HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES. 
 
 ( Mis. Doc. 
 \ No. 23. 
 
 ' 1 1 l ! IIX^J 
 
 REFORMED ALPHABET AND ORTHOGRAPHY. 
 
 • MEMORIAL 
 
 of 
 
 % E. DAWSON, OF BURLINGTON, IOWA, 
 
 SETTING FORTH 
 
 The plan of a reformed alphabet and orthography , and suggesting measures 
 to extend a knowledge of it over the nation. 
 
 February 5, 1878. —Referred to the Committee on Education and Labor and ordered 
 
 to be printed. 
 
 To the honorable the Senate and Souse of Representatives of the United 
 States in Congress assembled: 
 
 This memorial, by N. E. Dawson, of Burlington, Iowa, respectfully 
 represents that the question of a reformed orthography is one that is 
 now agitating a large number of the leading educators of the country; 
 that true reform in this direction is a felt want, is calculated to interest 
 and benefit not only the people of this country but of the whole English- 
 speaking world, and therefore merits the eucouraging recognition and 
 fostering approval of government in all judicious efLirts looking toward 
 its general dissemination; in support of which views the following is 
 submitted: 
 
 It has been observed that, where an important invention or improve¬ 
 ment upon old methods has been successfully accomplished, it will be 
 found to have been not the production of any one man’s unaided efforts 
 and researches, but the result of the labors of many intellects working 
 with a common purpose toward a more or less well-defined end, each 
 one supplementing the attainments of those who have.preceded him in 
 his chosen sphere of investigation, thus step by step, point by point, 
 approaching the desired end. To this law the phonetic movement in 
 pursuit of orthographic reform seems to be no exception. Its result is 
 the work of no single mind, but the grand total of the fruits of the labors 
 of many, labors extending through a long succession of ages, and em¬ 
 blazed with eminent and historic names, although the present designa¬ 
 tion of the movement—“The Phonetic Reform’ 7 —is of comparatively 
 recent origin. 
 
 The want of a perfect system of representing spoken language was 
 noted before the time of Cicero, and that illustrious Roman is believed 
 to have only followed in the footsteps of still more ancient philosophers 
 when he turned his thoughts and bent his great faculties to the task of 
 
 .\\ 
 
2 
 
 REFORMED ALPHABET AND ORTHOGRAPHY. 
 
 preparing a, scheme of writing bv means of which Tyro, his freedman, 
 should be enabled to preserve the language of his admirable orations as it 
 came trom the lips of the orator for the delectation and instruction of 
 future ages. True, that invention of Cicero’s may have little more 
 kihdship with our phonetics of to-day than Adam with all of us; but 
 it may not be an unpleasant fancy to consider it the “ little leaven” that 
 has coursed up through the ages to fruition in this, the latest and the 
 grandest. Since Cicero’s time there have been few, if any, periods 
 marked by intellectual activity and national and individual enterprise 
 which have not presented their quota of research in pursuit of a cor¬ 
 rect orthography. “This subject,” wrote Bishop Wilkins, more than 
 two hundred years ago, “has been largely debated by several authors of 
 great name and reputation tor learning. Besides those famous emper¬ 
 ors, Caius Caesar and Octavius Augustus, who both writ on this sub¬ 
 ject, Varro likewise, and Apion, and Quintillian, and Priscian, did bestow 
 much pains upon the same inquiry concerning the just number of letters. 
 And in later times it hath been treated of with great variety of opinions, 
 by Erasmus, both the Scaligers, Lipsius, Dalmasius, Yossius, J. Mathias, > 
 A. Metherchus, D. Malinchot, &c., besides several of our own country¬ 
 men, Sir P. Smith, Bulloker, Alexander Gill, and Dr. Wallas.” In En¬ 
 gland alone, and since the Elizabethan age, the names of all those who 
 have directed their mental energies to the task of improving upon the 
 faulty English orthography would require, to only enumerate them, the 
 pages of no mean volume; and among those more or less active in these 
 researches shine out the names of many who achieved distinction in 
 church and state, in literary and other pursuits: Bright, Willis, Pepys, 
 Bishop Wilkins, Wesley, Horne Tooke, Walker, Sir John Herschel, Sir 
 William Jones, Knowles, Sheridan, Smart, Dickens, Cramp, Stoddart, 
 Latham, Erasmus Darwin, Max Muller, &c. and in this country Ben. 
 Franklin, Pelham, Guess, Comstock, Webster, Whitney, Worcester, &c. 
 “Nothing,” says Noah Webster, “can be more disreputable to the literary 
 character of a nation than the history of English orthography, unless 
 it is that of orthoepy.” And then he sets about the contrivance of a 
 scheme by which to remedy the defects of that orthography, having re¬ 
 jected that of Dr. Franklin. “ The latter gentleman,” he writes, com¬ 
 piled a dictionary on his scheme of reform, and procured types to be> 
 cast, which he offered to me, with a view to engage me to prosecute his 
 design. This offer I declined to accept,” &c. 
 
 The distinctively phonetic movement, however, owes its origin largely, 
 if not wholly, to the labors and inventive geuius of Mr. Isaac Pitman, of 
 Bath, England. Up to about the year 1837 the letters of the ordinary 
 English alphabet had been almost, if not quite, uuiformly assumed as 
 necessarily the material out of which the sought for and long dreamed-of 
 adequate alphabet must be constructed, and by means of which all im¬ 
 provement upon our English orthography must be effected. Mr. Pitman 
 was led by a happy inspiration to temporarily shake off this hampering 
 and restraining incubus upon the awakening spirit of orthographic 
 reform which had so long impeded and rendered abortive all efforts aimed 
 at such reform. Making a light incursion into the then foreign domain of 
 geometry, he fashioned out of the suitable timber which he there dis¬ 
 covered and boldly appropriated to this use a scheme of symbols which, 
 it seems to me, is a key to the long songht-for perfect alphabet and 
 orthography, the theory of which, according to Dr. Latham (whose lan¬ 
 guage is adopted by Fowler in his masterly work on the English lan¬ 
 guage), some of the chief conditions are as follows: 
 
 1. That for every simple single sound, incapable of being represented 
 by a combination of letters, there be a simple single sign. 
 
REFORMED ALPHABET AND ORTHOGRAPHY. 
 
 3 
 
 2. That sounds within a determined degree of likeness be represented 
 by signs within a determined degree of likeness; while sounds beyond 
 a certain degree of likeness be represented by distinct and different 
 signs, and that uniformly. 
 
 3. That no sound have more than one sign to express it. 
 
 4. That no sign express more than one sound. 
 
 5. That the primary aim of orthography be to express the sounds of 
 words, and not their histories. 
 
 6. That changes of speech be followed by corresponding changes of 
 spelling. 
 
 Unhappily the idea of applying this scheme in giving practical effect 
 to Dr. Latham's very generally accepted theory did not occur to the in¬ 
 ventor and his co laborers, and hence, while it may be said to have nur¬ 
 tured into vigorous life the profession of verbatim reporting, Pitman’s 
 invention stopped far short of the grand results that might have been 
 easily and shortly attained. Instead of arranging a printing alphabet 
 in harmony with his admirable system of writing, he and his enthusiastic 
 disciples with all the ardor of blind faith in their assured correctness, 
 proceeded for typographical purposes to pair the forty elementary 
 souuds (including the four indispensable diphthongs) of the English 
 language, not to the forty geometrical, simple, elementary, beautiful 
 symbols which he had just elaborated and applied to writing, but to the 
 twenty-six condemned letters of the old alphabet, together with more 
 than half as many more symbols designed as if with special reference to 
 complexity and outlaudishuess of configuration; and thus again did 
 this nightmare of progress, the old alphabet, resume its paralyzing 
 sway and fatally misdirect the application of this phonetic scheme, 
 this beautiful and seemingly obvious and practical key to orthographic 
 reform* Is it strange that a sense of the ridiculous should seize upon 
 the minds of the masses on beholding this young creature trigged out 
 in that old, seedy, deficient garb eked out by patches in an effort to meet 
 the wants of a perfect stature, and, forestalling a caudid investigation 
 of its intrinsic merits, laugh the u Fonetic Nuz” out of countenance, 
 silence u Josef” Medill, and defeat the confirmation of statesman Beau¬ 
 champ to a foreign mission, simply because he is found to have at one 
 time adopted that style of orthography in dealing with matters, not of 
 state, but of tender sentiment ? 
 
 The labors of Mr. Pitman have been generously and ably seconded 
 by Alexander John Ellis and others in England, and supplemented in 
 this couutry by the enterprise and ingenuity of Beun Pitman, Audrews, 
 Webster, Lougley, Prosser, Graham, Parkhurst, Young, Munsou, Burns, 
 Lindsley, Leigh, Blackmar, &c. Noting as exceptions the Deseret and 
 Cherokee alphabets, nearly all efforts at constructing a phonetic print¬ 
 ing alphabet have continued to adopt the ordiuary old letters as the 
 foundation upon which to build. To illustrate what we deem one of the 
 obstacles to success in that direction, take the first letter of the old 
 alphabet retained in the designed phonetic alphabet to represent the 
 elementary sound of a heard in pronouncing the word fate. It must 
 not, as one of the prime conditions of a perfect alphabet, be used to 
 represent any other sound. Therefore we must expuuge from the un- 
 
 * Mr. Isaac Pitman first propounded the idea, which has been carriid out by him 
 and the author conjointly, of pbonetiz ng the English language; but Mr. Hill (the 
 father of the post-office reformer), first publicly advocated such a chauge in the printed 
 appearance of our lauguage in a speech delivered at a phonetic meeting at Birming¬ 
 ham, on 18th July, 1843, when he proposed and commenced a subscription with which 
 the matrices of three Roman fonts of typo were purchased.” Essentials of Phonetics: 
 Ellis. (Preface.) 
 
