326 Mr. Upington on Short-hand-Writing. 



act the descending tendency of our short-hand words, I allotted 

 to the letter L, which is the sixth letter on the " scale of oc- 

 currence." And to the letter K, which is only the eleventh upon 

 the scale, I allotted the less simple though at the same tune 

 the more lineal [or level] one. 



The question then was. How should the three remaining 

 right lilies be appropriated? Apparently to the three first 

 letters NTS. 13ut here all fixed rules of brevity gave way 

 in some trifling degree to convenience. In our language there 

 are frequently so many repetitions of N and S to be Ibund in 

 the same word, that lineal [call them horizontal] characters 

 are desirable for both ; and therefore to N I assigned the most 

 eligible of the simple curves w ; and to S * the horizontal 

 line — . 



T was provided for by the perpendicular | ; and R (the 

 fourth letter of the scale) obtained the ascendingf diagonal /. 



Three additional curves were now to be disposed of; one of 

 which, viz. ), I bestowed upon the succeeding letter D. L was 

 already formed. Th and F were passed over for reasons I 

 shall immediately adduce. M obtained another of those 

 curves, viz. the lineal [horizontal] one --^ ; while the remain- 

 ing one ( being in many cases very inconvenient for junction 

 with preceding characters, was assigned not to P [K was al- 

 ready disposed of], but to the following letter B, which occurs 

 somewhat oftener than P as an incipieiit, but far less frequently 

 than P as a subsequent. 



I now return to Th and F. Th (which I shall almost ba- 

 nish as an intermediate, and express by T aspirated when 

 necessary,) is the second letter on our scale as an incipient. 

 To /;; then I assigned the most suitable of the third class or 

 hooked characters, viz. '\ , or at option |" . These charac- 

 ters, though swift, and convenient as iticipients, are in many 

 cases exti-emely difticult of precise execution as ijitermediates. 



F, although a little superior to M on the scale of occur- 

 rence, obtained the remaining :f hooked characters v— = r— ; 

 which characters, notwithstanding the peculiar combinations 



* As the conjunction " a«rf" shall hereafter be represented by an ai-hi- 

 trary; and as the letter Sli is to be expressed by aspirated S ; the difference 

 between N, otherwise =1000, and S =762, will be so diminished, that, in 

 order to avoid some awkward turns, I conferred the horizontal line upon 

 the letter S in preference to N. 



■\ Although N has been reduced in brevity by the assignment of a curve 

 in place of a right line ; yet R, to which this curve should otherwise have 

 fallen, has been consequently increased. Therefore the actual loss sustain- 

 able is infinitely less than the superficial observer may suppose. 



:j: I say " remaining, ' in consequence of my having expunged as general 

 letters (for the prevention of crabbed turns and difficult angles) the hooked 

 chaiacters descending to the right. 



of 



