146 BROOM ALL : 



in father. When the c ceased to be pronounced and the a ( in 

 father) changed to a (in mate), the letter e was still kept, so 

 that it has now appropriated the office of indicating that the 

 preceding a has the new sound. Precisely the same adapta- 

 tion occurred in the case of /. Thus we now easily distin- 

 guish mat, mate , or niit, mite. 



In German, where somewhat similar phonetic changes 

 took place, the old a [m father ) which became a (in mate) 

 was indicated by adding e, making ae, now usually written a, 

 where the diacritical mark is the remnant of an over-written e. 

 This alphabetic readjustment, then, is by the growth of a new 

 sign, in German a, in English e mute after an intervening 

 consonant. 



Readjustment by a change of spelling is easier and more 

 frequent. It proceeds word by word. Again the illustration 

 may come from a vowel. We have seen how a (m father ) 

 became a (in mate), and / ( in pique) became / (in kind. ) In 

 the same way 00 sounds properly represented by f ^ m many 

 positions became on ( in out ) sounds. Thus, itt, thti, mi, eu, 

 have become out, thou, )iou', cow. liter and utmost retain the 

 old form ut because there the change to oii did not occur. 

 Here the change of sound did not aifect the alphabet. While 

 man}^ u sounds became ou sounds, yet I' was not re-named 

 " On " because the change was not extensive enough. The 

 readjustment was orthographic, not alphabetic. 



Therefore readjustment of letter to sound is always going 

 on, either generally by alphabetic change of name, or specially 

 by orthographic change of this and that word as its spelling 

 becomes more or less unphonetic. The phonetic idea which 

 underlies the alphabet and proper spelling is alwaj^s urging 

 the change. Traditional learning, conscious of literaiy forms 

 handed down to us, is always opposing the change. The first 

 would spell vittles, and the latter victuals. 



Perfectly phonetic writing and fixed forms of spelling are 

 inherently inconsistent. To be phonetic, each act of writing 

 must iie an original representation of sounds according to the 