4 
 
 REFORMED ALPHABET AND ORTHOGRAPHY. 
 
 derstanding, learn to forget, all other sounds of this letter, which by long 
 usage and severe discipline we have become habituated to; those heard 
 in the words mat, father, care, many, salt, wash, exhilaratecourage ; and 
 also the various a sounds represented by letters or combinations of let¬ 
 ters iu such words as heart, aunt, ah, guarantee, plaid, sirr ah, pain, goal, 
 day, there, great, reign, they, gauge, cau\, awful, awe, nor, broad, ought, 
 &e. Here, in a list of twenty-eight words, are forty-nine letters, which, 
 with the sounds they represent by virtue of long usage, will conflict 
 with this exclusive application of the symbol a in the minds of those 
 accustomed to the ordinary alphabet. Now the marlcs composing these 
 forty-nine letters and combinations of letters aggregate a sum-total of 
 nearly if not quite two hundred and fifty. More than two hundred 
 marks, then, which have acquired by long usage a ready and familiar 
 meaning to the English eye and brain, must be ejected from the memory 
 by an effort greater, perhaps, and more sustained than the long and 
 steady discipline, commencing with early childhood, which has gradually 
 invested them with a more than conventional, a living reality, in order 
 that the old Roman letter a may be available as a symbol in the re¬ 
 formed or phonetic alphabet. The required task is too great, for that 
 a is not necessary there. Resort at once to a simple mark to symbolize 
 that simple sound —a mark that cannot by its configuration, or associa¬ 
 tion, or acquired signification, conjure up in the mind a single one, much 
 less a host of those bewildering shapes to trip and entangle and befog 
 the steady and placid and natural flow of thought. Then will Horrfe 
 Tooke’s day-dream of u winged words ” have reached the frontiers of the 
 visionary and sighted the misty summits of the real. 
 
 But, again, this a is only one in this model alphabet (as compared with 
 others thus far presented to the world) which consists ot'forty sym¬ 
 bols corresponding to the small Roman letters, forty to the capitals, 
 forty to the italics, forty to the script, &c., (more than half of which 
 have acquired an almost intrinsic signification by habitual and familiar 
 usage iu the old alphabet), making at least one hundred and sixty (160) 
 complex aud diverse forms to represent the forty elementary sounds 
 which compose our spoken language. Now, as the already noted diffi¬ 
 culties connected with the use of the a (which we might have enlarged 
 upon enormously by giving two other powers to this letter, as does the 
 acutely-distinguishing ear of Worcester, and marshaliug a fresh array 
 of equivalents, which is possible to the extent of at least one hundred 
 and forty letters in combination in more than seventy additional words) 
 will be repeated through each of the three or more additional styles of 
 letter used, we may multiply those difficulties by four times forty 
 (4 x 40 = 160), one hundred and sixty, and contrast the result thus ob¬ 
 tained with the result of representing each of the forty simple sounds 
 uniformly by a simple mark in pursuance of accepted theories, easily 
 doue, and giving a beautiful, practicable alphabet, capable of being 
 learned in a few hours, and in accord with the conditions required by 
 Latham’s theory of a full and perfect alphabet. Thus it appears that as 
 that phonetic alphabet was an improvement upon the old, so it is sus¬ 
 ceptible of being vastly improved upon by a logical reduction to practice 
 of the theory upon which it was founded. 
 
 * Now as to the necessity which has called so long aud loudly for the 
 reform of the old English alphabet and orthography, now in common use. 
 
 Because of the respect with which we look upon the opinions of the 
 past, especially when advanced by eminent aud historic uatnes; be¬ 
 cause ot the caution and reserve with which we are apt to receive and 
 consider opinions that seem novel and of receut conception, aud par- 
 
REFORMED ALPHABET AND ORTHOGRAPHY. 
 
 5 
 
 ticularly because of the impossibility of my presenting this matter more 
 effectively, I will here draw copiously from statements contained in a 
 paper (in the form of a memorial) presented in the national legislative 
 body of his country by a statesman who bore the illustrious name of 
 Edmund Burke, a paper forcibly setting forth the crying want of refor¬ 
 mation in English orthography, even at that early day,but advancing a 
 totally inadequate and impracticable scheme for its accomplishment, 
 and, therefore, like all other schemes founded ou the ordinary English 
 alphabet, a failure: 
 
 I have, during some eight years, been considering the importance and practicability 
 of a thorough reformation of our written language, and a strict conformation thereof 
 to the spoken. I have at length come to some results, which I wish extensively to 
 communicate, especially among the people of this country. 
 
 Spoken language has usually originated among the unenlightened, and, by its own 
 ductility, in its progress toward perfection, it keeps pace with general national improve¬ 
 ment. But with the writing of this language it is far otherwise. By the exactness and 
 stability of its forms, it must remain unchanged, unless by general consent. On these 
 accounts, chiefly, the speaking and the writing of the same language do invariably, 
 without special preventions, tend toward a separation, though very slowly, and there¬ 
 fore without notice or alarm. Hence, by convention, they should be brought together, 
 when all that is wrong in writing should be corrected, and when means should, if pos¬ 
 sible, be instituted to keep them together. At the commencement of the last century, 
 the writing of our language was far, indeed, from perfection. From tbat time its ca¬ 
 pacity for a full and simple representation of our increasing number of primary sounds 
 has been gradually diminishing, till it has finally become intolerable, rising from many, 
 especially foreigners, the cry for reformation, radical and speedy, if possible ; hut at 
 any rate, a reformation. 
 
 In obedience to this loud and pressing call, many in this age of improvement have 
 projected, and some, even, have attempted such a reformation, though as yet without 
 much success. But should my vast labor upon this work also prove unavailing, yet 
 these facts do actually encourage me iu it, for they do all show that such a reformation 
 is greatly needed; that it is now crowding hard upon us ; that it is struggling vigor¬ 
 ously for existence ; that it must soon burst into being; and, with might, majesty, a< d 
 glory, bless our thrifty nation, and all who use our rapidly-spreading literature. 
 Though this may appear to some strange and paradoxical, yet it i^ iu fact true. 
 
 Well aware that this is a great work, requiring both talent and enterprise, and the 
 favor of Heaven likewise; well aware, also, that this grand concern of patriotism, 
 philanthropy, and religion is depending solely on the pleasure of The English re¬ 
 public of letters, the authors and publishers, yet it seemed that I could do something 
 toward forwarding so desirable an object by showing plainly to my countrymen, and, 
 as far as possible, to the English race, the vast necessity and the immense utility of a 
 simple and complete alphabet, containing one distinct, visible, invariable sign for each 
 of our forty important primary sounds, and an orthography relieved of all redundan¬ 
 cies and complexity, and at agreement, in the main, at least, with the most generally 
 approved standards of English orthoepy. This is, indeed, my humble aim and design, 
 while I seek for Heaven’s blessings aud the smiles of the nation and of the English 
 race upon the favored ones who shall accomplish the task I have begun, but may not 
 live or be able to accomplish. Be assured, then, that I have not entered on this busi¬ 
 ness without first counting the cost. 
 
 I will now endeavor to give the chief reasons for this reformation : 
 
 1. Our spoken language, on account of its combined excellencies, its variety, copi¬ 
 ousness, strength, melody, aud majesty, is, to say the least, one of the best now living 
 in the world; while somehow its written form, by its astonishing deficiencies aud re¬ 
 dundancies, is, as far as I know, quite the worst in the world, not to except, on some 
 accounts, even the French. This is a fact, I conclude, none will deny, and, of course, 
 it needs no proof. Now, who would not strongly desire that this valuable and refined 
 language should be furnished with a dress in natural and decent harmony with its 
 beauty and worth, fiiguity and glory? Let our senses of consistency, of propriety, of 
 congruity, and of honor also, be here exercised, and produce their natural and legit¬ 
 imate fruits. 
 
 2. Our alphabet is both redundant and deficient. Four of our twenty-six letters are 
 useless, of course greatly injurious— 3 , j, q , and x, their place being supplied by other 
 letters already and necessarily in the alphabet. We have, therefore, at most, but 
 twenty-two available letters to represent our primary sounds, which are at least forty. 
 There have been many doubts and decisions against w, also, as redundant; but I have 
 fiually concluded to retain it, believing it to represent different degrees of a very light 
 consonant sound peculiar to itself, in unison with the vowel-sound of u in full, aud o 
 
6 
 
 REFORMED ALPHABET AND ORTHOGRAPHY. 
 
 in wolf. We have, then, bat two more letters than half as many as we do absolutely 
 need. Who can realize this and not advocate an immediate supply of eigh een new 
 ones, that every important primary sound may have one and its own peculiar mark to 
 represent i to the eye ? 
 
 Our said twenty-two letters were once enough, doubtless, to represent all the ele¬ 
 mentary souuds then in use. But th'8 number for ages remaining the same, and the 
 oral language the whole time improving and becoming more and more copious, it lias 
 now become extremely deficient. What, then, should be done ? Surely, as goods in¬ 
 crease, so should store-room. As children in a family multiply, so should appropriate 
 names to represent and distinguish them. Hence, truly, as the primary sounds of 
 any language are added, they should be marked with additional appropriate letters. 
 What, strange and ridiculous shifts and expedients have we been driven to that we 
 might somehow possibly get along with the old alphabet! What would you think of 
 a tiller of the ground who had for years at vast expense growed twice as much corn as 
 he could either dispose of or accommodate with room ; or of the condition of the fam¬ 
 ily or a school containing forty children with only twenty-two names for the whole! 
 Worse than this, indeed, is it for us to have but twenty-two letters to represent and 
 distinguish our forty different primary sounds. Of course we must necessarily put a 
 number of very different sounds ou the same letter, as some four or five on a; about 
 as many on o, &c\; all unavoidably bringing on the learner much useless labor and vex¬ 
 atious embarrassment, causing even years of the precious time, liberty, comfort, and joy 
 of our dear children to be worse than thrown away. Expunge the four useless letters, and 
 add eighteen new ones, and you will do much toward perfecting the alphabet and 
 bringing up the written to the spoken language, and cause an immense saving in lit¬ 
 erary education and business. Is not here, then, a good reason for a radical and thor¬ 
 ough reformation ? 
 
