Il n'est pas-t-à moi . . =11 n'est pas a moi

13. . .il n'est point- z-à vous . . = . .il n'est point à vous . .

14. . .il n'est pas-t-à vous . . = . .il n'est pas à vous . . 14-15. ..je ne sais pas-t-à qu'est-ce! = ..je ne sais pas

à qui c'est!

The z and / between hyphens mark the faulty linking: s=z instead of t, and / instead of s=z. The sounds z (=s, x, z in spelling) and t (=t, d in spelling) are the most fre-

quent consonants heard in liaison. They are easily interchanged by illiterate persons who do not know the correct spelling of the words in question. It is a mistake made almost exclusively by natives, scarcely ever by foreigners. It is called pataquès, m., which name, however, is sometimes used with a wider meaning (''mistake in linking").

14-15. . .à qu'est-ce, vulgar, instead of à qui est-ce, or à qui c'est. The latter form of the interrogative clause would be correct here.

21-22. Nous les avions plantées-ensemble. The hyphen is used, here, to mark the linking {liaison) of s = z; plantées, with the grammatical ending -es, because the p. part, agrees with the preceding conj. pers. pron., dir. obj., plur., \es=les fleurs.

15. — 2. Planté ensemble. The correct ending -es of plantées is left out to indicate the usual omission of the linking in this case.

9. The linking between p. part, and a following adv. (plantées-ensemble) and similar cases of liaison are permissible and frequently used in elevated style and in poetry, but are out of place, uncommon, and considered pedantic in conversation and in the reading or reciting of ordinary prose, especially of the conversational kind. Such linkings characterize the affected speech of pedants and learned, morose old maids, like Armande in Molière's Les Femmes savantes, but do not agree with the natural talk of naïve, young girls, bright, gay and lively, though not distinguished for their scholarship, like Henriette, Armande' 's younger sister, who holds the part of the ingénue in Molière's play. Foreigners, speaking French or reading a French text, generally use the liaison too much and without any regard to the difference of style. This spoils their pronunciation so much the more, since they are often unable to pronounce rapidly the words connected by the liaison, and frequently have not learned to join the final consonant of the first word, in one syllable, with the initial vowel of the second word (plan-té e-zen- s emble) . Beginners had better carry out the liaison only in cases in which it is deemed absolutely necessary even in conversation, especially between art.

and noun, between adj. and noun, between conj. pers. pron. and verb, and between verb and conj. pers. pron. Their model, in pronunciation, ought to be Henriette1 s natural talk, and not Armande's pedantic way of speaking. They learn the rules regarding the liaison best by studying a few phonetic texts representing different styles of speech.

10-13. In rhumatisme, christianisme, paganisme, etc., the suffix -isme is generally pronounced ism, with a voiceless, hard s. In this case, the m, in ism, becomes voiceless itself and, therefore, indistinct and scarcely audible, unless it is followed by a word beginning with a vowel and closely connected with the preceding word by its meaning. This m is very often quite silent in popular speech, sometimes also in the wrong place, and -isme sounds, then, exactly like -isse: rhumatisme — rhumatisse. On the other hand, an illiterate person, being aware of the omission of m in such words, may endeavor to avoid this fault; then, he is apt to add an m, wrongly, to words ending in -ice, pronounced like -isse: exercice — exercisme.

16. ..nous autres Français, "we Frenchmen"; autres, "other," expletive and idiomatic, to be left out in translation.

16. — 19-20. ..quel goût qu'ça a! " ..what taste this has!" " ..how this tastes!" The expletive qu' (the apostrophe marking the pronunciation) =que is used, in this case, only in popular speech.

22-23. Quel goût ça a-t-il? "What taste has this?" "How does this taste?"