or happened to begin, to pronounce her linguals. She would imitate with accuracy any sound given her, and had a special preference for the nasal palatal ng, initial as well as final; and she could reproduce at once syllables beginning and ending with this sound, as ngang, ngeng, nging, ngüng, etc. Of course it made no difference to her whether the vowel sound existed or not, in English or any other language. But about this time it was observed that an obscurity of vowel sounds had begun again; but her consonants seemed perfect, and she had such a fondness for mere imitation of words and sentences, that at one year of age she ceased to use words as words except to a very limited extent, and when she did so, her facility of utterance seemed to have been lost; so that she watched the mouths of others closely when they were talking, and labored painfully after the sounds. This was evidently the result of a conscious effort taking the place of what might be called a natural instinct, and her experience in this particular seems to prove that a child's failure to produce certain sounds, as k, for instance, is not due to any organic defect or inability, but to want of knowledge how to go about it. (d.) Finally she began by degrees to drop her mimicry of language, and, at first very slowly, acquired real words with the ordinary infant pronunciation, showing a preference for labials (p, b, m) and linguals (t, d, n,-not 1) but presently she substituted easy sounds for difficult ones, or rather obvious sounds for hidden ones, and her acquisition of words was then, I fear, almost "unprecedented and abnormal." 3. Her pronunciation during the fourth period was tolerably uniform. The following table presents it as it was from eighteen (18) months to two (2) years: (In these tables the letters represent sounds, not the mere characters with which words are spelled.) Final combinations are omitted. They exhibited phenomena analogous to those of initial combinations. In reference to the latter, it is interesting to observe that when a letter which she could pronounce correctly preceded another, she retained the first; but if both were represented by substitutes, she retained the second. If, however, the second was one which she made silent, then she pronounced the first. Thus trt, krw (for r), kl = t (for k, being one of her silent letters). Her inability to pronounce initial 'was very striking, as it forced her to change the pronunciation of her name Lulie (which she had called "Lülü ") to "Uelü," which ultimately became "Ullie" (u in tub). Before she was two years old, however, she learned how to pronounce in all its positions, but did not put it into practical use until later. She has always had a tendency to carry the accent towards the end of the word if there is a long syllable or a secondary accent there, as "crinoíd," "rhubárb," "mantelpiéce," and even in some phrases, as "open ít," which, however, proved to be to her a word; for she would say "Open ít the door." 4. I was never certain that she invented words. On one occasion, when she was about eighteen (18) months old, a fly flew all about her plate when she was eating, and she exclaimed, “The old fly went wiggely-waggely." The expression, as far as we knew or could ascertain, was original with her. The use of words with her was, of course, not in all cases the same as with grown persons. She would, for example, say "Good-bye" to anything, no matter how unpleasant it was, when she left it. Until her eighteenth (18) month she employed "No" for both "Yes" and "No," and then she substituted" Mam" (from "Yes, ma'am") for "No" in the sense of "Yes," and retained it till she was two (2) years old, using "Yes" only when it was specially suggested to her. The word "gentleman" she employed to designate a negro man or boy, using "man" for a white man. Her nurse was colored. 5. Her Syntax at the end of two (2) years was very good, including the management of several forms of the subordinate sentence. The character of these sentences is sufficiently indicated by the conjunctions and adverbs in the appended vocabulary. The first sentence she ever constructed was: "Julia broke the doll"; but she arranged the words in any possible order, frequently repeating the sentence, as: "Julia broke doll," "Julia doll broke," "Broke doll Julia," etc. This was when she was sixteen (16) months old; and she already knew her verbs so well that she said "broke" (under the form boke), and not "break or "breakt." 