 Another reason for this reformation, and a principal one, is the many different methods 
 in the old orthography of expressing the same sounds, and that by sounded letters. I have 
 already discovered one hundred and eighty-one. Forty such methods are all that we 
 need. Of course one hundred and forty-one of them are redundant and useless. More 
 may remain to be discovered, but probably not many. This is an astonishing and 
 doleful fact, causing by itself alone about four and a half times the otherwise neces¬ 
 sary labor of learning to read, as is demonstrated by dividing the said one hundred 
 and eighty-one, the whole number, by forty, the whole necessary number. Indeed, 
 this would be true were all these different methods of expression simple, distinct, and 
 uniform. But they are interwoven, implicated, and enveloped in a thousand tang es 
 and witchknots. To extricate and unfold these would puzzle and perplex even a 
 philosopher, if he were now for the first time put to the task. Although you who early 
 become what are usually called good spellers and readers, and have in better days 
 forgotten most of the many educational afflictions, hardships, and torments of your 
 dependent, confiding, obedient, and buoyant childhood, may not at once, perhaps, be 
 ready to acknowledge the truth of this story, yet the great expense of our hard-earned 
 money in common primary schooling; the quantity of our ch ldreu’s time spent in 
 irksome, stupefying, and demoralizing confinement—the privation of their many in¬ 
 nocent and keenly relished juvenile pleasures aud enjoyments—and the loss of their com¬ 
 fort, health, and often even of life, during years spent upon this almost inexplicable 
 snarl—upon our very deficient, and our redundant alphabet—our clumsy, complicated, 
 and barbarous orthography, both the most shapeless, ugly, and inconvenient to be found 
 among all the nations of the earth, tells its sad reality, and tells it with an iron voice and a 
 hundred tongues. 
 
 I beg you here to allow me to illustrate a little freely. Take, for example, a, the 
 only pure vowel in our whole written language, all the others being sometimes used 
 as cousonants. It should mean a as in hate, and nothing else, and no other letter or 
 letters should mean a. But what is the fact ? Why, a not only means a, but it also 
 means &u as in hall, and a as in part, and ah as in sirrah, and ah as in hat, and bh as 
 in wash, and uh as in exhilarate, aud eh as in auy, aud Ih as in courage—nine differ¬ 
 ent meanings. But this is by no means the extent of the difficulty. For e sometimes 
 means a, as in the contracts e’er, ne’er; also ei as in eight, aud ey as iu they. There 
 is, however, a worse trouble still; for o sometimes means au aud o the same as a ; and 
 aa sometimes means ii, and ah, and uh the same as a. Moreover, e, ei, and ey, like a, 
 sometimes mean ab. I might go on and double the length of this strange account; 
 but let this suffice. Now what a snarl, puzzle, maze, and labyrinth, for a child, or even 
 a philosopher, to develop and disenthrall. Well might the dear little boy, who had 
 not become entirely benumbed at school, nor there lost quite all his native genius and 
 inquisitiveness, in the simplicity of his heart exclaim, “Why, master, it seems a means 
 most everything, and most everything means a, and how shall I know what to call 
 them ?” But, ou some accounts, it is worse with e, i, o, and u, especially as each is 
 sometimes used as a consonant. On quitting the vowels at present, let me state a few 
 strange facts. I have already discover d not less than twenty-three different methods 
 of expressing the short simple sound uh, or u as in duck; fourteen of expressing eh, or 
 
REFORMED ALPHABET AND ORTHOGRAPHY. 
 
 7 
 
 e as in met; eleven of expressing e, or e as in mete; and eleven of expressing fh, or i 
 as in pin. In searching among the consonants, I tind things, in this respect, very bad, % 
 though not so bad as among the vowels. In one instauce I have found eleven, in 
 another eight, and in another six different methods of expressing the same sound. 
 This is probably the most embarrassing aud vexatious evil found within the precincts 
 of our literature, or that of any other nation ; and it should, if possible, be expelled. 
 
 The grievous cumbrance of silent letters is another and a strong argument for a ref¬ 
 ormation. With these our writing and printing have become loaded and clogged. 
 Though some of them are sometimes used to mark some particular sound of some other 
 letter, as e to mark the sound of o in note, aud a in hate; yet generally they are 
 entirely useless— nothing but old rubbish in the way. These were doubtless once all 
 sounded; for who could be such a horrid misanthrope as to have put them in, or any 
 one of them, without just occasion ? But fact also proves this in some cases, which will 
 settle the doctrine for the whole. Take for example the word Wednesday; this was 
 originally written Woden’s day, or the day of Woden, an ancient British idol. For 
 ease of pronunciation and pleasantness of sound, it has, in course of time, become 
 changed to Wednesday. This teaches us how we came by the silent d aud e in that 
 ■word. The case is similar, I conclude, with regard to such letters in all other words. 
 Our written language has so far improved aud changed from what it formerly was, 
 that the sounds once marked by these letters are discontinued, while the letters them¬ 
 selves are still retained, a heavy , useless burden, because none had conventional authority 
 to throw them out. They at leugth seem to have acquired a kind of sacredness, like 
 the old wooden gods of the ancient Hawaiians displaced by new ones, and set outside 
 of their temples, which the celebrated Captain Cook molested at the forfeiture of his 
 life. Aud perhaps I ought to look out, lest I, for molesting these old silent letters, should 
 share the same fate. 
 
 Without a reformation, this evil is still slowly but constantly increasing. I well 
 remember when some letters, now silent, were sounded. There are now some lettt-rs 
 in a state of transition from souud to silence, as ts iu priests, th in cloths. But there 
 is another change going onward iu our language, though more slowly still. Another 
 sound is becoming extant, requiring another letter and another syllable, all as yet 
 without any additional marking, as in floiur, o A ur„ prisAin, spas A m. More than all 
 this, there is a new primary sound, coming slowly into existence, and used in several 
 interjections. It is a deep guttural mute, formed with open mouth, by closing the 
 glottis. This has never been marked with an appropriate letter; nor has it, to my 
 knowledge, before been noticed. It is possible that some primary sounds have also 
 been going slowly out of existence. Thus time operates ou language, as a river on the 
 adjacent land, taking off in one place and building on in another. All these changes 
 in oral language call for corresponding chauges iu the writ-en. 
 
 The mere preparations for the knowledge valuable in itself have cost quite too much. The 
 expense of money, time, and toil, laid out ou the tools, scaffolding, aud other prepara¬ 
 tions for raising the temple of knowledge, has prevented much pleasant and useful 
 labor upon the glorious building itself. Therefore, our alphabet and orthography, also 
 our grammar and chirography too, if you please, essential parts of such preparation, 
 should be rendered much more simple aud easy, and, ivithal, a much more agreeable part 
 of a primary education. This would give our children much time, now worse than 
 thrown away in sore and ruinous confinement, to be pleasantly employed in the noble, 
 captivating, and delightful business of storing up treasures of useful knowledge, ap¬ 
 propriate to their age, inclination, and genius—such as oral language, natural history, 
 and the rudiments of numbers, of some mechanic arts, of music, of physiology, and of 
 the physical sciences in general, &c. This topie would furnish matter for a long 
 discourse, but I cannot now stay about it. Though a short hint, may it prove a sea¬ 
 sonable and efficient one to all parents and other teachers, to all officers, counselors, 
 and helpers in an early, domestic, and common school education. “I speak as unto 
 wise men ; judge ye what I say.” 
 
 By neglecting this reformation, we give other nations the advantage over us. Whether 
 considered with regard to our own internal national concerns, or to our comparison 
 with other nations, this furnishes a new and considerable article of political economy. 
 This argument must touch our national pride and our patriotism in a tender spot. 
 Knowledge is wealth and power, and, in connection with judgment and virtue, if is 
 wisdom. Do think, then, of the three years saved in a primary education, aud of the 
 four, when a classic and professional is also included, all to be devoted to the pleasant, 
 and rapid acquisition of the most valuable and available knowledge. Think, also, of 
 the immense object of saving one-third in learning the art of writing, aud in all liter¬ 
 ary business, public and private; but, above all, take into sober consideration the 
 vastly superior literary facilities furnished by the simple and complete alphabets, and 
 the pure and natural orthographies of some of the old nations, and more especially 
 those of some small nations lately arisen from a state of totally illiterate barbarism, 
 such as the Cherokees and the Sandwich Islanders. 
 
8 
 
 REFORMED ALPHABET AND ORTHOGRAPHY. 
 
 Another argument is, the great increase of the English and the Anglo-American en terprise 
 and power. The many improvements among this peculiar and distinguished race of 
 men, especially since the commencement of the last century, furnish a good argument 
 to sustain the case in hand. In accomplishing this grand affair, so necessary and so vast 
 in its consequences, we should be acting worthy of our race and name; worthy of our¬ 
 selves. Will you now just take a glance at the rapid advance of this noble section of 
 human (of Enoch and Noah's) posterity during these one hundred and forty-four years, 
 notwithstanding all our grievous embarrassments and hinderances—their advance, I 
 mean, in general learning, in the various solid and useful sciences, in the many me¬ 
 chanic and liberal arts, in agriculture and commerce, in civil and religious light and 
 liberty, and in their many successful inventions and efforts for the benefit of our own 
 sort of people, and for the general elevation, improvement, and amelioration of the 
 condition and prospects of mankind. Consider, also, the hasty and gigantic growth, 
 within this term, of the English and American wealth and influence in the earth, and 
 the swift extension of our language in many and populous nations, and in all hemi¬ 
 spheres ; thus, so far, fairly promising, according to the strong opinion of some learned 
 men, to become universal; and then say whether English comistency and English 
 glory do not imperiously demand corresponding enterprise for the thorough reforma¬ 
 tion of the elements of our wide-spreading literature, and for bringing them forward 
 from where the dark ages left them, up to the present English wants and demands, to 
 the high and noble aims of this people, and to a congruous level with our other gen¬ 
 eral standards in this eventful and improving age. Now, who of our blood and spirit 
 and tongue can resist this argument ? 
 
 The great helps which this reformation ivould afford in the general concerns of education 
 is my last argument. This is rather a compend of arguments, which, however, have a 
 strong relationship among themselves. I will just notice these in proper order. 
 
 1. It would annihilate the vast and endless task of learning to spell the very num¬ 
 erous and strangely written words of our language, which have been, by mere dint of 
 memory, necessarily learned, each by itself, without much assistance from general rules, 
 for the sounds of the words would, in writing, invariably suggest the proper letters. Think 
 of the years that would be saved from this tiresome work. 
 
 2. It would pi event almost all the expense of learning to read well the whole En¬ 
 glish language, for, after the alphabet shall be well learned, the letters would always invariably 
 suggest the proper sounds. Speed would be acquired of course by use and habit, and ac¬ 
 cent, emphasis, and inflexions would all be natural, as in common speaking, provided 
 what is read be previously understood by the learner or practitioner, and none othei' 
 should ever be read vocally, and cannot be, without damage in the important art of read¬ 
 ing. 
 
 3. This proposed reformation would save about one-third of the usual expense of 
 learning chirography, or the art of writing; for the capital and small letters, though 
 of different size, are exactly of the same form. From these three sources, all combined, 
 r.hei e will, I think, arise a saving.of three years in a good primary education, and of four, 
 when a classic and professional one is included. What an immense object this would 
 be for the rising generations, especially of republican citizens! It would, indeed, 
 nearly double the worth of time in childhood and early youth. 
 
