e doubled at
pleasure. Thus we find in several languages.

[Greek: Sbennymi], scatter, sdegno, sdrucciolo, sfavellare, [Greek:
sphinx], sgombrare, sgranare, shake, slumber, smell, snipe, space,
splendour, spring, squeeze, shrew, step, strength, stramen, stripe,
sventura, swell.

S is mute in isle, island, demesne, viscount.

T.

T has its customary sound; as take, temptation.

Ti before a vowel has the sound of si as salvation, except an s goes
before, as question; excepting likewise derivatives from words ending in
ty, as mighty, mightier.

Th has two sounds; the one soft, as thus, whether; the other hard, as
thing, think. The sound is soft in these words, then, thence, and there,
with their derivatives and compounds, and in that, these, thou, thee, thy,
thine, their, they, this, those, them, though, thus; and in all words
between two vowels, as, father, whether; and between r and a vowel, as
burthen.

In other words it is hard, as thick, thunder, faith, faithful. Where it is
softened at the end of a word, an e silent must be added, as breath,
breathe; cloth, clothe.

V.

V has a sound of near affinity to that of f, as vain, vanity.

From f in the Islandick alphabet, v is only distinguished by a
diacritical point.

W.

Of w, which in diphthongs is often an undoubted vowel, some grammarians
have doubted whether it ever be a consonant; and not rather as it is called
a double u, or ou, as water may be resolved into ouater; but letters of the
same sound are always reckoned consonants in other alphabets: and it may be
observed, that w follows a vowel without any hiatus or difficulty of
utterance, as frosty winter.

Wh has a sound accounted peculiar to the English, which the Saxons better
expressed by hw, as, what, whence, whiting; in whore only, and sometimes in
wholesome, wh is sounded like a simple h.

X.

X begins no English word: it has the sound of ks, as axle, extraneous.

Y.

Y, when it follows a consonant, is a vowel; when it precedes either a vowel
or a diphthong, is a consonant, as ye, young. It is thought by some to be
in all cases a vowel. But it may be observed of y as of w, that it follows
a vowel without any hiatus, as rosy youth.

The chief argument by which w and y appear to be always vowels is, that
the sounds which they are supposed to have as consonants, cannot be
uttered after a vowel, like that of all other consonants; thus we say
tu, ut; do, odd; b