tal importance and of great
practical value to any one preparing for a literary or professional
career. To this it may be added that the study of Latin throws a flood
of light upon the structure of language in general and lays an excellent
foundation for all grammatical study. Finally, it has been abundantly
proved that there is no more effective means of strengthening the mind
than by the earnest pursuit of this branch of learning.

Review Questions. Whence does Latin get its name? Where is Latium?
Where is Rome? Was Latin always the same? What sort of Latin are we to
study? Describe the growth of Rome's power and the spread of Latin. What
can you say of the origin of Italian, French, and Spanish? How did the
ancient Greeks and Romans compare? How did Greece influence Rome? How
did Rome influence the world? In what sense are we Romans still? What
did Latin have to do with the formation of English? What proportion of
English words are of Latin origin, and what kind of words are they? Why
should we study Latin?

PART I

THE PRONUNCIATION OF LATIN

THE ALPHABET

_1._ The Latin alphabet contains the same letters as the English except
that it has no _w_ and no _j_.

_2._ The vowels, as in English, are _a, e, i, o, u, y_. The other
letters are consonants.

_3._ _I_ is used both as a vowel and as a consonant. Before a vowel in
the same syllable it has the value of a consonant and is called _I
consonant_.

Thus in Iu:-li-us the first _i_ is a consonant, the second a vowel.

SOUNDS OF THE LETTERS[1]

[Footnote 1: N.B. The sounds of the letters are best learned by
hearing them correctly pronounced. The matter in this section is,
therefore, intended for reference rather than for assignment as a
lesson. As a first step it is suggested that the teacher pronounce
the examples in class, the pupils following.]

_4._ Latin was not pronounced like English. The Romans at the beginning
of the Christian era pronounced their language substantially as
described below.

_5._ The vowels have the following sounds:

VOWELS[2] LATIN EXAMPLES

a: as in _father_ ha:c, sta:s
a like the first _a_ in _aha'_,
never as in _hat_ a'-mat, ca-na:s
e: as in _they_ te:'-la, me:'-ta
e as in _met_ te'-net, mer'-ce:s
i: as in _machine_ ser'-ti:, pra:'-ti:
i as in _bit_