 4. It would render common learning much more pleasant and captivating to children; 
 for, what was before uninteresting and hard is banished, and all things are now made 
 simple and easy; consequently the progress would be rapid and delightful. 
 
 5. It would, with proper books, render parents, in general, after they shall have 
 learned the reformed alphabet, at once the competent teachers of their own children, 
 at home, in almost the whole of what has been considered a good common literary edu¬ 
 cation; thus preventing most of the expense, the sufferings, the dangers, the vicious¬ 
 ness, and the many enormous evils of the common schools. Had I time, I should like 
 to dwell on this very important matter, and explain and illustrate at large all things 
 therein. But I cannot now. 
 
 6. It would, by its sure consequences, add much to the health, promise, comfort, 
 safety, and happiness of children; a matter, indeed, which all parents and philan¬ 
 thropists should duly appreciate and earnestly seek for. To show this in detail 
 would take too much time for the present. 
 
 7. It would, in fine, contribute much toward a thing greatly to be desired, espe¬ 
 cially in all states or nations of republican government and free institutions— an easily 
 self-supporting system of general and liberal education for both sexes, adequate to the probable 
 or chosen business af life, to be completed at an age between sixteen and tiventy years. 
 
 1 have now presented plainly before you, eight of the chief reasons for the complete 
 and speedy reformation of the writing of our excellent and worthy language; which 
 writing, or mode of representing it to the mind by sight, has long been intolerable, is 
 still growing worse and worse, is a disgrace to an enlightened people, and an unseemly 
 stain upon the fair countenance of our national glory. And which of these reasons 
 \ can you point out as futile or weak? 
 
 \ The next thing I should do is, to show you the possibility and feasibleness of this reforma• 
 
 \ 
 
9 
 
 REFORMED ALPHABET AND ORTHOGRAPHY. 
 
 I [ 1 
 
 Hon. Some whom I respect more for their erqd^tipd tuan for enterprise have 
 
 spoken discouragingly on this subject. But it is by no means so with all. The vast im¬ 
 portance of the thing, however, 1 believe ia gel fufiy conceded. Although it would, 
 be a new thing in the world, and a groat alao.aBd evba the greatest that was ever 
 accomplished by human agency, aud although many have failed in their attempts to 
 produce ir, yet I by no means despair; for this is beyond dispute, a race, a day, and a 
 nation of wonders. Men, especially men of our origin and kindred, have not yet done 
 their best, nor their mightiest. We are now entering upon an age of light, peace, and 
 improvement, su h as the world has never seen ; an age to be distinguished by bold¬ 
 ness in conception, skill in planuing, and success in achievement. Great and unheard 
 of things are to be devised, expected, undertaken, and accomplished. Compared with 
 what men might be, and what, in som ejavored, some “golden,” some millennial age, they 
 probably will be, there is now passing over the stage of life and action a mere dwarf, or 
 wreck of the human race. 
 
 Men can and will yet do more than they ever have done, and leave behind them 
 stupendous monuments of wisdom, rather than those of folly, such as the ancients did 
 in Egypt and other parts of the world. The summit of human efficiency has never yet 
 been reached. Look forward with raised expectation, and the eye of faith, aud behold 
 the wise and worthy wonders which shall be accomplished when war shall cease, and 
 the blessings of light, and virtue, and Christianity shall pervade the earth. Why not, 
 then, in the early stage, and incipient progress of this age of philosophic, philanthropic, 
 and Christian efficiency, and as a chief mea.iS of hastening it forward—why not appre¬ 
 hend, attempt, and bring to pass so great and so good a thing as the conformation of 
 our written to our spoken language ? This is indeed a matter of interest and of great 
 necessity, and would be of unspeakable benefit to all the English world ; but more par¬ 
 ticularly to this country of republican government at d of free popular institutions.- 
 It would truly produce an Augustan age in English literature, science, liberal learn¬ 
 ing, and general improvement, and mark the present as an era of distinguished luster. 
 
 But, after all, this is, in itself, not only a possible, but an easy work. We are kept 
 from its accomplishment more by cobweb than by adamantine chains. The obstructions 
 exist more in fancy than in fact. On subjects of this nature, we are too apt to startle 
 at real or supposed difficulties, and to imagiue them insurmountable. We take fright 
 at monsters of our own creating, and run from apprehended to real evils. And how 
 long must it be so? 
 
 Now to the case in hand. Let the authors, editors, and publishers of books and pa¬ 
 pers so agree, or consent, and the work is done at once, and done with the utmost ease! 
 And who can say, in this age of light, skill, and enterprise, that such agreement or 
 consent cannot be obtained ? 
 
 Notwithstanding all the hindrances from various quarters, what immense improve¬ 
 ments aud useful inventions have occurred to bless the world since the great astrono¬ 
 mer, Galileo, of Florence, was so cruelly persecuted for his discoveries in astronomy ; 
 since the severe punishment, even in England, of the honest inventor of the first water 
 saw-mill; and especially within seventy,or eighty years past. Now, shall we of this 
 age, and this country, be afraid of light and truth—of investigation and project—of 
 invention and experiment, for the good of the nation and of mankind ? Will you, in¬ 
 deed, be ready to persecute and punish the patient, assiduous, and self-sacrificing mod¬ 
 ern inventor and reformer with ridicule, reproach, and scorn, and call him 1 ‘ one-idead 
 enthusiast,” “ narrow-minded schemer,” or “ Utopian projector ?” Let not this be the 
 bitter reward of these devoted patriots and philanthropists, especially in this day and 
 land of free and independent inquiry, and of large and liberal views. In all things of 
 this nature, let us act according to the dictates of true honor and impartial justice. 
 
 But I will argue the possibility and feasibleness of this project from what has 
 already taken place in our literature since the commencement of the last century. We 
 have seen, in our day, considerable improvements, alterations at least, in our written 
 language, our style of composition, and some in our alphabet. Once we had but twenty- 
 four letters, aud called z ezzard, and used much the long ess. I have before suggested 
 that I well remember when some letters now silent were then sounded. We once had 
 s-h-e- w for show, mu-s-i-ck for music, fa-v o-u-r for favor. In the two last examples, 
 though, the wrong letter is retained ; yet one is thrown off as useless, and that too with¬ 
 out unbalancing the earth, or throwing it from its orbit! We have begun to throw off 
 some of our verbal terminations, as al from classical, and merit from advancement, and 
 lo! even this has not clothed the nation with sackcloth, nor filled the Euglish world 
 with lamentation, mourning, and woe! Now, why should not the desirable change 
 hitherto so partial, superficial, and sluggish, by use of proper means, like other things, 
 become radical and rapid, and in some few years be accomplished ? Let us take strong 
 interest in this thing ourselves, and by all means endeavor to create one in others, 
 and then be looking out for desirable and glorious results. But, I beg, let no people 
 of influence or authority, no parents or teachers, no friends of their country or of man¬ 
 kind, discourage or hinder this so great, so necessary, and so benevolent a work. 
 
 However, after all, the grand preliminary to a general reception of a plan for this 
 
10 
 
 REFORMED ALPHABET AND ORTHOGRAPHY. 
 
 r /; /( 
 
 reformation is, Unity by its general merits, it be found worthy of adoption , and that this wor¬ 
 thiness be extensively promubjated (wd known. Let this suggestion call to my aid, from 
 any ladies or gentlemei) of literature and beneficence, such helps in this arduous work 
 as they may be able freely to contribute, that a, plan for reformation be soon brought 
 as near as possible to perfection, aud circulated over the nation, and among all people 
 ■who use our language. 
 
 I will now give you some remarks preliminary to a reformed alphabet and orthography. 
 
 After long and close atteutiou to this whole matter, I am now disposed to give my 
 present , though imperfect views of the subject, concluding that I shall not, very soon, 
 be able to bring it much nearer to perfection without help from others. 
 
 I have placed in succession, and according to my ideas of the best order, forty letters, 
 twenty-two old and eighteen new ones, each appropriated to its own peculiar primary 
 sound, and to that alone. The first division of these is into sixteen vowe s ( each sub¬ 
 ject to different degrees, and some slight variation of its own peculiar sound), and twenty- 
 four consonants of different kinds. These letters are subdivided into seven different 
 sorts, to be noticed in the recital, and all represent simple sounds, except five, i, j, r, 
 w, aud y, which represent their own peculiar sounds, inseparably combined with an¬ 
 other sound, which is marked by another letter. 
 
 Whenever the sound of y comes before u, long or short, y should be invariably placed 
 before it, as in yule, young, and then these sounds of u would be always both simple aud 
 ui iform. 
 
 I exemplify no sounds but purely English, or such as have become fully Anglicized, 
 although some are still, in the old orthography, found in their ancient or foreign cos¬ 
 tumes. 
 
 The forms of the letters, in both writing and printing, should be kept as near alike 
 as the nature of the case will allow. This would give great facility in learning the 
 art of writing, and in reading that which is written by others, &c. 
 
 * * * # * * * 
 
 This reformation would tend greatly, as far as adopted, to promote uniformity in 
 pronunciation—a thing very desirable. Its exactness in representing theproper sounds 
 of the words, and its uuiformity of spelling, would always tend to this effect. 
 
 For sake of ease and pleasantness of sound, most of the unaccented vowels are slowly 
 amalgamating with short i, e, and u, especially the latter. This, I conclude, is the 
 reason why there have become so many different methods of expressing these sounds— 
 the first, eleven ; the second, fourteen; and the third, tweuty-three. 
 
 It would be both patriotic and wise for the men of letters in Great Britain * * * 
 
 no longer to be endeavoring to Gallicize, Germanize, Latinize, Hellenize, or Hebraize 
 our language; but, by every means, to Anglicize it, and add to it symmetry, euphony, 
 compactnet-s, and distinctive nationality. 
 
 It is probably the fact that additional primary sounds begin at first slowly to appear 
 among the illiterate in some rough, uncouth interjections. After a lapse of time, many 
 of these become nouns, aud obtain their various attributes, definitives, aud connect¬ 
 ives, aud finally acquire a respectable standing in language. Thus, the primary sound 
 of the Hebrews and other orientals, ah, or a moderate sound of a as in part, broken off 
 suddenly with an aspirate or a consonant, as in ah, pass, is taking its place, though a 
 very modest one, in our language, appearing in many interjections, and in some other 
 words, and does therefore justly deserve to be marked by its own distinct letter, which 
 I have given it. The case is similar with regard to o as in oh, stone, spoken , which I have 
 also accommodated with a letter. 
 
