The sounds represented in the three last examples are not only harsh and grating, but deep and full; the narrow sound of the r is therefore corrected by the broad vowels in roar, hoarse, groans, &c.

Bacon likens the sound of z to the quenching of hot metals, and that of sh to the noise of screech owls. The fact is that the sounds represented by z, zh, s, sh, are all more or less sibilant, and accordingly have a greater or less affinity to any sound of the like character. Now there are a variety of noises, which though not absolutely hisses, yet approach near to them in the sharpness and shrillness of their sound, as shrieks, screeches, the whistling of man or other animals. All these resemble more or less the hissing sound of the sibilants.

They saw-but, other sight instead! a crowd
Of ugly serpents; horror on them fell

And horrid sympathy; for what they saw

They felt themselves now changing; down their arms
Down fell both spear and shield, down they as fast,
And the diré hiss renew'd.

Dreadful was the din

Of hissing through the hall, thick swarming now
With complicated monsters, head and tail,
Scorpion and asp, and amphisbæna dire,
Cerastes horn'd, hydras and elops drear,

And dipsas, not so thick swarm'd once the soil,
Bedropt with blood of gorgon.

The hoarse night-raven, trump of doleful drere,
The leather-winged bat, day's enemy,
The rueful strich still waiting on the bier,

The whistler shrill that whoso hears doth die.

P. L. 10.

P. L. 10.

F. Q. 2. 12. 36.

By whispering winds soon lull'd asleep.

L'Allegro.

The breezy call of incense-breathing morn,
The swallow twitt'ring from her straw-built shed,
The cock's shrill clarion, or the echoing horn,
No more shall rouse them from their lowly bed.

And with sharp shrilling shrieks do bootless cry.

Gray.

F. Q. 2. 12. 36.

Now air is hush'd, save where the weak-ey'd bat,
With short shrill shriek flies by on leathern wing.

Collins's Evening.

It will be observed that in several of these examples the sharp sound of the sibilant is strengthened by that of the narrow vowels, long e and short i. These vowels are sometimes used with effect even by themselves.

The clouds were fled,

Driv'n by a keen north wind, that blowing dry
Wrinkled the face of deluge.

The threaden sails,

Borne with th' invisible and creeping wind,

P. L. 10.

Draw the huge bottoms through the furrow'd sea.

H 5. 3. Chorus.

The broad vowel sounds on the contrary, long a, au, long and short o, together with the broad dipthong ou, are used to express deep and hollow sounds;

A dreadful sound,

Which through the wood loud bellowing did rebound.

F. Q. 1. 7. 7.

His thunders now had ceas'd

To bellow through the vast and boundless deep.
All these and thousand thousands many more,
And more deformed monsters thousand fold,
With dreadful noise and hollow rombling sound
Came rushing.-

P. L.

F. Q. 2. 12. 25.

As the sound of waters deep,

Hoarse murmurs echoed to his words applause.

P. L. 5.

The very expression a hollow sound shows how close is the association of a hollow space with depth and fullness of sound. Hence the broad vowels are sometimes used to express mere breadth and concavity.

So high as heav'd the tumid hills, so low
Down sunk a hollow bottom, broad and deep.

Hell at last,

P. L. 7.

Yawning received them whole, and on them clos'd.

P. L. 7.

The observation of Bacon relative to the sound of ng may be generalized in like manner. There is no doubt that all the three nasals have a close affinity to any deep low sound; such as a hum, a murmur, or the twang of a musical string slowly vibrating. The reason I take to be the distinctness with which the vibrations of the voice are heard in pronouncing these letters, and the low deep tone in which they are generally spoken.

VOL. I.

Through the foul womb of night
The hum of either army stilly sounds.

H 5. 4. Chorus.

Macbeth.

The shard-borne beetle with his drowsy hums

Hath rung night's yawning peal.

Where the beetle winds

His small but sullen horn,

As oft he rises mid the twilight path

Against the pilgrim borne in heedless hum. Collins.

The bum-cock humm'd wi' lazy drone,

The kye stood rowtin i' the loan.

Where each old poetic mountain
Inspiration breath'd around,
Every shade and hallowed fountain
Murmur'd deep a solemn sound.

C

Burns.

Gray.

Even Johnson, notwithstanding the ridicule he has thrown upon enquiries of this nature, has admitted that particular images may be "adumbrated by an exact and perceptible resemblance of sound." But the law of resemblance that first great law of association-is not to be confined thus narrowly. If the mere sound of the words hiss and bah recall the cry of the animal, so may the muscular action, which the organs exert in pronouncing the words struggle, wrestle, call up in the mind the play of muscle and sinew, usual in those encounters. Wherever there is resemblance there may be association. We will now enquire what means our poets have used to fix their associations in the reader's mind, more especially in those cases, in which the connecting link has been the disposition or the action of the organs.

In the first place, we may observe that in making any continued muscular effort, we draw in the breath and compress the lips firmly. Now this is the very position in which we place the organs, when pronouncing the letters b, p. I have no doubt that to this source may be traced much of the beauty of the following verses.

Behemoth, biggest born of earth, upheav'd
His vastness-

The mountains huge appear

P. L. 7

Emergent, and their broad bare backs upheave
Into the clouds.

The envious flood

Kept in my soul, and would not let it forth,
But smother'd it within my panting bulk,

P. L. 7.

Which almost burst to belch in the sea. R 3. 1.4.

But first from inward grief

His bursting passion into plaints thus pour'd.

P. L. 9.

Who thrusting boldly twixt him and the blow,
The burden of the deadly brunt did bear.

F. Q. 4. 8. 42.

R 3. 4.

A grievous burthen was thy birth to me.

When the mind is seiz'd with fear and amazement, the lips open and voice fails us. If the surprize be sudden, a whispered ejaculation escapes, suppress'd almost as soon as utter'd. In this way I would account for that combination of letters st, which Spenser and others of our older poets affect, whenever they have to describe this feeling. Its fitness for the purpose seems to lie in the sudden stop, which is given by the t to the whisper sound of the sletters, be it observed, which are formed without the agency of the lips.

The giant self dismayed with that sound

In haste came rushing forth from inner bow'r,
With staring countnance stern, as one astound,
And staggering steps, to weet what sudden stour

Had wrought that horror strange and dared his dreaded pow'r.

F. Q. 1. 8. 5.

Stern was their look like wild amazed steers,

Staring with hollow eyes and stiff upstanding hairs.

F. Q. 2. 9. 13.

He answer'd not at all, but adding new
Fear to his first amazement, staring wide
With stony eyes, and heartless hollow hue,
Astonish'd stood.

F. Q. 1. 9. 24.

When too the sinews are overstretched, or shaken with sharp and jerking efforts, the same kind of broken breathing generally follows the strain upon them. The sound too is harsh and grating. Hence, in part at least, the effect produced by the combinations st, str, in the following passages;

Staring full ghastly like a strangled man,

His hair uprear'd, his nostrils stretched with struggling,
His hands abroad display'd, as one that grasp'd
And tugg'd for life.

But th' heedful boatman strongly forth did stretch
His brawny arms, and all his body strain.

Н 6.

F. Q. 2. 12. 21.