6. In preparing the vocabulary, I have adopted the alphabetical order according to the present English alphabet, merely because it was most convenient to do so, as I used a dictionary. The only attempt at classification is the distribution, under each letter, according to parts of speech. The tabular view at the end will serve for comparison with similar tables that have been made out by others. It was not in every case easy to decide whether a word should be put down or not. My general method has already been explained. I have not included proper names, nor words (amounting to hundreds) familiar to her only in nursery rhymes, of which she knows a considerable volume. The names of many animals and other objects known to her only in pictures or as toys, are excluded; but I have not, in every instance, felt myself bound to follow the rule of putting down the names only of such objects as she has seen. For instance, she has never seen a lion, or an angel; but she has derived from pictures and toys so definite and vivid a concep tion of these, that they must be recognized as intellectual and linguistic acquisitions, whether her conception of them agrees with ours or not. So, I have included things learned in this way, in cases where the child frequently speaks of them as real objects, apart from their pictures or images. She knows also many numerals, names of days of the week, etc., which I have omitted, as I could not be certain that she had any definite idea associated with them. During the six weeks that have elapsed since she was two years old, her improvement in pronunciation, her progress in construction, and her acquisition of new words, have been very rapid; but this does not belong to the present investigation. n.: V.: adj.: VOCABULARY. ache, acorn, angel, animal, ankle, ant, ape, apple, apron, arm, armhole, ashes, aunt, axe. ache, allow, am (was, been). afraid, all, an (a), another, any, asleep, awake. again, ago, all, almost, along, as, away, awhile. about, above, across, after, against, around, at. and. i., etc. aha. adv.: prep.: C.: B. n.: V.: adj.: adv.: prep.: C.: baboon, baby, back, bag, baker, ball, balloon, band (of musicians), barber, barrel, basin, basket, bat, bath, bead, bean, bear, beard, bed, bee, beef, beefsteak, bell, belly, bellyache, bell, bench, berry, bib, bird, biscuit, bishop (a mere name), bit, blackbird, blanket, blaze, block, blood, board, boat, body, bone, bonnet, book, bookcase, boot, bottle, bottom, bow (on a dress), bow (with the head), bowl, box, boy, bracelet, bread, breakfast, breast, breeches, brick, bridge, bridle, broom, brother, brow, brush, bubble, bucket, buckle, bud, bug, buggy, bull, bump, bundle, bureau, burn. baptize, bark, bathe, bawl, be, beat, been, beg, begin, behave, believe, bellow, belong, bend (bent), bite (bit, etc.), blaze, bleed, blow (blew), bother, bounce, bow, break (broke, etc.), bridle, bring (brought), brush, build (built), burn, buy (bought). bad, bare, barefoot, best, better, big, black, blind, blue, both, brown, busy. back, backwards. before, behind, but, by. because. i., etc. baa (of a sheep), bang (of a gun). n.: V.: adj.: adv.: n.: V.: adj.: adv.: prep.: C. cabbage, cage, cake, calf, camel, can, candy, cane, cap, cape, car, clean, cold, cool, crooked, cross, curly. D. daisy, dark, darling, daughter, day, dear, deer, desk, dime, dimple, dining-room, dinner, dirt, dish, doctor, dog, dollar, door, dot, drawer, drawers, dream, dress, drum, duck, dust. dabble, dance, dangle, die, dig, dip, do (does, did, done), draw (sketch), dream, dress, drink, drive (drove), drop, dry. damp, dead, dear, dirty, dry. directly, down. down. i., etc.: ding-dong. E. n.: eagle, ear, earring, easel, eel, egg, elbow, end, enough, eye, eye n.: V.: adj. adv.: prep.: n.: V.: adj.: face, fan, father, feather, fellow, fence, fiddle, finger, fire, fireplace, fish, fist, flag, flea, floor, flower, flute, fly, folks, foot (feet), forehead, fork, fox, frog, frost, frown, fuss. fall (fell), fan, feed (fed), feel, fetch, fight, fill, find (found), fit, fat, fine, fish, first rate, fresh, front (e. g., front door). for, from. G. garden, gaiter, gate, gentleman (i. e., a negro man or boy), giraffe, girl, glass, glove, gnat, God, gold, goose (geese), gourd, gown, grandma, grandpa, grape, grass, grasshopper, gravy, grease, ground, gun, gymnasium. gallop, get (got), give (gave), go (went, gone), grin, grow, growl, guess. glad, good, great (in “great big"), green. i., etc. good-by. |