5 A nasals, and liquids. Analogous English sounds have constituted the agents of the foregoing illustrations of French sounds. Generally, this has had reference to separate words only. But let it be remembered that, to give the correct sound of a French word as it stands alone, is a very different thing from giving that same French word its correct sound when it is used with other words in the formation of a sentence in reading, or a phrase in conversation. In this respect, the French language is like our own, as used in common conversation. The system of word-connections, in sentences and phrases in both languages, is nearly identical. For the purpose of illustration we will begin by giving specimens of word-connections in the English language, viz. : scale is called D, the third E, the fourth F, the fifth a, the STANDARD SCALE. C The pitch of the key-note may be given in the heading or title of a tune, thus "key A," "key G," "key B flat," etc. In "pitching a tune" it is usual to take the upper c1 of the standard scale from the tuning-fork or the pitch-pipe to descend to the pitch-note required, and then give its sound to the syllable DOH. DOH, thus fixed, establishes the relative position of all the other notes of a tune. Suppose the "pitch-note" required is D. Then you would take c1 from the tuning-fork, and run down till you come to D, which you would "swell out" a little, and then sing the same sound to DOH, taking the "chord afterwards. Thus : AGFE: D DOH ME SOH : : | DOH : - If you find any difficulty in singing your A B C backwards, C1 B A G F E D It My hat was on the table, is pronounced as if printed my hat woz-zon the table. I jumped upon the ground, is pronounced as if printed I Not at all, is pronounced as if printed not-tat-tall. I assert a dogma, another denies it, is pronounced as if printed I assert-ta dogma, another deniez-zit, etc. These and similar word-connections occur in almost every sentence and phrase in the English language, where the continuity of sound is not broken by punctuation marks, without our being sensible of it. It is unavoidable. We are, and have been, so constantly used to it, that we notice it only when attention is called to it. It will be observed that the foregoing word-connections in the English language occur when a word ending with a consonant is immediately followed by another word commencing with a vowel. And the same exists when, in common conversation, the word following the one with a final consonant begins with a silent h, viz. : I was out about an hour, is pronounced as if printed I waszout-tabout-tan-nour, etc. Word-connections in the French language also occur under circumstances exactly similar; i.e., when a word ending with a consonant immediately precedes another word commencing with a vowel or silent h. This feature, therefore, of the pronunciation of French, both in ordinary reading and common conversation, will present no great difficulty to the student. The following rules, thoroughly understood and committed to memory, will place the student beyond doubt and hesitation concerning these word-connections, and other matters pertaining to the correct, intelligible use of the French language, both in reading and conversation. I.-Pay no attention whatever to the apostrophe. II.-Pronounce the pronoun elle like the English 1. III. The final letters ent of verbs, with which the pronouns ils and elles do or can agree, are always silent. IV. In reading poetry, ia, ie, ié, io, ion, ier, and sometimes ien, are pronounced as two syllables. V.-The letters es final are pronounced like the letters ay in the English word day, except when s forms the plural of words ending in e, in which latter case es are not pronounced. VI.-Pronounce eux, æ, ou, like e mute or unaccented. VII.-Pronounce ch and ech, generally, like the letters sh in the English word fish, except the letters ch in the word yacht. VIII.--The letters st final, in the words Christ and antichrist, are sounded, but they are silent in Jésus Christ. IX.--All final consonants after r are silent, except in the words Mars and ours, a bear. X.-In the word Messieurs, the final letters rs are only sounded But a man's voice, taking the c from the tuning fork, would when preceding a word beginning with a vowel. sing the scale an octave lower, thus: XI. Whenever a word ending with a consonant immediately precedes a word beginning with a vowel or silent h, the sound of the final consonant of the former word is carried to the first syllable of the latter, or to the word itself, if it be a monosyllable, just as if the latter word commenced with that consonant. This is most particularly the case if the two words are intimately connected in sense. The above rule owes its existence entirely to euphony, to subserve which almost everything else is sacrificed in the French language. Still the student must not observe it too rigidly, except in poetry. Neither in prose nor conversation does this rule hold good in the following cases, viz. :— 1. When a harsh sound would be the consequence. 