 * * * * * * * 
 
 I take it as a granted doctrine that the whole legitimate object of alphabetic writing 
 is to represent to the sight, as accurately and as simply* as possible, the sounds of spoken 
 words. Hence the written language should always be seeking conformity to the spoken, 
 rather than the spoken to the written. This would entirely prevent all future disagree¬ 
 ment between our orthography and our orthoepy, and more fully represent the epistol¬ 
 ary writer’s living and known sounds and tones used in his common conversation. 
 But let all the elocutionary authorities and influences in our country, aud other coun¬ 
 tries using English; let all the public speakers, and the authors and publishers of 
 standard works, constantly use their endeavors to promote uniformity in pronunciation, 
 aud of course, on this plan, uniformity of orthography also, wherever our language is 
 used. 
 
 ******* 
 
 * Simplicity! That is the point! But this author’s scheme, like the rest, omits oue 
 of the first requisites of his theory the moment, he attempts to reduce that theory to 
 practice. In theory we have such requisite insisted on as above, and by other authors, 
 of whom we will quote a few, as follows: “ Words are the means by which men’s 
 thoughts are interchanged, and, like other means of language, their beauty and per¬ 
 fection consists in their simplicity and uniform application.”— Cramp’s Philosophy of 
 Language. 
 
 “ Stripped of its adventitious recommendations, and judged on its own merits” (refer- 
 
REFORMED ALPHABET AND ORTHOGRAPHY. 
 
 11 
 
 OBJECTIONS CONSIDERED. 
 
 Written languages have generally originated among people in a greater or less de¬ 
 gree unimproved, and are therefore liable to great imperfection. Hence they do, like 
 other things, however difficult, after a nation have become far advanced in civilization, 
 demand great alteration for the better. This argument is available with regard to 
 every other concern of human society; why not, then, to this? The change herein 
 proposed would be a very cheap and efficient instrument to urge forward our public 
 interests and honor. What dire calamities are we still enduring by means of the leprous 
 productions of the dark or almost barbarous ages which are now ponderous cloys indeed to 
 our characteristic enterprise and energy. How long shall they remain for our grievous 
 national injury and shame ? Have we not in us yet some Saxon , some British blood ?— 
 some American counsel, skill, and independence?—some Yankee ingenuity and force, 
 that we may speedily demolish, or ivhittle away, these sore evils, entailed on us by our 
 honored, though remote and unprivileged, ancestors? Then, let the whole be stirring 
 in us and among us, till there shall result an achievement and a glory such as the world 
 has never seen. Ay, indeed, it is high time this grand affair were accomplished, or 
 well in progress; for truly it should be done, it must be done, yea, moreover, it will be 
 done, if our combined enterprise and courage, skill and energy, say so. 
 
 Though it seems that 1 might stop here with this general answer to all objections, 
 yet I will come down to some particulars, and use further endeavors to pacify the 
 objector’s feelings. 
 
 1. “It will obstruct the privilege of future etymological research.” I answer: Per¬ 
 haps not one in ten thousand would ever have occasion for this. Persons acquainted 
 with other languages might recognize our words of foreign origin about as readily 
 from their sound and English meaning, united, as from their dress. But, after all, the 
 chief object of speakers and writers, philologists and lexicographers, should be to 
 know the present English or American vernacular meaning of words, irrespective of 
 origin or derivation. Besides, the native orthography of all foreign words, the origi¬ 
 nals of our words derived from other languages, and the old orthography of all our 
 own words, as far and as long as necessary , might easily be placed in some of our dic¬ 
 tionaries, or all of them, for needed accommodation; and all this, on the reformed 
 method, would not make them so large as they are now. 
 
 2. “The books already in existence would become useless.” Answer: 1. None valu¬ 
 able need be lost, and for the loss of the rest no one should mourn. 2. Both alphabets 
 might be learned while the change is forming; thus all, for a necessary term, might 
 be able to read and write in either. 3. For consulring ancient records, or other fortui¬ 
 tous occasions, the old could be learned in times to come as easily as in times past. 
 4. All books worthy of it would be, in due season, reprinted in the new dress, and 
 could be afforded cheaper than now. 
 
 3. “Authors, publishers, and booksellers would suffer loss in old stock.” Answer: The 
 change might be, and doubtless would be, regulated by these, and be so gradual as 
 would give fair opportunity to dispose of old stock, and close that mode of the manu¬ 
 facture. Besides, the diminution in the expense of printing, and the natural rise of 
 books in proportion to this diminished expense, would probably more than cancel all 
 loss, even that in stereotype plates. The loss in movable types would be trifling; for 
 the old capitals would be disused, the twenty-six old common letters would still be 
 employed, and, for the present, no new matrices need be formed for any of the forty 
 letters or five characters, except the expulsion of the dots from the ies and jays. 
 
 4. “The old, hard, dry, tiresome methods of primary learning tend to discipline the 
 mind and improve its faculties, especially the memory.” Answer: But the easy, pleas¬ 
 ant, and interesting substituted learning, all profitable in itself, would surely do much 
 more toward this very important object. This is the dictate of nature, reason, common 
 sense, and experience. Besides, the success of this project would doubtless produce a 
 great and blessed revolution in the affairs of common early education, and cause the 
 
 ring to the alphabet of Dr. Lepsius), “ we think it deficient in simplicity.” — Max Mul¬ 
 ler’s Science of Language. 
 
 But notwithstanding this observation, Muller himself forgot this requisite when 
 constructing his own alphabet, which seems also to have signally failed, like that of 
 Dr. Lepsius,in the elements necessary to popular acceptation. 
 
 “ To make a change really useful, moreover, it would have to be radical, and then 
 we are reduced at once to phonography,” (the very essence of simplicity).—S chele de 
 Verb’s Studies in English. 
 
 The first condition of a full and perfect alphabet and orthography is, “That for every 
 simple, single sound, incapable of being represented by a combination of letters, there 
 be a simple, single sign.”— Latham on English Language. 
 
 “There is nothing more admiratde uor more useful than the invention of signs; at 
 the same time there is nothing more productive of error when we neglect to observe 
 (avoid?) their complication.”— Horne Tooke’s Diversions of Burley. 
 
12 
 
 REFORMED ALPHABET AND ORTHOGRAPHY. 
 
 time, character, and abilities of children to be worth more at twelve years of age than 
 they usually have been at sixteen. There is, in truth, something more agreeable 
 and useful for children to learn and to do than to be, for years of their precious 
 time, toiling and delving, and plodding in most distressing and ruinous confinement at 
 the strange and dreadful old alphabet and orthography, even if it were nothing but 
 giving names to stones in the wall, or the trees in a grove, and committing them to 
 memory! Now I should not think that any would again make this objection. 
 
 5. “All readers and writers must relearn to read and write.” Answer: The expense 
 aud inconvenience of change have, in this plan, been avoided as much as possible ; and 
 I have no doubt, and that from actual experiment, that good readers a d writers in 
 the old would learn to read and write in this, with proper assistance, though slowly 
 at first, in less than six hours. Dexterity and speed would, of course, be acquired by 
 use aud habit. Let none, then, be greatly troubled any more on this score ; for it is 
 no great affair to learn the forms and uses of eighteen new letters when the sounds are 
 already familiar. I trust that this mighty objection will now no more be urged by 
 people of sense and wisdom.* 
 
 6. “Children, by much help and stimulating, usually get over, somehow, the chief 
 difficulties in the old literature before they arrive at the proper age for criticising these 
 matters, and soon, forgetting very much their former toils and sufferings, their preju¬ 
 dices become strong in favor of the old written language.” Answer: Apply this argument 
 successfully to all subjects, and there is an end, at once, to all improvements. We have 
 already been governed quite too long by the prepossessions, the early notions aud 
 whims of childhood, and the imperious and senseless customs and authority of the semi- 
 benighted by-gone ages. But full-grown men in the present eventful and improving 
 age, and of this free and enlightened country, should deliver themselves of childish and 
 half-barbarian trammels, aod dare to search, and think, and speak, and act also, for 
 removing the immense evils that enwrap our precious, extending, and improving lit¬ 
 erature, and that deprive it of more than half its value. 
 
 During how many more years, ages, and generations must the enterprising posterity 
 of the brave settlers of this country, indeed our own dear children, be unnecessarily 
 subject, in their ductile and forming age, to the cruel labor, the tormentiug vexation, 
 and the tiresome, stupefying, and deleterious confinement, imposed on them as it was on 
 us, before days of maturity and independent inquiry : and all that, too, by blind attach¬ 
 ment to the awkward, ugly, indecent, clownish, cumbrous, hideous dress of our refined, 
 polished, powerful, harmonious, and delightful language? In the name and pride of 
 our country, and of all the English race, I do beg for our admirable lauguage a dress 
 suited to its character and merits. Do not, I entreat you, deem me sacrilegious aud 
 monstrously wicked, and deserving Heaven’s vengeance, for denouncing and 3lasphem- 
 ing that paltry, shapeless old idol, the coarse and bungling manufacture of partly- 
 civilized people, long ago passed away and gone ; although, it did, at vast pains and 
 expense, receive your obedient devotions some four or five years of your otherwise 
 brilliant and promising childhood and youth. * 
 
 Had a longer, a happier, and a more productive course of natural, plain, interesting, 
 and useful oral instructions been generally used with children, and had they not been 
 put to artificial literature till able to investigate for themselves, this needed reformation 
 would, long ago, have been accomplished, and that, too, easily and freely, without rub 
 and tug and strife. 
 
 * # * # # * * 
 
 Quite too early in the life of our young, active, social, imitative fello w-boiugs, have we 
 dropped, if we evor began, free and pleasing oral, model, and sample instructions ad¬ 
 ministered kindly, simply, and incidentally by affectionate parents, or assistant parents, 
 aud shut them up in schools, and confined them to artificial literature. In this, truly, 
 we have exactly reversed the just order of things. We should have begun with nature 
 and ended with art; or, in other words, we should, in the great concerns of education, 
 have more obediently, faithfully, and entirely followed nature’s dictates, from the first; 
 dawn of physical, sensative, intellectual, and moral existence, and should have con¬ 
 tinued thus to do, admitting art incipiently and occasionally to assist nature in her wise, 
 bmeficent, and god-like operations. 
 
