Spelling

forming words with letters. Each language has its difficulties, some place of laborious passage, some citadel that must be taken. The traditional schoolboy, attempting Greek, meets solid squares of verb forms, grim and impenetrable, reminding him of the Macedonian phalanx of which he may have read in his ancient history. The Latin verb is comprised within narrower limits, perhaps, but its marching legions extend over many a fair page and have carried dismay into the hearts of young recruits for generations. The variations of Sanskrit and Hebrew are reported to be as the sands on the seashore, almost beyond computation. French and German have so many niceties of declension and conjugation, of position, of vowel changes, of accent, and of gender, that only the educated make the slightest pretension to speak or to write their native language correctly. In these particulars English is simple and is delightfully free from hindrances. A half-dozen verb forms, twice as many forms of the pronoun, two or three changes in a noun, say a score of variations in all, and the inflection of the English language is practically in hand. But we do have spelling. We escape the toil and the danger of inflection, but we still have the most unsystematic, law-defying, uncouth, thoroughly intractable, and yet the most homelike and attractive spelling that has found place in a dictionary.

First of all, we have many words. Ours is not a primitive language. The creative mind is not content with a plain garb for plain thought, a primitive word or two for a simple idea. We have multiplied words, and colored our vocabulary, and refined our meanings, until one word will no more cover the changing tints and shades of an idea than one word will describe the blending hues with which autumnal leaves are decorated. Take the term little, for instance. Nothing can be more simple. An object is little when it lacks size, when there is not much of it. That is all there is to the idea. The word little would seem quite adequate. But the artistic mind is not satisfied with one word. People delight in variety. The more vigorous the intellectual life of a people, and the more they have to say worth the saying, the greater the variety in their speech. Hence our wealth of words. Not content with little, we speak of the small hours, a tiny harebell, a wee lassie, a petite slipper, a minute grain, a diminutive donkey, a slight consideration, a minimum payment, an infinitesimal portion, a faint trace, a remote chance, a petty crime, a trivial fault, a trifling annoyance, an unimportant loss, an insignificant appropriation, a paltry sum, an inconsiderable source, of Lilliputian stature, a feeble income, a slender purse, a stingy allowance, a low estimate, in reduced circumstances, on meager information, and, not to extend the list laboriously, microscopic animals.

It is contrary to the laws of development to hope for help from a decrease in the number of words in current use. We already have more words than any other language, ancient or modern. We English-speaking people are so active and are scattered so widely that we are multiplying words faster than any other people. What between digging up old forms and the invention of new, together with an incessant adoption of such terms as "khaki," "laager," "trek," and "boloman,"--words that have a relish for the reporter and a fascination for the reader,--it is not too much to suppose that our working vocabulary grows at the rate of a word a week. Indeed, an increase of five hundred words in ten years is not an overestimate, as the history of any prominent dictionary will testify. There is no relief in this direction; the speller will never be able to get off with fewer words.

Nor is anything to be gained by an underestimate of the number of words in common use. We hear, on supposed authority, that a workingman uses five hundred words; when, in fact, the witty section-man, leaning on his shovel, uses that many thousands of words as he descants on the earth he digs into, the state of the atmosphere that surrounds him, the world that rolls by him, and the world he lives in. Children, too, understand the meaning of more words than they are given credit for. A thousand words is nothing unusual for a four-year-old child. Children entering school at six very frequently have a vocabulary of two thousand words. The writer believes that few English-speaking children enter school with less than five hundred words at command. Educators are not justified in assuming that few words are needed, or that few words are in use.

The perplexities of learning to spell are many. German children, once they can pronounce a word, are reasonably sure of how to "letter" it. The sound is a guide to the spelling and the spelling is a guide to the sound. It is claimed that in this respect German children have the advantage by a school year over their English-speaking cousins, who are unable to spell as they pronounce and equally unable to pronounce a word as it is spelled. In case a schoolgirl desires to write that she is no longer privileged to enjoy the instruction of a former teacher, she will get on as far as "We have a"-Then comes a series of pitfalls. Shall she write nu, neu, nue, gnu, knew, pneu, newe, neau, niew, nou, or finally and rightly, "new teacher?" A philologist may gain satisfaction from the reflection that the vowel and consonant groups of these possible spellings are all authorized; but the wisdom and the pride of the philologist is far from being a present help to a child in trouble. She cannot enter into the ecstasies of the learned. All the little girl wants just now is to know how to write that she has a new teacher.

