50 Transaction*. — Miscellaneous. 



The first-named reason has probably been the cause of all 

 tbe rest. The child is taught that a = ar; no broad a is taught. 



e = i, or German ie. 



i is a diphthong = ai. 



o, as in other European languages : but in practice has 

 several sounds. 



u, also a diphthong = iu. 



y = uai. 



Thus we find three diphthongs represented by i, v. and y ; 

 three diphthongs in six letters. No other European language, 

 that I know of, represents diphthongs by vowels. It is un- 

 fortunate that the broad a is not represented in the English 

 alphabet, the child being taught that a — ae ; the con- 

 sequence is that in these days of education ae is rapidly 

 taking the place of a. I lately heard a newsboy iu London 

 calling " Staendard." I find bass (fish), in the West of England 

 called baess. At a meeting of a scientific society, I heard basalt 

 called baesaolt. I was almost tempted to ask whether the lecturer 

 was talking about bay-salt. It is a curious fact that when the 

 letter a appears twice in an English word it is rarely pro- 

 nounced the same way in both instances. One letter is a, 

 the other ae: as in passage, passaeye : facilitate, facilitaete. Often 

 the change goes in the other direction. Thus we hear Garibaldi 

 called Garibaoldi ; Gibraltar, Gibraoltar : Malta, Maolta : malt, 

 maolt ; halt, haolt. 



The introduction of French sounds into a Teutonic language 

 has made great mischief. These in question are non-phonetic, 

 and un suited to the character of the English language. Thus, 

 in French we have mats = mes, tais = tes ; and we have in- 

 troduced the same sound into English, as in tail, which to 

 adapt to Teutonic spelling we should write tael : tailor, taelor ; 

 nail, nael ; sail, sael. 



Then au in French is sometimes equal to o, and at others 

 to ao : as Pan = Po, manvais = move, viator = moor. We find 

 the latter sound in English in Paul, maul, fund, &c. ; whereas, 

 phonetically, we ought to employ av to stand lor such words as 

 ov in how, and so accommodate to Teutonic spelling. 



On the other hand, we have such French words as invite, 

 divide, to which we have given English sounds. How to deal 

 with them is one of the most puzzling things in spelling re- 

 form. If the spelling is altered phonetically, it takes the word 

 away from its derivation ; and the question is, whether a 

 change back to the French sound can be brought about. 



Then we have from the French the words ending in Hon, such 

 as attention, promotion. The French sound of Hon is peculiar, 

 something between sion and siong. The English shorten this 

 into shun, which hideous termination the spelling reformers pro- 

 pose to adopt. I am inclined to say with Lord Melbourne. 



