It will be noticed that in this particular the 'ladies of Paris' succeeded in perpetuating their pronunciation in part, for we do not now say 'paier.' They had equal success in many other cases. For example, it seems to be due to them that the final S of the plural is not pronounced except under exceptional circumstances[80]: as, for instance, when it is followed by a word beginning with a vowel; for, speaking of the cases in which that letter is elided in Latin, Tory expresses himself thus: 'The ladies of Paris for the most part observe this poetic figure of speech, dropping the final S in many words, as when, instead of saying: "Nous avons disne en ung iardin, & y avons menge des prunes blanches et noires, des amendes doulces & ameres, des figues molles, des pomes, des poires & des gruselles," they say and pronounce: "Nous avon disne en ung iardin, & y avon menge des prune blanche & noire, des amende doulce & amere, des figue molle, des pome, des poyre & des gruselle."' The thing that seems especially offensive to Tory is that they make the men join them in this faulty pronunciation. 'This fault,' he says, 'would be pardonable in them, were it not that it passes from woman to man, and that there is entire absence of perfect pronunciation in speaking.'[81]
Moreover, if we are to credit Tory, the provincials have also, in certain cases, succeeded in establishing their pronunciation, as we may conclude from the following passage, relative to the letter T: 'The Italians pronounce it so full and resonant that it seems that they add an E thereto, as when, for and instead of saying: "Caput vertigine laborat," they pronounce: "Capute vertigine laborate." I have seen and heard it pronounced so in Rome at the schools called La Sapienza, and in many another noble place in Italy. Which pronunciation is no wise held or used by the Lionnois, who drop the said T, and do not pronounce it any wise at the end of the third person plural of verbs active and neuter, saying "Amaverun" and "Araverun," for "Amaverunt" and "Araverunt." In like manner some Picards drop this T at the end of some words in French, as when they would say: "Comant cela, comant? monsieur, c'est une jument," they pronounce: "Coman chela, coman? monsieur, chest une jumen."'[82] We see that the Picard pronunciation has prevailed in this instance, for we no longer pronounce the final T at the end of the words 'comment,' 'jument,' and the like.
Tory did not content himself with setting forth the state of things existent in his day: he suggested improvements, almost all of which have been sanctioned by usage. For instance, at the beginning of the sixteenth century, the pronunciation was very difficult to grasp for lack of accents; he proposed to supply them. 'In our French language,' he says, 'we have no symbol of accent in writing, and it is on account of this lack that our language is not yet established nor submitted to fixed rules, like the Hebrew, Greek and Latin. I would like that it should be, as might well be done.... In French,' he says farther on, 'as I have said, we do not write the accent over O vocative, but pronounce it full, as when we say:
'O pain du ciel angelique,
Tu es nostre salut antique.
'In this lack of accent we have an imperfection, which we ought to remedy by purifying and subjecting to fixed rule and art our language, which is the most graceful language known.'[83] Elsewhere he suggests replacing elided letters by an apostrophe, which had not then been done in French. 'I say and allege these things in this place to the end that if it should happen that one had to write in antique letters verses where the S must disappear, one may write them honestly and purposely without using the said letter, ... and place a hooked point over the place where it should be.'[84] In another place he emphasizes the necessity of the cedilla, which we find in French manuscripts from the thirteenth century, but which typography had not as yet adopted. 'C before O,' he says, 'in French pronunciation and language, is sometimes hard, as in saying "coquin," "coq," "coquillard"; sometimes it is soft, as in saying "garcon," "macon," "françois," and other like words.'[85]
Tory could hardly overlook the matter of punctuation, that most essential, and even in our day so sadly neglected, branch of orthography; but as he had only 'antique' letters to deal with, he presented only three sorts of punctuation marks, without going into details as to their use, which, in truth, if we may judge by his own book, was not as yet fully settled. The comma, for instance, which has so much to do with the clearness of the sentence, is frequently there inserted in a far from rational way.
I have said above that Tory had adopted about 1523, for the mark of his bookshop, the Pot Cassé represented in the engraving placed at the end of his poem on his daughter's death. To make it more appropriate for that purpose, he subjected it to various modifications. At first we find it alone, as in the accompanying cut, on the cover,[86] or on the back,[87] of a number of octavo books bound at his establishment. Other bindings, in quarto, exhibit the broken jar with the drill (toret).[88]
Afterward, Tory placed the jar on a closed book, and still later he modified the design by the introduction of other additions.[89]