ESPERANTO.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume XLVII, Issue 81911, 24 December 1906, Page 2

ESPERANTO.

To the Editor. Sir, —You evidently <lo not yet agree with Sir Joseph Ward us to our need of an international language, nor do you consider Esperanto easier to loam than any other language. Well, Sir the Premier's one and only experience of the cumbrous menus by which delegates at an International Congress try to understand each other lias convinced him that an international lan guage in our present day relations with foreign countries is just as much a necessity as international postage, or weights and measures As to the case with winch Esperanto can be learned I do not think from my two years' acquaintance with it, that the Premier exaggerated when he said that it could be learned in six months. The average sixth standard boy or girl in that time would be almost as much the master of it, as hit own English which is never learned. Of course, to a linguist the learning of it would be but a trifle, because he would already know the root words of Esperanto in some form or other. For instance, an Auckland professor of languages in a letter to the paper, said that he was able to read it in 15 minutes. That surely is a record. Tolstoi comes a long way behind. It took him 2 hours to read it. Just a word or two, as to its growth. It apparently was introduced into England in IDU2, for one group or Society was formed in November of that year at Ivcighley, in 11)03, 0 others were formed 1!)04, 14 in 1!)05, this year 30. These figures only refer to those societies alliliated to the British Esperanto Association. From the cities of the South American Republic, to Ykulivostock and other cities of the far Hast, groups are formed and Esperanto propaganda magazines are published, besides the special organs, such as "Espero X'acifisto," the organ of the Peace Party; "Espero Katolika," in the interests of Catholicism, the "Foto ltevus" and the Intermacia Science Kevuo," and others such as the "Internationalist Socialist lleview" will be published in the near future. Such evidence of growth ought to satisfy even Professor Von Zedlitz, who apparently thinks everyone ought to be able to swim before going into water and everyone should know Esperanto before it is taught in schools, although it is being taught in some of the London public schools. While I am able to read and understand a letter or written by Finn Austrian, or Bolivian, just as easily as from any of my New Zealand friends, it will take more than a professor to convince me of the uselessness of Esperanto.—l am, etc., C. PARISH..

[Our correspondent is in error. We did not question the utility of an international language. We simply questioned the wisdom of adding Esperanto to oi(r already overloaded primary school syllabus.—Ed,]