2. Whenever any punctuation mark is placed between the two words in question. XII. The letter t, in the words et (a conjunction meaning and) and cent (meaning a hundred) is never carried to the following word in pronunciation. XIII. The letter a in the word Août, the month August (pronounced oo, and not ah-oo), is not sounded. XIV. In the compound word est-il, and a few others, the t is carried to the second syllable in pronunciation. XV.-Whenever a word ending with a silent e is immediately followed by another word beginning with a vowel or h mute, the consonant preceding the silent e of the first word is carried to the next word in pronunciation; as: 6. Connaître means to be acquainted with; savoir, to know, is said only of things. Connaissez-vous ce Français, cet Anglais, cet Allemand, et cet Savez-vous le français, l'anglais, RÉSUMÉ OF Le Capitaine G. sait-il le français ? La France entière, as if printed la Fran-centière, and pro-Il ne le sait pas, mais il l'apprend. nounced lah franh-sanh-teair. Honnête homme, as if printed honnê-tomme, and pronounced on-nay-tom. XVI. With the words ah, eh, oh, ouest (one of the points of the compass), ouf, oui, onze, onzième, phɔ, uniême, yacht, yatagan, yole, and yucca, no final consonant of a preceding word is connected in pronunciation. Neither is any elision of the article made before any of these words. XVII. In the phrase vers les une heure, the s final of the second word, les, is not carried to the following word, une, in pronunciation. XVIII. The word cinq is pronounced sanh whenever it comes before a consonant or an aspirated h. But before a vowel or h mute it is pronounced sanhk. Connaissez-vous le Docteur L. ? Do you know that Frenchman, that Does Captain G. know French? Do you know Dr. L. ? Je ne le connais pas, mais je sais I am not acquainted with him, but où il demeure. Ce monsieur est-il peintre ? I know where he lives. Ce monsieur est un architecte dis- That gentleman is a distinguished tingué. Ce Français parle grec et arabe. Il parle le grec, l'arabe et l'italien. architect. That Frenchman speaks Greek and He speaks the Greek, Arabic, and Italian languages. Avez-vous vu Charles Dix, frère de Have you seen Charles the Tenth, XIX.-The letters we have the sound of u, when they are not Allemand, -e, German. silent, after g and q. Ancien, -ne, ancient. VOCABULARY. Grec, -que, Greek. XX. The word dix, ten, before a consonant, is pronounced dee; before a vowel or h mute, deez; and at the end of a clause, Bibliothèque, f., book- Langue, f., language. Quatorze, fourteen. Russe, Russian. sterer. 1. Connaissez-vous ce monsieur ? 2. Oui, Madame, je le connais fort bien. 3. Savez-vous de quel pays il est ? 4. Il est hongrois. 5. Parle-t-il allemand? 6. Il parle allemand, polonais, russe, suédois et danois. 7. N'est-il pas médecin? 8. Non, Monsieur, avant la révolution il était capitaine. 9. Avez-vous envie d'apprendre le russe ? 10. J'ai envie d'apprendre le russe et le grec moderne. 11. Connaissez-vous les messieurs qui parlent à votre sœur? 12. Je ne les connais pas. 13. Savez-vous où ils demeurent ? 14. Ils demeurent chez le tapissier de votre frère. 15. N'avez-vous pas l'histoire de Louis Quatorze dans votre bibliothèque ? 16. Je n'ai ni celle de XXIV.-Divide each word naturally into syllables, as you Louis Quatorze, ni celle de Henri Quatre. 17. Avez-vous tort would in the English language. d'apprendre le chinois ? 18. Je n'ai pas tort d'apprendre le chinois. 19. Vos compagnons apprennent-ils les langues anciennes? 20. Ils savent plusieurs langues anciennes et modernes. 21. Parlez-vous anglais ? 22. Je sais l'anglais et je le parle. 23. Connaissez-vous l'Anglais que nous voyons 24. Je ne le I apprend le français, l'anglais, He learns French, English, German, connais pas. 25. Il ne me connaît pas et je ne le connais pas. l'allemand et l'italien, and Italian. 1. Does our physician know French? 2. He knows French, English, and German. 3. Does he know the French physician? 4. He knows him very well. 5. Are you acquainted with that lady? 6. I am not acquainted with her. 7. Is she a German or a Swede? 8. She is neither a German nor a Swede, she is a Russian. 9. Do you intend to speak to her? 10. I intend to speak to her in (en) English. 11. Does she know English? 12. She knows several languages; she speaks English, Danish, Swedish, and Hungarian. 13. Is your brother a colonel? 14. He is not a Dane, he is a Swede. 17. Are you a Frenchman? No, Sir, he is a captain. 15. Is your upholsterer a Dane? 16. 18. No, Sir, I am a Hungarian. 19. Do you know Chinese? 20. I know Chinese, Russian, and modern Greek. 21. Are you wrong to learn languages? 22. I am not wrong to learn languages. 23. Do you know the Englishman who lives at your brother's? 24. I am acquainted with him. 25. I am not 5. PRESENT OF THE INDICATIVE OF the Irregular VeRES. acquainted with him. 26. Do you like books? 27. I am fond LESSONS IN PENMANSHIP.