[97] This word is commonly heard in two syllables, yune’yun; but if Walker is right in making it three, yu’ne-un, the sound of y consonant is heard in it but once.  Worcester’s notation is “y=un’yun.”  The long sound of u is yu; hence Walker calls the letter, when thus sounded, a “semi-consonant diphthong.”

[98] Children ought to be accustomed to speak loud, and to pronounce all possible sounds and articulations, even those of such foreign languages as they will be obliged to learn; for almost every language has its particular sounds which we pronounce with difficulty, if we have not been early accustomed to them.  Accordingly, nations who have the greatest number of sounds in their speech, learn the most easily to pronounce foreign languages, since they know their articulations by having met with similar sounds in their own language.”—­Spurzheim, on Education, p. 159.

[99] If it be admitted that the two semivowels l and n have vocality enough of their own to form a very feeble syllable, it will prove only that there are these exceptions to an important general rule.  If the name of Haydn rhymes with maiden, it makes one exception to the rule of writing; but it is no part of the English language.  The obscure sound of which I speak, is sometimes improperly confounded with that of short u; thus a recent writer, who professes great skill in respect to such matters, says, “One of the most common sounds in our language is that of the vowel u, as in the word urn, or as the diphthong ea in the word earth, for which we have no character.  Writers have made various efforts to express it, as in earth, berth, mirth, worth, turf, in which all the vowels are indiscriminately used in turn. [Fist] This defect has led to the absurd method of placing the vowel after the consonants, instead of between them, when a word terminates with this sound; as in the following, Bible, pure, centre, circle, instead of Bibel, puer, center, cirkel.”—­Gardiner’s Music of Nature, p. 498.  “It would be a great step towards perfection to spell our words as they are pronounced!”—­Ibid., p. 499.  How often do the reformers of language multiply the irregularities of which they complain!

[100] “The number of simple sounds in our tongue is twenty-eight, 9 Vowels and 19 Consonants. H is no letter, but merely a mark of aspiration.”—­Jones’s Prosodial Gram. before his Dict., p. 14.

“The number of simple vowel and consonant sounds in our tongue is twenty-eight, and one pure aspiration h, making in all twenty-nine.”—­Bolles’s Octavo Dict., Introd., p. 9.