The Coreans have also adopted the Chinese character, but without many of the elaborate modifications in use among the Japanese. They have had more intercourse with the Chinese, but have not been able to make their polysyllabic words assimilate with the monosyllables of the Chinese. They have invented an alphabet, the letters of which combine to form syllables, and these syllabic compounds are then used like the Japanese characters to express their own words. The original letters consist of fifteen consonants, called _ka_, _na_, _ta_, _la_ or _ra_, _ma_ or _ba_, _pa_, _sa_ or _sha_, _nga_, _tsa_ or _cha_, _ts´a_ or _ch´a_, _k´a_, _t´a_, _p´a_, _ha_, and _wa_; and eleven vowels, _a_, _ya_, _o_, _yo_, _oh_, _yoh_, _ú_, _yú_, _u_, _í_, and _âh_. The combinations of these form altogether one hundred and sixty-eight syllables, the last fourteen of which are triply combined by introducing the sound of _w_ between the consonants and some of the vowels, as _kwa_, _ts´hwo_, &c. The sounds and meanings of Chinese characters are expressed in this syllabary in the duoglott works prepared by the Coreans for learning Chinese; while it is used by itself in works intended for the natives. The Coreans have not, like the Japanese, unnecessarily increased the difficulty of their own language by employing a great number of signs for the same sound, but are content with one series. It is to be hoped that this facility results in a greater diffusion of knowledge among the people. The Japanese have the inflections of cases, moods, tenses and voices, in their language; but these features are denoted in Corean by the collocation of the words, and the words themselves remain unchanged as in Chinese. The sounds of the Corean are pleasant, and both it and the Japanese allow many alterations and elisions for the sake of euphony. Further investigation will probably show some connection originally between the Corean and Manchu languages, though the former of these has been more modified by the Chinese than the latter.[111] The people of Annam have adopted the Chinese characters without making a syllabary or alphabet to express their own vernacular. The inhabitants of this country are evidently of the same race as the Chinese, and now acknowledge a nominal subjection to the emperor of China by sending a triennial embassy to Peking, partly commercial and partly tributary. The sounds given to the Chinese characters are, however, so unlike those given them in China, that the two nations cannot converse with each other. The Annamese have many sounds in their spoken language which no Chinese can enunciate. The court dialect is learned by educated men, and books are written and printed in Chinese. The sounds given to the characters are all monosyllabic, and slight analogies can be traced running through the variations; but they offer very little assistance to any one, who, knowing only one mode of pronunciation, wishes to learn the other.