-XVIII. In the copy-slips that are given on this page, a new elementary form is brought under the reader's notice the first of the four elementary strokes entering into the composition of the seven letters of the writing alphabet that yet remain to be considered. This stroke, which is shown separately in Copy-slips Nos. 61 and 63, enters into the formation of V, W, and b. When exhibited by itself, it may be described as a fine bottom-turn or hooked-stroke, consisting of a hair-line commenced at the line the looped form of termination is useful when the next letter happens to be e, as by making the finishing-turn larger, we are the better able to carry it into the fine up-stroke commencing at cc, which forms the loop of this letter. In Copy-slip No. 61, as our readers will perceive, the stroke that we have been describ ing is given with the top-and-bottom turn, to which elementary stroke it is added in order to form the letter V, the simplest of the three letters into whose composition it enters. In Copy-slip No. 63, the bottom-turn is given, to which, twice repeated, this new elementary form is added to form the letter w, while with. cc, and brought downwards, like the lower half of the ordinary | the modification of the bottom-turn, known as the letter 1, which bottom-turn, as far as the line b b, where it is turned to the right and carried upwards, with a slight inclination to the left after it has crossed the line cc, until it reaches the line a a. The pen is then brought down the line again to a point about midway between a a and c c, to thicken it, and then turned abruptly to the right, making a small curved stroke, which completes the elementary form. The short thickened stroke which is made by the downward course of the pen along the hair-line already carried up to the line a a, must have its broadest part at this line, and taper gradually downwards until the point is reached at which the curved line completing the stroke is turned to the right. Sometimes this stroke is finished with a small loop at the top resembling the loop of the letter e. The method, however, adopted in our copy-slips is neater and more compact, although stands third in order in Copy-slip No. 63, it forms the letter b. The three letters V, W, and b, are given separately in Copyslips Nos. 62, 64, and 65. It will be noticed that although in exhibiting the stroke by itself it has been commenced at the line c c, and carried downwards and then upwards with a bottomturn, practically it is nothing more than the extension of the fine up-stroke of the bottom-turn as far as the line a a, where it is finished in the manner already described. It should be remarked that the letter w is frequently made by adding this termination to the fine up-stroke of the bottom-turn of the letter n. The form, however, that we would recommend our readers to adopt is given in Copy-slips Nos. 64 and 66, where w is formed by the addition of this termination to the fine up-stroke of the second octtola-turn of the letter u. HISTORIC SKETCHES.-IX. THE BLOODY ASSIZE. THERE are some historical events of which we gladly cherish the memory, because of the lustre they spread around our national character, or because of the intrinsic worth of the events themselves. Such are the great victories of the nation, abroad and at home, the enforcers of our foreign and colonial policy against external foes, the winners of steps onward in the path of constitutional freedom, in opposition to the tactics of absolutists and tyrants. Other events there are over which we would gladly draw a veil, if it were permitted us to do so, events so sad and disgraceful, not only to our national character, but to humanity itself, that we would fain not look at them. But we cannot afford to lose sight of them, much as the contemplation may disgust us; we are bound in our own interests, and in the interests of those who are to come after us, not to "let oblivion damn" the record in which these ugly histories are written. There is, seemingly, a natural tendency in politics to repeat themselves, and in principles to re-assert themselves: and if, according to this rule, we may look for a re-appearance of past glories, so we must look also for a fresh advent of past evils. They may not come in the same shape-indeed, the chances are strongly against their doing so-but come they will, and it behoves us to watch very diligently against the evils lest they take us by surprise, and furnish for posterity a chapter of horrors, a counterpart of those old chapters which we are bound freshly to remember. To use the emphatic language of Lord Erskine, with reference to some irregular proceedings in the law courts, presided over by the subject of this sketch (Judge Jeffreys), which were taken off the file and burnt, "to the intent that the same might no longer be visible to after ages:""It was a sin against posterity; it was a treason against society; for, instead of being burnt, they should have been directed to be blazoned in large letters upon the walls of our courts of justice, that, like the characters deciphered by the prophet of God to the Eastern tyrant, they might enlarge and blacken in your