3. Collision of hard bodies, represented by p, t, k; as clap, rap, tap, flap, slap, rat-tat, &c.
4. Collision of softer bodies, represented by b, d, g; as dab, dub, bob, thud, dub-a-dub, &c.
5. Motion through the air, represented by z, &c.; as whizz, buzz, sough, &c.
6. Resonance, represented by m, n, &c.; as clang, knell, ring, twang, clang, din, &c.
7. Motion of liquids, &c., represented by sibilants, as clash, splash, plash, dash, swash, &c.
These are but specimens of the wide extent of these words in a language by no means the most remarkable for its adoption of onomatopœia. There are even broad general laws by which the various degrees of intensity in sound are expressed by the modification of vowels. Thus, high notes are represented by i, low broad sounds by a, and the change of a or o to i has the effect of diminution, as we see by comparing the words clap, clip, clank, clink, pock, peck, cat, kitten, foal, filly, tramp, trip, nob, nipple, &c. Another way of diminishing intensity is to soften a final letter, as in tug, tow, drag, draw, swagger, sway, stagger, stay, &c. Reduplication of syllables is a mode of expressing continuance, as in murmur, &c., and this effect is also produced by the addition of r and l, as in grab, grapple, wrest, wrestle, crack, crackle, dab, dabble, &c.
It is easy to see from the above examples that the onomatopœia and the interjection are the points from which language has developed itself, and from which “two separate lines of concurrent and[124] simultaneous evolution have proceeded.” The manner in which the various parts of speech grew out of these elements, and which of them may be supposed to be logically or actually anterior to the rest, is a wide and difficult subject of inquiry on which much uncertainty must necessarily prevail, and with which we are here unconcerned.
There is no doubt that, for some reason or other, many of our English onomatopœians are regarded as in some degree beneath the dignity of words, and are supposed to partake of the nature of vulgarity.[125] Yet with great inconsistency the places in which poets have been most successful in producing “an echo of the sound to the sense” are generally regarded with especial favour. The classic poets used this ornament with the most fastidious good taste. Even the ancients had learned to admire the rhyming termination by which Homer faintly recalls the humming of the summer swarms, in the lines—
Ἠύτε ἔθνεα πολλὰ μελισσάων ἀδινάων