324 



[April 5, 



nant v we slioulcl have been spared many useless appendages to words 

 like 7iave, live, etc. 



In the fourteenth century the system of doubling the vowels was resorted 

 to, to indicate length. Since then ck has been substituted for cc or kk, 

 and within memory the k has been dropt in words like music, public, etc. 



Toward the end of the sixteenth century i was largely substituted for y, 

 so common in Caxton. "In fact," says Skeat, "English abounds with 

 such fonetic devices ; no one objects to them so long as they are allowed 

 to remain sporadic, irregular, and inconsistent." 



Says Dr. Murray, " The whole history of written language is the record 

 of such gradual and partial reformation. "We know, for instance, what 

 was done about 1500 bj' the systematic application of ea and ee to distin- 

 guish two sounds formerly both exprest by long e, and the analogous 

 adoption of oa and oo for the two sounds of long o. And the slightest 

 glance at the orthografy of Shakespeare, Bunyan, or a Bible of the seven- 

 teenth century, will show even the most ignorant, what an immense 

 amount of spelling reform has been done since then. Thus, to take at 

 random a single instance, Psalm 106 (forty- eight verses), as printed in 

 1611, differs in 116 spellings from that printed in 1879, and the first chap- 

 ter of Genesis, as now printed, differs in 135 spellings from the same ver- 

 sion as printed in 1611. One hundred and thirty-five differences in thirty- 

 one verses ! tho the same version word for word. Yet there are people — 

 some certainly fools only, but some I fear knaves — who, when spelling 

 reform is mentioned, shriek, ' You are going to alter our language ! ' 

 * * * the fools not knowing, and the knaves pretending not to know, 

 tliat the spelling in which they read these works [Milton, Shakspere, and 

 the Bible] is already a greatly reformed spelling." 



Finally, "In 1883," says the report of the State Commission, "a 

 scheme of partial reform was jointly approved by the Philological Society 

 of England and the American Philological Association, and recommended 

 for immediate use. Those changes were made in the interest of etymo- 

 logical and historical truth, and are confined to words which are not much 

 disguised for general readers. * * * Many propositions have been 

 made for adopting part of these changes." * * * 



Among these is the progressive scheme used by " The Spelling Reform 

 Leag," as follows : 



1. Use the simplified forms allowed by standard dictionaries, as j^roffram, 

 Javor, etc, 



3. Use the Tv/o Words : tho, thru. 



8. Use the Ten Words : tho, thru, "wisht, catalog, definit, hav, 

 giv, liv, gard, ar. 



4. Use the Two Rules : 1. Use/ for ph sounded as /, as in alf abet, fan - 



torn, filosofy, etc. 2. Use t lor d or (d final sounded as t, as in Jixt, 

 tipt, stopt, clast, crost, distrest, etc. 