sight to terrify you from acts of injustice." It is a sketch of one of those subjects which, for the above reason, should never be forgotten, that it is proposed now to bring under the notice of our readers. The Duke of Monmouth, the illegitimate son of Charles II. and Lucy Waters, having been engaged in many intrigues to procure his own elevation to the throne instead of the Duke of York (James II.), had got into trouble during his father's lifetime; but when Charles died in 1685, and his brother, James II., succeeded him, the Duke of Monmouth renewed more energetically his intrigues, and succeeded in fastening to his cause a very considerable following. There were said to exist proofs of Charles II. having been married to Lucy Waters, and though they did not actually exist, many believed they did, and on that ground alone, apart from their dislike to James, regarded him as their lawful king. Finding his party, as he fancied, sufficiently strong, he determined, in the spring of 1685, a few weeks after the king's accession, to try his hand at an invasion. With a slender force he landed on the 11th of June, at Lyme, in Dorsetshire, where many of the country people joined him. Shortly afterwards he proclaimed himself king, denounced James as a usurper, and all his adherents as traitors. In a lengthy declaration, Monmouth asserted the reasons why James ought to be deposed, and stated the measures which he intended to introduce if the people would put him in possession of the throne. Four days after landing he left Lyme at the head of over 3,000 men, raw levies for the most part, badly officered, and without the countenance or help of any of the country gentlemen. At Taunton, where the Duke was received with open arms, some addition was made to the number, but hardly to the quality of his army. At Bridport, where a detachment of his men first came in contact with the royal forces, he experienced a check, and nowhere did he gain anything by force of arms. Wells, Bridgewater, and Exeter received him; but Bath and Bristol shut their gates on him, and refused him supplies. At Sedgemoor, about five miles to the south-east of Bridgewater, in Somersetshire, he was compelled to fight on the 6th of July, by the king's general, Lord Feversham; and after a combat of some hours' duration, in which the royal troops lost about 300 men, and the rebels 800, besides three times that number of prisoners, he was completely defeated. The duke, with two companions, fled before the fight was done, and galloped off in hope of ulti mately reaching the Hampshire coast, but after skulking about for several days in various disguises, they were captured, and Monmouth, who had been already condemned by Act of Parlia ment, was brought to London and executed. Perhaps it cannot be said, on a calm review of the facts, that the Duke of Monmouth received anything but what he deserved. He was "the head and front of the offending," and in his person it might be said that the law fairly claimed its due. Not much could have been said on the score of strict justice if the other leaders in the rebellion had shared his fate, but the proceedings of Judge Jeffreys on the circuit, well called the "Bloody Assize," were of such a kind as to make one doubt whether even the guilty were not unwarrantably condemned. Immediately after the battle of Sedgemoor thirteen of the prisoners were hanged without trial, by order of Colonel Kirk, a brutal commander of brutal soldiers, who were called by the satirical nickname of "Kirk's Lambs." Further military executions would, no doubt, have taken place; but the king decided to have the rebels tried according to the law of the land, a decision which would have been recorded to his advantage, had he not chosen the man he did choose to put the law in motion. The prisons in the western counties, except Cornwall, which had remained loyal, were crowded with prisoners. On account of the disturbed state of the country there had not been any summer assize on the western circuit, so that the ordinary prisoners remained for trial, but the people who crowded the gaols to overflowing were the captives taken at and after Sedgemoor. For the trial of these a special commission was issued, with Jeffreys, Lord Chief Justice of England, at its head. A second commission was given to Jeffreys alone, appointing him temporarily commander-in-chief of the troops in the west, with the rank of lieutenant-general. Now Jeffreys was a man who had risen at the bar by brute force exhibited through his mind. Was there any dirty, disgusting case to be taken in hand, any utter scoundrel to be defended, any honest man to be hunted down, Jeffreys was the counsel employed. His knowledge of law was small, but the amount of his brazen hardihood was enormous, and by dint of this questionable quality he acquired a large practice of the baser sort. When the Crown, during the life of Charles II., wanted such talents for the purpose of prosecuting its enemies to death, Jeffreys came forthwith to the front. He was rapidly promoted