise thee, and not thine own mouth; a stranger, and not thine own lips. PROVERBS XXIII. 9. Speak not in the ears of a fool: for he will despise the wisdom of thy words. 10. Remove not the old landmark; and enter not into the fields of the fatherless : 20. Be not among wine bibbers; among riotous eaters of flesh. PROVERBS III. 28. Say not unto thy neighbour, Go, and come again, and to-morrow I will give; when thou hast it by thee. PROVERBS VIII. 10. Receive my instruction, and not silver and knowledge rather than choice gold. PROVERBS XXX. 25. The ants are a people not strong, yet they prepare their meat in the summer. To whom the angel, with contracted brow : Dismiss not her, when most thou need'st her nigh, Less excellent, as thou thyself perceiv'st. For what admirest thou? what transports thee? Milton. LESSON 17. ON THE PARTICIPIAL TERMINATION, ing. THE disagreeable effect produced on the ear by the repetition of the end syllable in such sounds as bringing, singing, flinging, &c., has induced many good public speakers to give up the pronunciation which seems to be required by the orthography, and to sound the termination as if written in: bringin, singin, flingin. This practice, however, which can only be defended on the plea of euphony, should be carefully confined to participles whose root ends in ing. If applied to those which have in for the final letters of the root, the reader or speaker, so far from gaining his object, will produce the inconvenience which his practice seeks to remedy. Such sounds as sinnin for sinning, and beginnin for beginning, are quite as disagreeable as those first mentioned. They would be still more objectionable if followed by |