A SCIENTIFIC LANGUAGE.

Auckland Star, Volume XXXI, Issue 156, 27 October 1900, Page 2 (Supplement)

A SCIENTIFIC LANGUAGE.

;Is an international language possible? M.> Leon Bolak, of France, thinks it is. Undaunted by the failure, of Yolapuk, Spelin, and about a score of others, to neutralise the Tower of Babel, he has produced and laid at the feet of an astonished world "The Blue Language." •: It is named after the sky, because, as M. Bolak tells us, "the fondest wish o£. ; the author is that his method may be chosen in order to realise the dream of humanity anxious for concord, and therefore he has given to his work the name of the very colour of the firmament."

It is also called Bolak, after the inventor. ; • \

The new language lays no preposterous claim to euphony or literary form. Moreover,, it does not worry about anything but the simplest wants of international humanity. The word for "heart" is "kor," which is easily re-cognised-by Frenchmen and Englishman, as well as by any other person who knows Latin. The /word for "game*' is "spil," which a German recognises at once, as does alsio anybody who has heard of their "Kriegspiel."

The, shades of meaning are obtained by tacking on to the words single letters or little syllables, to each of which the inventor assigns "a definite signification." Thus the B'olak for. "love" is. "lov"; "alov" means "indifference," the prefix "a" always implying "absence of"; "lova" means to love; "vintumily" means "windmill"; "vatihnily" means'1 "watermill"; "danfumily" ineanSA "steam mill." That, seems happy? b\it "Mcl venson dovis gab" for the number 1126 seems a trifle roundabout.

These little snippets of syllables you have to learn by heart. Owing tip the dear old law of permutations and combinations "their significations," as M. Bolak tells .us, "have been created somewhat arbitrarily." ',"'■

There ;are only nineteen letters in theßßlur alphabet,, and each represents only one sound." Moreover, each of the Blue sounds is represented by one letter and nJo other.

tM. Bolak has been considerate enough to invent only one hew letter. It is like an "h" turned upside down, and it is pronounced "teh," as you do in sneezing. The Blue spelling is phonetic, and Blue i's need not be dotted nor blue t's crossed. On the. other hand, M. Bolak has unfortunately been compelled to invent eight new parts of speech.

He has forgotten nothing, not even certain Masonic signs for use by Blues. If you are writing you draw a circle with a cross in it, something like this: "Bill Stumps^ his mark."- If you are face to face to you put your first and second fingers behind your ear. That means that yiou understand two longua.g§s, your own. and the Blue.