to the highest official dignity at the bar, and when Lord William Russell and Colonel Algernon Sydney were to be tried for complicity in the Rye House Plot-a plot to waylay and assassinate the king and Duke of York on their return from Newmarketwith which neither of the accused had any real connection, it was recognised as a necessity that Jeffreys should be promoted to the office of their judge. The selection was thoroughly justified by the result. In defiance of the rules of evidence, even such as they were in those days, with brutal browbeating and cross-examining of witnesses from the bench, the prisoners all the while being undefended by counsel, Jeffreys, the judge, helped the Crown lawyers to procure a verdict of guilty; and having succeeded, he had the indecency to mock the prisoners after having sentenced them to death. The public of that day, not over-squeamish, were scandalised at his proceedings, and many about the court made no secret of their disgust for him; but the man was necessary to such a government as then existed, and the king distinguished him with favour. When James II. succeeded his brother, the chief justice found favour in the sight of the new king, to whom he was as necessary as he had been to Charles. When Monmouth's rebellion had filled the West-country gaols with prisoners, there was no fitter man than Jeffreys to clear them in the only way the Crown meant them to be cleared. With an escort of soldiers Jeffreys opened his commission at Winchester, when the only trial connected with Monmouth's rebellion was that of Alice, Lady Lisle, the widow of one of the judges of Charles I. This lady had given shelter to two refugees from the rebel army after the battle of Sedgemoor, and had denied them, when Colonel Penruddock, one of the king's officers, came to search her house. The men were found concealed on the premises (the event furnishes a subject for one of the beautiful frescoes on the walls of the entrance to the House of Commons) she was arrested for having harboured known traitors, and was indicted as a participator in their guilt. Her case was, that she did not know the men had been concerned in the rebellion; that she understood one of them, a minister, was merely persecuted for non-conformity; and she made this capital point herself for no legal assistance was in those days allowed to prisoners on trial for treason-that it was unreasonable to try her for complicity in treason, when the person implicated as the traitor had not been proved one, seeing that he had not been tried at all, and that "peradventure he might afterwards be acquitted as innocent after she had been condemned for harbouring him." This very reasonable objection was overruled by the judge, who himself examined adversely to the prisoner the witnesses for the prosecution, and then summed up in violent language against her. Some accounts, written at the time, report that the jury three times refused to find a verdict, and that it was only in consequence of the threats of the judge that they at length found her guilty. It is but right to say that the account given in the State Trials says nothing about this, though it gives enough to show the disgraceful bias of the judge against the prisoner, and the unjudicial part, and that a violent one, which he played. He expressed the greatest surprise that the jury should have hesitated so long about their verdict, adding, "If I had been among you, and she had been my own mother, I should have found her guilty." He then passed sentence, the sentence of the law be it observed, not of the judge, "That you be conveyed hence to the place from whence you came, and from thence you are to be drawn on a hurdle to the place of execution, where your body is to be burnt alive till you be dead. And the Lord have mercy on your soul." This horrible sentence to death by fire was changed by the royal clemency-save the mark-to death by beheading, the utmost King James could be induced to grant to a woman. When James himself was sent into exile, an Act of Parliament reversed the attainder of Lady Lisle, on the ground that "the verdict was injuriously extorted by the menaces and violence, and other illegal practices of George, Lord Jeffreys, Baron of Wem, the Lord Chief Justice of the King's Bench." At Salisbury, the next town on the circuit, various punishments, including flogging and imprisonment, were passed on rebel sympathisers who had wished "the cause" good speed; but there were not any actual rebels for trial till the judge came to Dorchester, where the real campaign began. He charged the grand jury to the effect, that he would punish with the extreme rigour of the law, not only principals, but all aiders and abettors, all who had encouraged traitors, whether by word or deed, and all who had helped any of them to escape. Several hundreds of "true bills" were found, when the meshes of the net were declared to be so ample, and Jeffreys, alarmed for his own convenience if so many prisoners were tried singly, announced that those who would plead guilty "should find him to be a merciful judge; but that those who put themselves on their trial, if found guilty, would have very little time to live; and, therefore, that such as were conscious they had no defence, had better spare him the trouble of trying them." To show that he was in earnest, he ordered thirteen out of twenty-nine of those first convicted to be hanged in thirty-six hours after sentence, and the remainder the next morning. To one man who objected to the competency of a witness, he exclaimed, "Villain! rebel! methinks I see thee already with a halter about thy neck;" and this poor man he ordered specially to be hanged first. Two Qundred and ninety-two were condemned to death at this town, and seventy-four of them were actually hanged; the others were sold as slaves, and sent to the plantations in the West Indies. Cruel floggings took place, in addition to these severities, on those who had taken smaller part in the rebellion; one poor wretch was sentenced to be whipped through every market town in the county for seven years, that is to say, once a fortnight for seven years. sickening iteration, and then Jeffreys went on to Bristol, where, however, he had but three victims. Two men of the same family having been convicted in Somersetshire, one of them was condemned to death, and the other procured a pardon; but before his release, the other man escaping, Jeffreys ordered execution to be done on the pardoned one, because "his family owed a life!" A large sum of money was made by the judge in the sale of pardons, notwithstanding the quantity of blood actually shed. As much as £15,000 was given in one case, £3,000 was refused in another, and by the time the circuit was over, Lord Jeffreys found himself rich enough to support the dignity of lord-chancellor, a post which was the reward of his zealous services in the west. Neither king nor judge profited in the end. The former lost his throne, which has been ever since barred against the return of any of his dynasty, and the spirits disembodied on the Bloody Assize sat heavily on the soul of the judge, and pressed it down to death. As soon as it was found that King James had fled on the approach of the Prince of Orange, in 1688, the people demanded with loud voices that his ill advisers should not escape. The chief one for whose punishment they thirsted was Jeffreys, and search was made high and low for him. Almost he escaped. Steps to ensure his departure from England had been "secretly taken, and, disguised as a seaman, his eyebrows shaven off, the better to conceal his features, he had arrived on board the collier which was to take him to Hamburg, when he took it into his head to go on shore. At an alehouse in Wapping he was recognised by one to whom he had, as judge, behaved brutally; a mob surrounded the house, and would have torn the fugitive to pieces, had not some soldiers rescued him and taken him to the Lord Mayor. By order of the temporary Government he was sent to the Tower, where he died miserably, before he could be brought to trial on a charge of high treason." In the West of England the man's memory is still preserved as that of an incarnate fiend, the true representative of perfect injustice, the fit sign of brutal cruelty and oppression. Probably some inventions to his disadvantage have been made by the fertile brains of angry foes, and possibly some traits of goodness may have been forgotten amidst the universal execration which has been his historical epitaph; but there are few even now-a-days who think the epithet "bloody," which is usually prefixed to Jeffreys' name, too strong for the man who presided over the special commission after Monmouth's rebellion, and who, in his capacity of judge, "played such fantastic tricks before high Heaven, as made the angels weep." Christian V... 1670 France, King of. Louis XIV. 1643 Germany, Emperor of. Leopold I. 1658 Poland, King of. John Sobieski At Exeter, the first man convicted was sent to instant execution. Thirty-seven more suffered death at the same place, and 206 were condemned to whipping, slavery in the West Indies, or imprisonment. At Taunton 500 prisoners awaited their trial, and Jeffreys observed, in his address to the grand jury, that "it would not be his fault if he did not purify the place." One hundred and forty-three were ordered for execution, 284 were to be sent to the plantations, and, in order that the rebellious county defeated the Turks in might be duly warned for the future, Jeffreys ordered some of many battles, and comthe condemned men to be executed in the surrounding villages.pelled them to raize the At Wells, the scenes enacted at Taunton were repeated with siege of Vienna, in 1683. 1674 [This monarch was the last independent king of Poland. He Portugal, King of. Peter II. (previ ously Regent) . 1683 Rome, Pope of. Innocent XI. Russia, Czars of. Ivan IV. and Peter I. (the Great) conjointly. Spain, King of. Charles II. . 1676 1682 1665 Streden, King of. Charles VI, 1660 Turkey, Sultans of. Mahomet IV. 1619 . 1687 Solyman III. |