words, or ten words to each sound,—still a sufficient hindrance to
anything like certain intelligibility of speech. But this is not the
whole case. The ten characters, for instance, under each sound, are
distributed over four separate groups, formed by certain modulations of
the voice, known as Tones, so that actually there would be only an
average of 2½ words liable to absolute confusion. Thus 烟 yen^1 means
"smoke"; 鹽 yen^2 means "salt"; 眼 yen^3 means "an eye"; and 雁 yen^4 means
"a goose."

These modulations are not readily distinguished at first; but the ear is
easily trained, and it soon becomes difficult to mistake them.

Nor is this all. The Chinese, although their language is monosyllabic,
do not make an extensive use of monosyllables in speech to express a
single thing or idea. They couple their words in pairs.

Thus, for "eye" they would say, not _yen_, which strictly means "hole,"
or "socket," but _yen ching_, the added word _ching_, which means
"eyeball," tying down the term to the application required, namely,
"eye."

In like manner it is not customary to talk about _yen_, "salt," as we
do, but to restrict the term as required in each case by the addition of
some explanatory word; for instance, 白盐 "white salt," _i.e._ "table
salt"; 黑盐 "black salt," _i.e._ "coarse salt"; all of which tends very
much to prevent confusion with other words pronounced in the same tone.

There are also certain words used as suffixes, which help to separate
terms which might otherwise be confused. Thus 裹 _kuo_^3 means "to wrap,"
and 果 _kuo_^3 means "fruit," the two being identical in sound and tone.