To what is all this due but to this _bond of language_ uniting these millions, and embracing every foreign element, in its children at least? The theme is inexhaustible, but I am limited as to time; yet additional remarks on the same subject will be forthcoming during the further pursuance of these studies. For song, it appears to me, the words, besides being marked by notes, should also be marked as to rhythm, as this would assist singers in giving them the proper intonation; notes indicating metre, but not rhythm. Metre and rhythm are produced by two distinctly different processes; metre, or time, being the outcome of a mode of breathing subject to the will, while rhythm is the outcome of an involuntary mode of breathing for a characteristic quality inherent in a nation's language as its idiomatic expression. Ordinarily, both metre and rhythm are expressed by the same signs (˘¯); this is very misleading. To express time, or metre, I use the signs for short and long (˘¯). To express rhythm, or the fall and rise of the voice, I use the signs for what is usually called the accent (´`). If we were to _meas__ure_ the exact time, however, consumed in the utterance of syllables, we would find that the falling voice, which is the product of inspiration and belongs to the thorax, requires more time than the rising voice, which is the product of expiration and belongs to the abdomen. In marking verse, however, the sign for long (¯) generally accompanies the short syllable of the rising, and the sign for short (˘) the, as a matter of fact, long syllable of the falling voice. It takes longer to fill a bottle than to pour out its contents; to prepare a dish than to eat it; to walk upstairs than to jump from a window. It takes longer to _prepare_ for an utterance than to utter it. It takes longer to inspire than to expire. In view of the vast foreign element constituting a part of this nation, it would be a matter of interest to know at what period the foreigner ceases to exist as such and the "American" begins; or, in other words, to understand when the evolution takes place which transforms the foreigner into the American. From my point of view it is, above all, a question of language. The political aspect of the case is scarcely to be considered. An unnaturalized Englishman, consequently, after thoroughly "Americanizing" his language, becomes more of an American (no matter whether he himself thinks so or not) than an Irishman who, though naturalized, never ceases to use his native brogue. These questions, of course, are many-sided. When I speak of nationality, however, I have the _best_ specimens of a nation as representatives thereof in view always. A man with a foreign accent does not have the same standing or influence in municipal, state, and national councils as one who speaks a pure English; there is always a _feeling_ against him, no matter how able or patriotic he may be, of some foreign influence as a substratum in his composition.