Illiteracy is at bottom poor spelling. Power to grasp the central thought of a sentence is inseparable from a rapid, discriminating eye. Rapid appropriation of printed thought is possible only to the owner of a searching and a certain eye. Spelling for purposes of writing, for composition, is a small part of its province. Pupils should learn to spell as a means of getting acquainted with words, as a means of mastering their own speech. Rules are of little avail. The habit of correct spelling should be well fixed and a considerable vocabulary should be mastered at an early age, before derivations can be made of service. Connect the word with the idea and learn to spell outright. Spelling exercises should be easy, familiar, frequent, sprightly, and accurate. Oral spelling should predominate. Within their capacity, children like to spell. They delight in brief, rapidly changing effort. The swift, correct spelling of well-known words develops conscious strength and pride of scholarship. Spelling should never be allowed to drag, to become a Bridge of Sighs, but should be a joyous entrance to the children's heritage,-the literature of their forefathers.

Many attempts have been made to reform our spelling, and some progress has been made. "Publick" has been shortened to "public"; one "I" is considered sufficient in "traveler"; programme" is on the point of losing the final "me"; "sulfur" seems to stand a fair chance of displacing "sulphur," etc. It is a question just how far spelling and pronunciation can be made to agree without loss of associations. "Esquimaux" has been shortened to "Eskimo" and is still sufficiently redolent of fur, fish, and blubber; but it is doubtful whether "mignonette" would retain quite its native fragrance if reduced to "minyunet." Doubtless science should drive whim and custom before it, and it were unwise to resist desirable changes; but, fortunately, it is not the part of the school to anticipate, but rather to follow usage.

Within recent years a movement for spelling reform has taken definite shape. The National American Educational Association has issued a short list of words spelled after the new fashion. This list embraces such words as "tho" for "though," "thru" for "through," "catalog" for "catalogue," etc. It has been adopted by several state associations, and President Roosevelt sought to give it vogue by using the new spelling in messages and other documents issued from the executive office. This latter use of the reformed spelling has since been abandoned. A more pretentious system of phonetic spelling has been adopted by the American Spelling Reform Association which has been indorsed by a similar association in England. Their method of orthography is outlined in the following rules:

1. e.-Drop silent e when fonetically useless, as in live, vineyard, believe, bronze, single, engine, granite, eaten, rained, etc. 2. ea.-Drop a from ea having the sound of e, as in feather, leather, jealous, etc. Drop e from ea having the sound of a, as in heart, hearken, etc. 3. eau.-For beauty use the old beuty. 4. eo.-Drop o from eo having the sound of e, as in jeopardy, leopard. For yeoman write yoman. 5. i.-Drop i from parliament. 6. o.-For o having the sound of u in but, write u, in above (abuv), dozen, some (sum), tongue (tung), etc. For women restore wimen. 7. ou.-Drop o from ou having the sound of u as in journal, nourish, trouble, rough (ruf), tough (tuf), and the like. 8. u.-Drop silent u after g before a, and in native English words, as guarantee guard, guess, guest, guild, guilt, etc. 9. ue.-Drop final ue in apologue, catalogue, etc. demagogue, pedagogue, etc., league colleague, harangue, tongue (tung) etc. 10. y.-Spell rhyme rime. 11. Dubl consonants may be simplified. Final b, d, g, n, r, t, f, l, z, as in ebb, add, egg, inn, purr, butt, bailiff, dull, buzz, etc. (not all, hall). Medial before another consonant, as battle, ripple, written (writn), etc. Initial unaccented prefixes, and other unaccented syllables, as in abbreviate, accuse, affair, etc., curvetting, traveller, etc. 12. b.-Drop silent b in bomb, crumb, debt, doubt, dumb, lamb, limb, numb, plumb, subtle, succumb, thumb. 13. c.-Change c back to s in cinder, expence fierce, hence, once, peace, scarce, since source, thence, tierce, whence. 14. ch.-Drop the h of ch in chamomile, choler, cholera, melancholy, school, stomach. Change to k in ache (ake), anchor (anker). 15. d.-Change d and ed final to t when so pronounced, as in crossed (crost), looked (lookt), etc., unless the e affects the preceding sound, as in chafed, chanced. 16. g.-Drop g in feign, foreign, sovereign. 17. gh.-Drop h in aghast, burgh, ghost. Drop gh in haughty, though (tho) through (thru). Change gh to f where it has that sound as in cough, enough, laughter, tough etc. 18. I.-Drop l in could. 19. p.-Drop p in receipt. 20. s.-Drop s in aisle, demesne, island. Change s to z in distinctive words, as in abuse verb, house verb, rise verb, etc. 21. sc.-Drop c in scent, scythe (sithe). 22. tch.-Drop t in catch, pitch, witch, etc. 23. w.-Drop w in whole. 24. ph.-Write f for ph, as in philosophy, sphere etc.