characters arranged under them. Each genus (containing the same final sound) is again divided into fifteen classes, in reference to the initial sounds with which they are severally connected.
The Chinese have not carried their analysis of vocal sounds to the nice elementary distinctions recognized in Western languages; but each simple word is divided by their analysis into two parts: a final part, or “mother sound,” which gives body to the word, and a “leading part,” or initial sound.
The initial sound consists of a single consonant, or of two consonants combined, but no vowel over acts as the “leading part,” or initial.[1]
The final part, or “mother sound,” consists, essentially, of a vowel or vowels, followed, in some words, by a single consonant, but never by two consonants. Ng, which is found at the end of many Chinese words, represents, as in English, but a single elementary consonant sound, unlike either n or g when used alone, and not compounded of the sounds of n and g combined. This is a distinct elementary sound, and is used both at the beginning and end of Chinese words. This consonant sound, which we represent by ng, is one of the initials, and in some cases it is used alone, without the addition of a final, but only as a prefix to other words, giving them a negative signification; as, hò2, good; ng7-hò2, bad; k’ò3, to depart; ng7-k’ò3, will not depart.
Each class of syllables is again sub-divided, according to the distinctions introduced by the tones.
The thirty-three final sounds, multiplied by the fifteen initial sounds, give four hundred and ninety-five primary syllables. These again, multiplied by the seven tones in actual use, give three thousand four hundred and sixty-five different monosyllable words, which may be distinguished by the ear; to which may be added the semi-vocal initial, ng, used in a single tone without a final, as mentioned above.
Though there are in theory this number of simple words, many of them are distinguished from others by very slight shades of differences, and there are (so far as known to the writer) only sixteen hundred and forty-four in actual use.
To supply the defect which this paucity of words occasions in the spoken language, two or more words are frequently combined into one, to express a single idea. This practice is so common, that the
- ↑ One of the (so-called) initials has merely the force of the Greek spiritus lenis, and denotes the absence of any initial consonant, in which case the word begins with the vowel of the final or “mother sound.”