 Thoroughly reform our written language, and then learning to read, spell, and write 
 would be so easy that formal schools and set lessons in sore and ruinous confinement 
 would be totally unnecessary. If the previous education be right, these valuable 
 accomplishments would, in proper season, be sought after, and obtained incidentally, 
 like other kinds of every-day business, as the farmer’s son learns to reap, and his daughter 
 to sweep. You may, therefore, safely let artificial literature alone, till children shall 
 have arrived at some age and maturity ; and even then you need not hurry or press 
 them forward in it, provided, however, that they, as much as possible, under the care of 
 parents, or assistant parents, their natural guardians and teachers, have their time 
 
 * Whatever may be said on this point with reference to the alphabet proposed by 
 this memorialist may be said with tenfold more reason with reference to the simplified 
 alphabet herewith presented. 
 
REFORMED ALPHABET AND ORTHOGRAPHY. 
 
 13 
 
 properly divided between interesting, free, and safe recreations, proper manual labors, 
 and a good system of oral, model, and sample instructions, advancing spontaneously 
 and delightfully toward artificial literature, and into it, as they approach adult years. 
 Let these be the natural tendencies , and these the sure results of any new or improved system 
 of a general primary education , and then do what you please with the old common 
 schools; only do not, at such vast expense, privation, and suffering, allow them to stun , 
 and stunt, and stupefy, and stagnate, and stultify, our dear, affectionate, sprightly, and 
 promising children. 
 
 I rejoice that the people of this country, the cradle of civil, literary, educational, 
 and religious light and liberty, are waking up, though slowly, to this vastly important 
 object, and beginning to discover their errors, and the natural and effectual remedies. 
 This, I trust, in its onward progress, will contribute much toward the general improve¬ 
 ment and happiness of the rising generations, and much also toward the radical, 
 thorough, and timely reform of the external dress and the ocular representation of 
 our worthy and delightful language. 
 
 (Here follows an illustration of the practical working of this author’s 
 scheme, after which he proceeds :) 
 
 In these ten sentences, according to the old, there are 839 letters; according to the 
 new 533; the difference 30 Q—considerably over one-tliird. The general average would 
 doubtless be quite one-third without the aforesaid abbreviations, and with them, quite 
 two-fifths. Now, it is here fully demonstrated, that this reformation would save one- 
 third of all the expense of silent reading, of all writing and printing.* Is there not 
 here, then, an object worthy of serious and general consideration ? And should not those 
 who have this matter under their control feel their respousibleness to God and their 
 country, and speedily adopt this, or a better, reformed alphabet and orthography? 
 
 It is to be expected that in this age of invention and improvement there would be 
 many unavailing attempts at this reformation. But let all well-disposed undertakers 
 be comforted and encouraged by the consideration, that every such attempt will prob¬ 
 ably do its share toward perfecting for our language a system of writing which will 
 finally be found worthy of general adoption; its share, also, toward proving to every 
 enlightened and liberal mind the laboring and pressing necessity of such a reformation. 
 
 All herein contained is presented to excite attention and discussion, criticism, and 
 correction, as an essay toward preparing for future adoption all necessary improve¬ 
 ments in the elements of our swiftly-spreading literature. 
 
 Having drawn thus freely upon an investigator of the past, let us 
 turn briefly to the language of a recent lecturer before an association 
 of educators in one of our largest cities : 
 
 It would seem as if every thoughtful observer must admit that our spelling is an 
 absurd, unnatural, illogical, unreasonable, aud contradictory contrivance. In orthog¬ 
 raphy we are on a boundless sea without rudder or compass. Currents and counter¬ 
 currents, eddies and whirlpools, beset us on every hand. One difficulty mastered helps 
 little or none about the next. Memory is almost our sole reliance. Hence our chil¬ 
 dren are forever learning to spell, and adults are always questioning their spelling, 
 and ever and auon manipulating the lexicon to recover lost orthography. No one can 
 tell when he hears a word for the first time how he must spell it to pass muster, for 
 every word may be written in many different ways. For illustration, suppose we have 
 occasion to write the simple word rainbows, with no guide but analogy ; let us see 
 what questions may arise. The initial sound we find represented by r (far), re (are), 
 rt (mortgage), rr (burr), rps (corps,) wr (write), rh (rhyme), and rrh (myrrh). The 
 second sound we find spelled by a (fame), ai (aim), ay (day), aye (aye), ao (gaol), ag 
 (champagne), e (fete), ee (melee), ea (great), ei (veil), ey (they), au (gauge), et 
 (crochet), uet (bouquet), eig (reign), eigh (weigh), aud aigh (straight). The third 
 sound, that of n, we have found spelled in thirteen different ways. For the first sound 
 of the second syllable we need perhaps decide only between b and bb, and then make 
 choice of one of the twenty-one spellings of o previously given, which will bring us to 
 the final sound and set us to choosing among z (zone), zz (buzz), zo (size), s (as), ss 
 (hussy), es (thieves), se (disease), ce (suffice), sp (raspberry), and x (beaux). After 
 due deliberation we might perhaps settle on something like this: wrheighkn- 
 bboughzzex—the x being appended partly to indicate that after all our pains the cor¬ 
 rect spelling is unknown. 
 
 When teaching school many years ago at Sugartown, a sweet little village in Penn¬ 
 sylvania, I used to spell the name of the town thus : sboulgueyrrhphthoughku. This 
 spelling is justified analogically by the following words: (shoul)d, ro(gue), m(yrrh), 
 (phth)isic, pl(ough), (kn)ow. 
 
 * We have already endeavored to show how to save immensely upon this saving,page 3. 
 
14 
 
 REFORMED ALPHABET AND ORTHOGRAPHY. 
 
 How many times have you been obliged to refer to the dictionary to ascertain 
 whether to spell it able or ible ? and perhaps then you found it eble, as in dele- 
 ble, while it is ible in indelible. It would take a bright boy a longtime to master 
 the orthography of this little suffix alone. He w ould be furnished no less a task in 
 words ending with the syllable heard in winter, dollar, honor, murmur, fakir, and 
 theatre ; and after he had memorized all words of this termination, as to whether they 
 should end in er, ar, or, ur, ir, or re ; if he had any time left he might settle up with 
 1 and 11, s and ss, and all the rest of the doubles. Next, he might take w'ords ending 
 in the u sound, as prison, cousin, deepen, in the last syllable of which there is no vow.el 
 sound, and remember if he can whether the useless letter in each particular word iso, 
 i, or e. In this list I have not included such words as sylvan, mountain, surgeoD, im¬ 
 agine, because when distinctly pronounced there is a slight difference between the last 
 syllable of these and the others, though as ordinarily uttered the difference is not ap¬ 
 parent. 
 
 If our bright boy be not surrounded-by the cares and duties of manhood ere he gets 
 through with the work suggestod, he might next take up the very common termina¬ 
 tion shn, and question all words of that ending as to whether they must conclude with 
 tion (motion), cean (ocean), tian (Egyptian), shion (fashion), shen (Goshen), sion (ornis- 
 tion), cian (physiciau), cion (coercion), chion (falchion), or shun, which would be better 
 than any of the other spellings. When our pupil had completed all these tasks be 
 would have made o< ly a beginning. No wouder one of our city preachers wrote so 
 sorrowfully in response to an invitation to take part in a spelling-match when the 
 fever was on two years ago. Hear him : 
 
 “ March 25,1875. 
 
 “ O. C. Gibbs : 
 
 “Dear Sir: I shall be out of the city Friday evening, and hence shall not be 
 able to attend the spelling-trial of that evening. Could I be present, my remarks 
 would be of a melancholy nature. When I look out upon the outrageous con¬ 
 duct of the vowels aud consonants that make up our English, the scene is ‘ sad and 
 dreary,’ and I 4 would not live always.’ The English language should be abolished. 
 
 “No doubt intemperance will pass away, the sources of the Nile will be approached 
 by railway, aud will be decorated with a depot aud a restauraut, a bishop will be 
 agreed upon for our diocese, the North Branch will abound in brook trout; but the man 
 who shall look out upon that happy age will sit down at his table and mourn as he 
 tries to spell out a simple letter to his grandmother, and the lunatic asylum will be 
 full of those who went crazy over an effort to stand up last in spelling-school. 
 
 “With irrepressible grief, yours, 
 
 “DAVID SWING.” 
 
 It is to be hoped that intemperance is on the wane; Stanley is working at the Nile 
 problem; it is certain our diocese has its bishop ; I cannot say as to the prospect of 
 trout in the North Branch; but I purpose to do what in me lies to keep those poor 
 fellows out of the lunatic asylum by doing away with the need of spelling-schools. 
 
 In conclusion, I borrow the following from a speech delivered a few 
 days ago at Saint Louis, before the fifth annual meeting of the National 
 Spelling-Reform Association, bv Prof. William T. Harris, superintendent 
 of the public schools of Saint Louis, who took strong grounds in favor 
 of a phonetic system of orthography : 
 
 Th* Romanic or common alphabet consists of 26 letters, which are supposed to repre¬ 
 sent, singly or combined, all the sounds in the English language —21 consonants aud 5 
 vowels. But there are in the English language, as spoken, 12 vowels, 4 diphthongs, 22 
 consonants, 34 in all, exclusive of diphthongs. Then the Romanic alphabet must vio¬ 
 late Latham’s fourth law, that “ only one sound shall be expressed by one sigu.” Yes, 
 as Mr. Ellis has shown in his tables appended to the “Plea for Phonetic Spelling,” the 
 letter “ a ” has 7 sounds, “ e ” has also 7, “ i ” has 6, “ o ” has 11, “u ” has 8, and “ y,” as a 
 vowel, has 3 ; an average of 7 sounds to each of these simple signs. But this would 
 not be bad were it all. The third law of Latham, that “no sound have more than oue 
 sign,” is disregarded even more flagrantly. The vowel sound of e, heard iu “meet” is 
 represented by no fewer than 40 different signs and combinations of signs; a. as heard 
 in “mate,” by 34; o, in “mote,” by 34 also. 
 
 In short, if we view the alphabet in this light, it consists not of 26 letters only, but 
 of more than 200! 
 
