DIFFERENT SOUNDS OF THE DIPHTHONGS LAV, EE, EL

cheat, clean, cleanly (adverb), clear , clearance,cleave, cochineal, colleague, conceal, congeal, cream,creak, crease, creature, deacon, deal, dean, dean-ery, dear, decease, defeasance, defeasible, defeat,demean, demeanor, decrease, dream, drear, dreary,each, eager, eagle, eagre, car, cast, caster, easy, toeat, eaten, eaves, entreat, endear, escheat, fear,fearful, feasible, fusibility, feast , feat, feature,flea, fleam, freak, gear, gleam, glean, to grease,grease, greaves, heal, heap, hear, heat, heath, hea-then, heave, impeach, increase, inseam, interleave,knead, lea, to lead, leaf, league., Itak, lean, lease,leash, leasing, least, leave , leaves, mead, meagre,meal, wean, meat, measles, meathe, neat■ neap,near, neat, pea, peace, peak, peal, pease, peat , plea,plead, please, reach, to read, ream, reap, rear,rearward, reason, recheat, redstreak, release, re-peal, repeat, retreat, reveal, screak, scream, seal,sea, scam, seamy, sear, seareloth , season, seat,shear, shears, sheath, sheathe, sheaf, sleazy, sneak,sneaker, sneakup, speak, spear, stoal, steam,'Streak,stream, streamer, streamy, surcease, tea, teach, tend,league, teal, team, tear , tease, teat., treacle, treason,treat, treatise, treatment, treaty, tireag, tweak,tu'eague, veal, underneath, uneasy, unreave, up-rear, weak, weakest, weal, weald, wean, weanling,weariness, wearisome, weary, weasand, weasel,weave, wheal, wheat, wheaten, wreak, wreath,wreathe, tvreathy, yea, year, yeanling, yearling,yearly , zeal.

228. In this catalogue we find beard and beardedsometimes pronounced as if written herd andherded; but this corruption of the diphthong,which Mr. Sheridan 1ms adopted, seems confinedto the stage.—See the word.

220. The preterimperfect tense of eat is some-times written ate, particularly by Lord Boling-broke, and frequently, and, perhaps, more cor-rectly, pronounced et, especially in Ireland ; buteaten always preserves the ea long*

£30. Ea in fearful is long when it signifies ti-morous, and short when it signifies terrible, as ifwvit.ten ferful. —See the word.

231. To read is long in the present tense, andshort in the past and participle, which are some-times written red.

232. Teat , a dug , is marked hy Dr. Kenrick, Mr.Elphinston, and Mr. Nares, with short e, like tit ;but more properly, by Mr. Sheridan, Mr. Scott,W. Johnston, Mr. Perry, and Mr. Smith, withthe long e, rhyming with meat.

233. Beat, the preterimperfect tense, and par-ticiple of to beat, is frequently pronounced in Ire­ land like bet (a wager): and, if utility were theonly object of language, this would certainly bethe preferable pronunciation, as nothing tendsmore to obscurity than verbs which have no dif-ferent form for their present and past times ; butfashion in this, as in many other cases, triumphsover use and propriety ; and bet, for the pasttime and participle of beat, must be religiously

avoided.

234. Ea is pronounced like the short e in thefollowing words : Abreast, ahead, already, bed-stead, behead, bespread, bestead, bread, breadth,breakfast, breast, breath, cleanse, cleanly (adjec-tive), clean lily, dead, deadly, deaf, deafen, dearth,death, earl, earldom, early, earn, earnest, earth ,earthen, earthly, endeavour, fea 1 her, head, heady ,health , heard, hearse, heaven, heavy, jealous, im-pcart, instead, lead, leaden, leant (the past timeand participle of to lean), learn, learning, leather,leaven, meadow, meant, measure, pearl, peasant,pheasant, pleasant, pleasantry, pleasure, read(past time and participle), readily, readiness,ready , realm, rehearsal, rehearse , research, seam-stress, scarce, search, spread, stead, steadfast,steady, stealth , stealthy, sweat, sweaty, thread,tlireaden , threat, threaten, treachery, tread, treadle,treasure, uncleanly , wealth, wealthy, ueapon,weather, yearn, zealot., zealous, zealously.

