by the national flat a. Grandgent[1] says that the broad a is now restricted in New England to the following situations:
1. when followed by s or ns, as in last and dance.
2. when followed by r preceding another consonant, as in cart.
3. when followed by lm, as in calm.
4. when followed by f, s or th, as in laugh, pass and path.
The w-sound also shows certain differences between English and American usage. The English reduce the last syllable of figure to ger; the educated American preserves the it-sound as in nature. The English make the first syllable of courteous rhyme with fort; the American standard rhymes it with hurt. The English give an oo-sound to the u of brusque; in America the word commonly rhymes with tusk. A w-sound, as everyone knows, gets into the American pronunciation of clerk, by analogy with insert; the English cling to a broad a-sound, by analogy with hearth. Even the latter, in the United States, is often pro- nounced to rhyme with dearth. The American, in general, is much less careful than the Englishman to preserve the shadowy y-sound before u in words of the duke-class. He retains it in few, but surely not in new. Nor in duke, Hue, stew, due, duty and true. Nor even in Tuesday. Purists often attack the sim- ple oo-sound. In 1912, for example, the Department of Educa- tion of New York City warned all the municipal high-school teachers to combat it.[2] But it is doubtful that one pupil in a hundred was thereby induced to insert the y in induced. Finally there is lieutenant. The Englishman pronounces the first syllable left; the American invariably makes it loot. White says that the prevailing American pronunciation is relatively recent. "I never heard it," he reports, "in my boyhood."[3] He was born in New York in 1821.
The i-sound presents several curious differences. The Eng- lish make it long in all words of the hostile-class; in America it is commonly short, even in puerile. The English also lengthen it in sliver; in America the word usually rhymes with liver. The