 As Chambers remarks, in his “ Papers for the People,” “ we violate every principle of 
 a sound alphabetical system more outrageously than any nation whatsoever. Our 
 spelling cannot be matched for whimsical caprice. If ‘ myrrh ’ be mer, why not ; syrrh,’ 
 sir ; 4 through,’ throo ; ‘ tough,’ to ; 1 bough,’ how ; ‘ cough,’ cow ; ‘ noise,’ hoise for 1 boys’ ; 
 4 tongue,’ liongue for ‘ hung ’; ‘ quay,’ may for 1 me ’; 1 colonel,’ in-folonel for 4 infernal ’; 
 ‘neighbor,’ leighhor for 1 labor’?” 
 
REFORMED ALPHABET AND ORTHOGRAPHY. 
 
 15 
 
 The word “ scissors,” it has been mathematically demonstrated, can be spelled 7)90,580 
 different modes, and have Romanic analogies to authorize each spelling! Some are 
 extravagant, as schiessourrhce, justified by schism, sieve, scissor, honour, myrrhe, and 
 sacrifice. 
 
 Shakespeare might be spelled Schaighkespeighrrhe. Sheridan, the anther of an En¬ 
 glish pronouncing dictionary, says: “ Such is the state of our written language that the 
 darkest hieroglyphics, or most difficult ciphers that the art of men has invented, weie 
 not better calculated to conceal the sentiments of those who used them, from those who 
 had not the key, than the srate of our spelling is to conceal the true pronunciation of 
 our words from all except a few well-educated natives.” And Walker, iu the preface 
 to his pronouncing dictionary, says: “ The orthography and pronunciation differ so 
 widely that Dr. Watts and Dr. Jones lay it down as a maxim in their treatises on spell¬ 
 ing that all words which can be sounded different ways must be written according to 
 that mode which is the most distant from the true pronunciation.” 
 
 But, unfortunately, no rule whatever can be made, not even that rule. It is confi¬ 
 dently asserted that there are not oue hundred words in the whole English language 
 that are spelled according to phonetic principles. 
 
 This makes it an effort to the memory to learn the spelling of each word separately, 
 and the following are the results : 
 
 1. It stands in the way of a sound, comprehensive national education. Hence the 
 prevalence of illiterates. 
 
 2. No one is certain how to pronounce a word he has only^een written and never 
 heard spoken. 
 
 3. No one is sure how a word is spelled which he has only heard pronounced, and never 
 seen written. 
 
 4. It throws a barrier in the way of all sound and accurate philological research. 
 
 As confirmation of these principles, in England and Wales (according to the British 
 
 Quarterly Review), in 1846, nearly one-half the people were unable to write their names, 
 and five millions ui able to read their mother tongue. Iu fact, there are at least five 
 years as good as thrown away learning the mass of heterogeneous conventionalities 
 dignified by the name of orthography (the Greek words orthos and grapho ), correct writ¬ 
 ing (?). Heterography has been suggested as a word which would more aptly express 
 it, i. e., various writing. 
 
 If the phonetic alphabet were adopted, these five years would be saved, aud could 
 be devoted to useful science. 
 
 There would also result a uniformity of pronunciation, because all people would write 
 just as correctly as they speak, and we should have the pronunciation of the best authors 
 daguerreotyped for us. Another very weighty consideration is this, the child who is 
 just commencing his education should have something consistent and logical, method¬ 
 ical and philosophical, to employ his mind upon, rather than something without either 
 analogy or system ; for these first impressions have sometimes the power to change and 
 fix the whole bent of the mind. 
 
 It has been demonstrated by actual experiment that children will learn to spell the 
 English language far more correctly, and in one-half the time, by first learning to 
 read in the phonetic way, which can be done iu a few days. 
 
 Dr. Stone, of Boston, proved this several times. 
 
 Iu this matter we of Saint Louis can speak with positive experience. In the fall of 
 1866 the phonetic modification of the alphabet, as invented by Dr. Edwin Leigh, was 
 tried in one of our public schools as au experiment, and the following year it was 
 adopted throughout the public schools of this city, where it has ever since retained its 
 place. By this system the child has a perfectly phonetic alphabet in so far as “ one 
 sound for each character” is concerned, although it violates the third law of Latham 
 in having more than one character for the same sound. Yet, even with this, we find 
 the following advantages in the system, which is still in use with us after ten years : 
 
 1. Gain in time—a saving of one year out of the thtee years usually occupied in 
 learning to call off easy words at sight. 
 
 2. Distinct articulation, the removal of foreign accent and of local and peculiar in¬ 
 tonations. v 
 
 3. The development oflogical power of mind in the pupil. He can safely be taught 
 to analyze a word into its sounds and to find the letters representing them, whereas 
 with the ordinary orthography it is an insult to his reason to assure him that a sound 
 is represented by any particular letter. Hence, analytical power is trained instead of 
 mere memory, from the day of his entrance into school—aud analytic power is the 
 basis of all thinking activity. 
 
 As to the popular dread which lies under the proposed change of orthography, the in¬ 
 troduction of a new language, there would not be so much difference between phonetic 
 print and that ordinarily used now, as there is between the English used now and that 
 of Spenser, and we can read them without much difficulty. 
 
 All foreign names, e. g., geographical names, would then be easily reduced to a cor¬ 
 rect pronunciation, and missionaries could easily reduce unwritten language to writing' 
 a thing which has been tried with a phonetic alphabet with eminent success. 
 
16 
 
 REFORMED ALPHABET AND ORTHOGRAPHY. 
 
 The disuse of silent letters will reduce the bulk of books one-tenth part, and save in 
 the item of books millions of dollars per annum. 
 
 There is another objection brought against the phonetic system, viz: that it would 
 so obscure the etymologies of words as to render it impossible to distinguish them from 
 the words spelled phonetically. But the great philologists depend upon phonetic 
 analysis in their profound investigations into the primitive state of a language ; and 
 the philologist knows that it would be of exceeding value to know that a nation used 
 a phonetic alphabet; for then one could immediately determine the pronunciation 
 which gets lost as the nation changes. 
 
 If a phonetic basis had always been used we could tell now exactly how Shakes¬ 
 peare pronounced his living words, or how Chaucer read his Canterbury Tales. 
 
 But suppose we could not determine the etymology as well as before? Are we to 
 sacrifice all beauty and symmetry in the language ? Are we to consume five years in 
 the life of every youth just to make it easier for one scholar in a thousand men (there 
 are hardly so many as that, even), to save him the trouble of consulting his copy of a 
 dictionary ? But there is no basis of argument here, for plionotypy restores and 
 reveals three analogies of language, where it obscures one. Dr. Franklin, in 1768, 
 favored the idea of a phonetic alphabet, and answered all the objections very 
 plainly in a letter to Miss Stevenson. He says: “ The objection you make to rectifying 
 our alphabet, ‘that it will be attended with inconveniences and difficulties/ is a nat¬ 
 ural one, for it always occurs when a reformation is proposed, whether in religion, gov¬ 
 ernment, or laws, even dpwn to roads and wheel-carriages. 
 
 “The true question, then, is not whether there will be no difficulties or inconvenien¬ 
 ces, but whether the difficulties may not be surmounted, and whether the conveniences 
 w r ill not, on the whole, be g'eater than the inconveniences. In this case the difficulties 
 are only in the beginning of the practice; when they are once overcome, the advantages 
 are lasting. To either you or me, who spell well in the present mode, I imagine the 
 difficulty of changing that mode for the new is not so great but that we might perfectly 
 get over it in a week’s writiug. As to those who do not spell well, if the two difficul¬ 
 ties are compared, viz, that of teaching them true spelling in the present mode, and 
 that of teaching them the new alphabet, and the new spelling according to it, I am 
 confident that the latter would be far the best. They naturally fall into the new 
 method already as much as the imperfection of their alphabet will admit of; their 
 present bad spelling is only bad because contrary to present bad rules ; under the new 
 rules it would be good. The difficulty of learning to spell well in the old way is so 
 great that few attain it, thousands and thousands writing on to old, old age without 
 ever being able to acquire it.” 
 
 Having compiled thus freely from the most respectable and authori¬ 
 tative sources in proof of the great necessity of this reform, and point¬ 
 ing to the numerous learned societies and numberless individuals in this 
 country and Great Britain devoted to the advancement of this cause, 
 allow your memorialist now respectfully to offer a scheme which he has 
 had under consideration for over three years, and which he confidently 
 believes will serve as a basis of reform, at least worthy of consideration. 
 
 It will be observed that I have kept in view some points already re¬ 
 ferred to: 
 
 1. Dr. Latham’s six essential conditions of a perfect alphabet; 
 
 2. That capitals and the small letters should be of the same form ; 
 
 3. That the forms of the letters in both writing and printing should 
 be as nearly alike as the nature of the case will allow; 
 
 4. That the Roman letters should give way to the phonographic; 
 
 5. That while it should be arranged with special reference to the prac¬ 
 tical requirements of the English language, it should also present the 
 basis of a universal or missionary alphabet; 
 
 6. That the present orthography is not likely to become obsolete at 
 once, and therefore the desirability of a phonetic alphabet from which the 
 transition to the ordinary orthography may be as easy as possible. The 
 child having commenced his education by learning this alphabet and ac¬ 
 quiring some idea of the true theoretical relation between the written 
 and the spoken language, the design is to provide a text-book printed in 
 a compound character or type, in which the Roman letter is united with 
 the phonographic, the latter being the more prominent in letters that 
 
REFORMED ALPHABET AND ORTHOGRAPHY. 
 
 17 
 
 should be sounded, and omitted from silent letters in words of the ordi¬ 
 nary spelling ; thus distinctly presenting both the correct pronunciation 
 and the current authorized orthography. 
 
 PHONETIC ALPHABET, 
 
 with a few examples of the compound letter: 
 
 \ 
 
 2 
 
 \ 
 
 3 l 
 
 1 
 
 5 
 
 / 
 
 6 
 
 / 
 
 7 
 
 8 
 
 9 V 
 
 10 
 
 11 
 
 ( 
 
 12 
 
 ( 
 
 “ ) 
 
 “ ) 
 
 15 
 
 y 
 
 16 
 
 17 
 
 18 
 
 19 
 
 20 
 
 21 
 
 r 
 
 22 
 
 r 
 
 23 
 
 > 
 
 24 
 
 25 
 
 0 
 
 26 
 
 0 
 
 27 
 
 Q 
 
 28 
 
 0 
 
 29 
 
 0 
 
 30 
 
 0 
 
 31 
 
 0 
 
 32 
 
 0 
 
 33 
 
 0 
 
 34 
 
 0 
 
 35 
 
 0 
 
 36 
 
 0 
 
 37 
 
 0' 
 
 38 
 
 0 
 
 39 
 
 © 
 
 40 
 
 @ 
 
 41 
 
 . 
 