235. I have given the last three words, com-pounded of zeal, as instances of the short soundof the diphthong, because it is certainly the moreusual sound ; but some attempts have lately beenmade in the House of Commons to pronouncethem long, as in the noun. It is a commendablezeal to endeavour to reform the language as wellas the constitution; but whether, if these wordswere altered, it would be a real reformation,may admit of some dispute.—See Enclitical Ter-mination, No. 515, and the word Zealot

230. Heard, the past time and participle of heat,is sometimes corruptly pronounced with thediph-thong long, so as to rhyme with rear’d ; but thisis supposing the verb U> be regular ; which, fromthe spelling, is evidently not the case.

•237. It is, perhaps, worth observation, that, whenthis diphthong comes before r, it is apt to slideinto the short#-, which is undoubtedly very nearthe true sound, hut not exactly: thus pronouncingearl, earth, dearth, as if written url, urth, durth,is a slight deviation from the true sound, whichis exactly that of i before r, followed by anotherconsonant, in virtue, virgin ; and that is the truesound of short e in vermin, vernal, &c. 11)8.

23a. Leant, the past time anti participle of tolean, is grown vulgar : the regular form, leaned, ispreferable.

239. 'Hie past time and participle of the verb toleap scons to prefer the irregular form ; there-fore, though we almost always hear to leap rhym-ing with reap, we generally hear leaped wiiitenand pronounced leapt, rhyming with wept.

240. Ea is pronounced like long slender a inbare, in the following words: Bear , bearer,break,forbear, forswear, great, pear, steak, swear, totear, wear.

241. The word great is sometimes pronouncedas if written greet, generally by people of educa-tion, and almost universally in Ireland ; but thisis contrary to the fixed and settled practice inEngland. That this is an affected pronunciationwill be perceived in a moment by pronouncingthis word in the phrase Alexander the Great ; forthose who pronounce the word greet in othercases will generally in this rhyme it with fate.It is true the ee is the regular sound of this diph-thong ; but this slender sound of e has, in all pro-bability, given way to that of a, as deeper andmore expressive of the epithet great.

242. The same observations are applicable tothe word break ; which is much more expressiveof the action when pronounced brake than /week,as it is sometimes afl’ectedly pronounced.

243. Ea is pronounced like the long Italian a infather, in the following words: heart, hearty ,hearten. hearth, hearken.

244. Ea, unaccented, has an obscure sound, ap-proaching to short u in vengeance , sergeant , pa-geant, and pageantry.

EAV,

245. This is a French rather than an English triphthong, being found only in words derivedfrom that language. Its sound is that of lon-gopen o, as beau, bureau, flambeau, portmanteau .In beauty and its compounds it has the first soundof u, as if written bewty.

EE.

246. This diphthong, in all words except thosethat end in r, has a squeezed sound of long opene, formed by a closer application of the tongue tothe roof of the month than in that vowel singly*,which is distinguishable to a nice ear in the drf.ferent sounds of the verbs to flee ami to meet, andthe nouns flea and meat. This has always beenmy opinion; but, upon consulting some goodspeakers on the occasion, and in particular Mr.Garrick, who could find no difference in thesound of these words, I am less confident in givingit to the public. At any rate the difference isbut very trifling, and 1 shall therefore consideree as equivalent to the long open e •

247. This diphthong is irregular only in the wordbreeches, pronounced as if written britches. Cheese-cake, sometimes pronounced chizcake, and breech ,britch, 1 look upon as vulgarisms. Beelzebub , in-deed, in prose, has generally the short sound ofe, as in bell: and when these two letters form butone syllable, in the poetical contraction of e’erand ne er for ever and never, they are pronouncedas if written air and nair.

EL

248. The general sound of this diphthong seemsto be the same as ey, when under the accent,which is like long slender a ; but the other Boundsare so numerous as to require a catalogue of themall.