The consonant "X has a sharp sound, like ks; as in ox: and a flat one, like gz; as in example. X is sharp, when it ends an accented syllable; as in exercise, exit, excellence: or when it precedes an accented syllable beginning with a consonant; as in expand, extreme, expunge. X unaccented is generally flat, when the next syllable begins with a vowel; as in exist, exemption, exotic. X initial, in Greek proper names, has the sound of z; as in Xanthus, Xantippe, Xenophon, Xerxes"—See W. Allen's Gram., p. 25.
XXV. OF THE LETTER Y.
Y, as a consonant, has the sound heard at the beginning of yarn, young, youth; being rather less vocal than the feeble sound of i, or of the vowel y, and serving merely to modify that of a succeeding vowel, with which it is quickly united. Y, as a vowel, has the same sounds as i:—
1. The open, long, full, or primal y; as in cry, crying, thyme, cycle.
2. The close, curt, short, or stopped y; as in system, symptom, cynic.
3. The feeble or faint y, accentless; (like open e feeble;) as in cymar, cycloidal, mercy.
The vowels i and y have, in general, exactly the same sound under similar circumstances, and, in forming derivatives, we often change one for the other: as in city, cities; tie, tying; easy, easily.
Y, before a vowel heard in the same syllable, is reckoned a consonant; we have, therefore, no diphthongs or triphthongs commencing with this letter.
XXVI. OF THE LETTER Z.
The consonant Z, the last letter of our alphabet, has usually a soft or buzzing sound, the same as that of s flat; as in Zeno, zenith, breeze, dizzy. Before u primal or i feeble, z, as well as s flat, sometimes takes the sound of zh, which, in the enumeration of consonantal sounds, is reckoned a distinct element; as in azure, seizure, glazier; osier, measure, pleasure.