 42 
 
 0 
 
 43 
 
 © 
 
 “ } 
 
 45 
 
 The powers of these characters are as follows: 
 
 1. The sound of p in pay or cap. 
 
 2. The sound of b in bay, or bb in ebb. 
 
 3. The sound of t in tame , or ed in looked. 
 
 4. The sound of d in dame, or ed in loved. 
 
 5. The sound of eh in chest, or tch in watclu 
 
 6. The sound of j iu jest, or g in gem. 
 
 7. The sound of k in kelt , or c iu can. 
 
 8. The sound of g in gilt, or gue in league. 
 
 9. The sound of /in fan , orjp/i iu phase . 
 
 10. The sound of v in van , or/ in of. 
 
 11. The sound of th in pith, or in think. 
 
 12. The sound of th in thy, or the in breathe. 
 
 13. The sound of s in seal, or c in icy. 
 
 H. Mis. 23-2 
 
18 
 
 REFORMED ALPHABET AND ORTHOGRAPHY. 
 
 14. The sound of z in zeal, or s in was. 
 
 15. The sound of sh in shun, or s in sure. 
 
 16. The sound of z in azure, or s in vision. 
 
 17. The sound of n in no, or Icn in hnow. 
 
 18. The sound of ng in singer, or n in finger. 
 
 19. The sound of m in man, or in 
 
 20. The sound of h in or wh in whole. 
 
 21. The sound of l in lay, or Zw in 
 
 22. The sound of y in you, or e in euchre. 
 
 23. The sound of r in right, or wr in write. 
 
 24. The sound of w in wade. or u in persuade. 
 
 25. The sound of a in arm, or ua in guard. 
 
 26. The sound of a in ate, or ai in pain. 
 
 27. The sound of e in mete, or i in machine. 
 
 28. The sound of a in at, or ai in plaid. 
 
 29. The sound of e in met, or a in many. 
 
 30. The sound of i in pin, or o in women. 
 
 31. The sound of a in fall, or ough in ought. 
 
 32. The sound of o in note, or eau in beau. 
 
 33. The sound of o in prove, or u in rule. 
 
 34. The souud of o in don, or a in ward. 4 A 
 
 35. The sound of u in cup , or o in love. 
 
 36. The sound of u in bull, or oo in foot. 
 
 37. The sound of i in hite, or eigh in sleight. 
 
 38. The souud of ow in cow, or ough in plough. 
 
 39. The sound of oi in boil, or oy in boy. 
 
 40. The sound of ew in new, or eau in beauty. 
 
 41. 42, and 43 equivalent to 1, 2, and 3, respectively. 
 
 44. The sound of c in place, equivalent of No. 13. 
 
 45. The sound of G in Cameron, equivalent of No. 7. 
 
 Since writing the above, my attention has been directed to the follow¬ 
 ing article bearing upon this question, published in one of our most in¬ 
 fluential journals: 
 
 SPELLING REFORM—GREAT MOVEMENT IN ENGLAND TO SIMPLIFY ORTHOGRAPHY—A 
 HUNDRED SCHOOL-BOARDS DEMAND A COMMISSION. 
 
 [London Times, January 19.] 
 
 Yesterday afternoon a very large deputation, representing the Loudon school-board, 
 the Liverpool, the Birmingham, the Manchester, the Leeds, and other school-boards 
 and a conference held in May last of scholars and philologists, waited upon the Duke 
 of Richmond and Gordon and Lord Sandon to urge that their lordships should advise 
 Her Majesty’s Government to recommend the appointment of a royal commission to 
 inquire into the subject of English spelling, with a view to reforming it in the inter¬ 
 ests of education. The London school-board was represented by Sir Charles Reed, Sir 
 John Bennett, Professor* Gladstone, F. R. S., Mr. Freeman, the Rev. Dr. Angus, the 
 Rev. G. M. Murphy, Mr. Heller, Mr. Richardson. Mr. Sidney Buxton ; and among other 
 gentlemen present were Mr. Rathbone, M. P.; Mr. Torr, M. P.; Mr. Backhouse, M. P.; 
 Mr. Pease, M. P.; Mr. H. Richard, M. P.; Mr. Davies, M. P.; Mr. McArthur, M. P.; the 
 Rev. W. Arthur, M. A.; Mr. T. Pagliardini; Dr. Hurley, F. R. S.: Mr. E. Chadwick, C. 
 B.; Mr. E. R. Hill; Dr. R. Morris, &c. 
 
 Sir Charles Reed stated that this large deputation represented school-boards of Eng¬ 
 land and Wales, as well as other bodies interested in the educational progress of the 
 people. In August, 1876, the London school-board passed the following resolutions : 
 
 “(1) That this board is of opinion that a great difficulty is placed in the way of 
 education by our present method of spelling, and that it is highly desirable that the 
 government should be moved to issue a royal commission for considering the best man¬ 
 ner of reforming and simplifying it. 
 
REFORMED ALPHABET AND ORTHOGRAPHY. 
 
 19 
 
 “ (2) That a copy of the above resolution be forwarded to the Society of Arts and the 
 various country school-boards, inviting them to unite in a joint representation to be 
 addressed to the education department on the subject.” 
 
 Upward of 100 school-boards in England and Wales assented to the proposition, but 
 before action could be taken to ask the government to issue a royal commission the 
 board came to an end. Under the new board, in 1877—a board largely composed of 
 new members—the propositions were distinctly reaffirmed, and 131 other school-boards 
 of the country gave their direct assent to the proposals, 69 signing a memorial to be 
 laid before the department. Some boards, such as Birmingham, Bradford, Chigwell, 
 Kingston-on-Hull, and Southampton, had either sent in separate memorials or trans¬ 
 mitted separate resolutions, and a conference of eminent scholars and philologists, 
 meeting at the society of arts, had also concurred in the appeal to the government for 
 an inquiry by royal commission. They came simply to ask for this inquiry, and they 
 begged to point out that the question of reforming the English spelling affected not 
 only this country, but every country where the English language was spoken. This 
 was not brought before the department as a matter of finance, although no doubt it 
 would be a saving to the ratepayers and a saving fb the parents if there were a sim¬ 
 plified spelling. 
 
 Professor Gladstone stated that it was found on comparing the progress made in 
 education by English children with the progress made by children in some continental 
 countries, where spelling was more simple, that the foreign children learnt to read and 
 spell with striking rapidity. If, for instance, the English language had a spelling as 
 simple as the Italian or German, there would be a saving in the school-life of every 
 English child of a year’s time, and this time might be occupied in the technical edu¬ 
 cation acknowledged to be lacking in our artisans. The spelling of English had al¬ 
 ways been changing, as was seen in our literature, and it was a well-founded complaint 
 that various systems were adopted in the country. It was not for the school-board to 
 say which of the systems of spelling should be adopted, or what changes should be 
 made; but they simply asked for an inquiry into the subject, in order to point out a 
 remedy for the present anomalous condition of spelling. 
 
 The Rev. Dr. Angus observed that elementary education, and, to some exteut, higher 
 education, were public questions, provided for by the rates and taxes, and that, there¬ 
 fore, it was a question lor the government whether there should be any factitious 
 difficulties created in the way of education by an imperfect svstem of spelling. Then, 
 too, parents who had hitherto had the control of their children were now forbidden 
 to send their children to work until these children were efficiently educated, and if 
 nothing was done to lessen the difficulties of education the working classes would 
 turn against the pressure now placed upon them. The government, by reason of the 
 examinations under commissioners, had become the examining body of the kingdom, 
 and the rules which the government chose to lay down in regard to spelling would be 
 followed everywhere, so that the government had a distinct power in this matter. 
 The educationalists of the country desired to teach knowledge, and they urged that 
 the acquisition of knowledge should not be barred, as at present, by the anomalous 
 spellings of our language. The difficulties presented by these various spellings were 
 seen in the reports of the civil service commissioners, who stated that a large num¬ 
 ber of failures to pass the examinations were due to spelling, so that this was a proof 
 that rich and poor were alike interested in the settlement of a standard system. 
 
 Dr, Morris drew attention to the points which had come before the meeting of phil¬ 
 ologists. # 
 
 Mr. Ellis read a letter from Prof. Max Miiller, who said, “I fully authorize you to 
 state that I have never changed the' opinions which I expressed in the Fortnightly 
 Review on the scientific aspects of phonetic spelling, and that I am as fully convinced 
 as ever of the advantages of a spelling reform.” 
 
 Mr. H. Richard, M. P., stated that there was a great desire upon the part of the 
 Welsh people to acquire the English language, but they were greatly debarred from it 
 by the arbitrary spelling. 
 
 The Rev. W. Arthur, M. A., and Mr. T. Pagliardini afterward addressed their lord- 
 ships. 
 
 Lord Sandon had to leave before all the speakers had finished, and he expressed him¬ 
 self as greatly interested by what he heard. 
 
 His grace, the president, in reply, said that all present were agreed upon one point, 
 and that was on the very great importance of the question which they had brought, 
 before the department, as one affecting the education of the people of this country. 
 The question was of such great importance and large extent that those represented by 
 the deputation considered it could not be dealt with in any satisfactory way other 
 than by the Crown being advised to issue a commission to inquire into the matter; and 
 so grave a subject was it, and one pregnant with such an amount of difficulty, that 
 the honorable member for Liverpool had guarded himself and the board he represented 
 from venturing to assert that such a change was practicable. This fact would show 
 how considerable and difficult the subject was. The deputation would well understand 
 
20 
 
 REFORMED ALPHABET AND ORTHOGRAPHY. 
 
 that he could not venture to express his own opinion upon the subject, but lie would 
 place fairly before his colleagues the views which had been put before him with great 
 c learness by the speakers. 
 
 Sir Charles Reed, in thanking the minister, observed that the Liverpool school-board 
 had signed the memorial of the school-board for Loudon, asking for a royal commis¬ 
 sion. 
 
 r ' deputation then retired. 
 
 i- rein contained is presented to excite attention and discussion, 
 >d correction, as an essay toward preparing for future adop- 
 ecessary improvement, in the elements of our swiftly-spread- 
 cerature. 77 
 
 O 
 
 
 
 *