SPELLING REFORM.

Lyttelton Times, Volume CXXIII, Issue 15923, 8 May 1912, Page 3

SPELLING REFORM.

TO TUB EDITOR. Sir, —Knowing that your hospitable columns are always open for the discussion of any question tending to advance human knowledge, may 1 ask for a little space to {Joint out how the appalling ignorance of the lower classes may bo partly remedied by the adoption of a sensible, scientific system ol' spelling our mongrel language? X have recently witnessed so much unnecessary difficulty amongst children in trying to assimilate our absurd orthography that I am constrained to point out that phonetic spelling would save two or thrro years of hard mental work to our children in committing to memory the various combinations of hieroglyphics that constitute our written language. The timo thus saved could ho more profitably employed in acquiring other branches of useful knowledge, so that a youngster on leaving school at fourteen would be as well equipped mentally as a youth now is at a secondary school. That this is no vain prophecy to prop up a belief in spelling reform has been proved over and over again when the svstems were tested side by side. ' Why should we be for ever slothfully content to spell words" in the fantastic style of Queen Anne, and force the rising generation to strain unnecessarily their young minds in memorising the cumbrous and irrational peculiarities of orthodox orthography? Why, for example, should “ beauty ” and “duty” bo spelt in such widely different ways; and why should we think that “ buty ” and “ deauty ” look illiterate and vulgar? Wlia.t earthly reason can there be for spelling “tongue” and “lung” in such dissimilar fashion, instead of following the shorter and easier plan of the latter word?

Whv should we put a “b ” in“doutt” and “lamb” blit not in “shout” or “lia-m”? Why have a large assortment of words, such as “ write,” “wright,” “rite,” “right,” when we pronounce them fill alike? If the context show's the meaning when speaking, would it not do so when writing? We havo indeed altered “ fyssho ” and “shippe” to shorter and more sensible, forms, but why cannot we .similarly improve thousands of other words that no more correctly represent the spoken words than the Chinese gridiron marks do? We should remember tho years of pain fill study we ourselves passed through in early life, and do what wo can to save posterity from tho same useless martyrdom.

The only possible objection to spelling reform is a childishly sentimental assertion that the history of tho w'orld is preserved in the .present clumsy methods but as this object can bo better achieved in a dictionary.we should be practical and save our children and ourselves from spending valuable time in trving to solve, tho ridiculous orthographic conundrums wo meet in readin a English. If any of your numerous readers would ltnow more of tho system of spelling reform now advocated by some of the hivliest educated authorities, they should apply to the Simplified Spelling Society, 44. Great Russell Street, London, W. o.—l am, etc.. MAUD CAMPBELL. Leeds, March 27, 1912.