"Haagsche Post"—a Dutch journal—devoies in a recent issue considerable attention to English as she is written. The writer comments somewhat pathetically on the fact that when foreigners are striving to learn English they are told "Drop your foreign accent." As proof of the difficulty of achieving this he writes: Dearest creature in Creation, Studyicg English pronunciation, I will teach you in my verse Sounds like corpse, corps, horse and worse. It will keep you, Susy, busy, Make your head with heat grow dizzy; 'Tear in eye your dress you'll tear, So shall I! Oh, hear my" prayer, Pray, console your loving poet, Make my coat' look new, dear, sew it!
Just compare heart, beard and heard, Dies and diet, lord and word, Sword and sward, retain and Britain, (Mind the latter, how it's written Mode has not the sound of bade, Say—said, pay—paid, laid, but plaid. Now I surely will not plague you With such words as vague and ague, But be careful how you speak, Say break, steak, but bleak and streak, Previous, precious; fuchsia, via; Pipe, snipe,.-recipe and choir, Eh n; how and low; Script, receipt; shoe, poem, toe, Hear me say, devoid of trickery: Daughter, laughter and Terpsichore, Typhoid; measles, topsails, aisles; Exiles, similes, reviles Wholly,' holly; signal, signing; Thames; examining, combining Scholar, vicar and cigar, Solar, mica, war and far, From desirable—admirable samper, plumber; bier, but brier; Chatham, Brougham; renown, but known, Knowledge; done, but gone and tone. ne, anemone; Balmoral Kitchen, lichen; laundry, laurel Gertrude, German; wind and mind; Scene, Melpomene, mankind Tortoise, turquoise, chamois-leather, Reading, Reading heathen, heather, his phonetic labyrinth Gives moss, gross, brook, brooch, ninth, plinth, Billet does not end like ballet Vouquet, wallet, mallet, chalet.
Blood and flood are not like food, Nor is mould like should and would. Banquet is not nearly parquet, Which is said to rhyme with '"darky.""
Viscous, viscount; load and broad; Toward, to forward, to reward, And your pronunciation 's 0. K. When you say correctly croquet Rounded, wounded; grieve and sieve Friend and fiend; alive and live; Liberty, library; heave and heaven; Rachel, ache, moustache; eleven, We say hallowed, but allowed People, leopard; towed, but vowed, Mark the difference, moreover, Between mover, plover, Dover, Leeches, breeches; wise, precise Chalice, but police and lice.
Camel; constable, unstable Principle, disciple; label Petal, penal and canal Wall, surmise, plait, promise; pal Suit, suite. ruin: circuit, conduit Rhyme with "shirk it" and "beyond it."
But it is not hard to tell, Why it 's pall, mall, but Pall Mall, Muscle, muscular; gaol; iron; Timber, climber; bullion, lion, Worm and storm; chaise, chaos, chair; Senator, spectator, mayor, Ivy, privy; famous, clamour And enamour rhyme with "hammer."
Pussy, hussy and possess, Deseri, but dessert, address, Gott, wolf; countenance; lieutenants Hoist, in lieu of flags, left pennants, River, vival; tomb, bomb, comb; Doll and roll and some and home. Stranger does not thyme with anger, Neither does devour with clangour, Soul, but foul and gaunt, but aunt; Foot, front, wont; want, grand, and grant, Shoes, goes, does *) Now first say; finger, And then: singer, ginger, linger.
Real, zeal; mauve, gauze and gauge; Marriage, foliage, mirage, age, Query does not rhyme with very, Nor does fury sound like bury, Dost, lost, post and doth, cloth, loth Job, job, blossom, bosom,' cath, Though the difference seems little, We actual, but victual, Seat, sweat; chaste, caste; Leigh, eight, height Put, nut; granite, but unite Reefer does rot rhyme with '"deafer." Feoffer does, and zephyr, heifer, Dull, bull; Geoffrey, George; ato, late; Hint, pint; senate, but sedate; Scenie, Arabic, pacific; ence, conscience, scientific Tour, but our, and succour, four; Gas, "alas and Arkansas!
Sea, idea, guinea, area, Psalm; Maria, but malaria; Youth, south, southern; cleanse and clean 5 Doctrine, turpentine, marine, Compare alien with Italian, Dandelion with battalion, Sully with ally; yea, yo, I, ay, aye, whey, key, quay! Say aver, but ever, fever, Neither, leisure, skein, receiver, Never guess—it is not safe:
We say calves, valves, half, but Ralf! Heron; granary, canary; Crevica and device, und eyrie; Face, but preface, but efface, Phlegm, phlegmatic; ass, glass, bass; Large, but target, gin, give, verging Ought, out, joust and" scour, but scourging Ear, but earn; and wear and tear Do not thyme with "rare," but "ere." Seven is right, but so is even; Hyphen, roughen, nephew, Stephen Monkey, y; clerk and jerk; Asp, grasp, wasp; and cork and work, Pronunciatio—think of Psyche Is a paling, stout and spikey; Won't it make you lose your wits, Writing "groats" and saying groats? It's dark abyss or tunnel, Strewn with stones, like' rowlock, gur-wale, Islington and Isle of Wight, Housewife, verdict and indict! Don't you think so, reader, rather, Saying lather, bather, father?
ly: which rhymes with "enough,"
ough, through, plough, cough, bough, or tough? Hiccough has the sourd of "cup"... My advice is—give it up! you are wrong. This is the of "doe."
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.