Chapter I: Part 1

_Questions at Issue in
Our English Speech_

_Edwin W. Bowen, Ph.D._

_Author of
“Makers of American Literature”_

_Broadway Publishing Company_
_PUBLISHERS AND BOOKSELLERS_
_835 Broadway, ⁂ New York_

Copyright, 1909

BY

EDWIN W. BOWEN, Ph.D.

_All Rights Reserved_

_ACKNOWLEDGMENT_

_Practically all the matter in this collection of essays has been printed elsewhere. Four of the articles, “A Question of Preference in English Spelling,” “Authority in English Pronunciation,” “What Is Slang?” and “Briticisms versus Americanisms,” first appeared in the “Popular Science Monthly” and are here reproduced with the kind permission of the editor of that journal. The paper, “Vulgarisms with a Pedigree,” is rewritten from three brief essays on allied themes which were published in the “Atlantic Monthly” and the “North American Review.” The essay on “Our English Spelling of Yesterday--Why Antiquated?” is reprinted from the “Methodist Review.” I wish here to thank the publishers of these periodicals for permission to reprint._

CONTENTS.

PAGE

Our English Spelling of Yesterday. Why Antiquated 1

A Question of Preference in English Spelling 25

Authority in English Pronunciation 38

Vulgarisms With a Pedigree 60

Briticisms Versus Americanisms 82

What is Slang? 108

Standard English. How it Arose and How it is Maintained 130

OUR ENGLISH SPELLING OF YESTERDAY--WHY ANTIQUATED?

There is a marked distinction between spoken and written language. In writing a system of conventional symbols is adopted to represent speech. At best such a system is ill-devised and incomplete. In many cases, as in our own tongue, the written language fairly bristles with innumerable inaccuracies and inconsistencies and with flagrant absurdities of orthography. Of course the written language is only an imperfect attempt to represent graphically the spoken speech and is a mere shadow of the real substance, of the living tongue. No system of symbols has been adopted which represent with absolute accuracy and adequacy a spoken language at all periods of its history. It is a matter of extreme doubt whether any living language is now, or ever has been, represented by its alphabet with absolute accuracy and precision. It is quite probable that no living European tongue is today represented by its alphabet with more than approximate accuracy and completeness. As for the dead languages, like the classics, we may be reasonably certain that neither the Greek nor the Latin alphabet correctly and adequately represented those respective languages at all periods of their history. The body of Latin literature now extant is but a desiccated, lifeless mummy of the living, pulsating speech which was heard upon the lips of the ancient Romans. Of that robust and vigorous Latin vernacular, as employed by Cicero and Virgil in all its purity, we have only embalmed specimens, preserved to us in the stirring rhetorical periods of that prince of Roman orators and in the stately rhythmical hexameters of that famous Mantuan bard. _Quantum mutatum ab illo_--how unlike the spoken language, how unlike the burning eloquence which used to thrill the populace in the ancient Roman Forum! Small wonder we are accustomed now to speak of the tongue of the ancient Roman and of the tongue of the ancient Hellene as a “dead language,” for those noble tongues perished, truly, centuries ago, when they ceased to be spoken by the inhabitants of Rome and Athens respectively.

However, the classics are not the only “dead languages.” There is a sense in which some of the modern languages may be said to be “dead.” Even our own Saxon tongue, which good King Alfred employed in all its pristine purity both in conversation and in the translations which he made for his people, is practically as “dead” as Latin or Greek, inasmuch as it is no longer possible for us to think in terms of the Anglo-Saxon or to speak with the accents and sounds of that rugged, unpolished idiom. Indeed, the speech of Chaucer and even of Shakespeare, no less than that of King Alfred, is to all intents and purposes a “dead” tongue to the English-speaking people of the twentieth century, for we no longer employ the idiom and the sound values then current. We have the language of those times, it is true, preserved in the works of Chaucer and in our rich literary heritage from the Elizabethan age, but the speech of those times--the vernacular spoken by the mellifluous-tongued and myriad-minded Shakespeare, no less than that employed by that “verray perfight gentil knight,” Chaucer--is no longer heard upon the lips of the users of English and may therefore be said to be “dead.” These authors have left us a photograph more or less faithful and true, though not a speaking likeness, of the English language then existent. How our English vernacular has changed ever since the days of the famous virgin queen, not to mention the more radical changes of the far-remote days of the ill-starred Richard II! A spoken language is constantly changing. It grows and develops, or languishes and decays, upon the lips of those who employ it as their mother-tongue, now incorporating into itself new expressions and idioms and now casting off such as are old and worn out. But it is no easy matter to fix its ever-shifting, kaleidoscopic form, or to determine its chameleon color. The spoken language is modified by each speaker who uses it as a medium for the communication of his thoughts and feelings. The words which a man employs to convey his thoughts to his fellow man have not an absolute and unvarying significance. They have only a relative meaning, not a rigid and definite signification, which is essential in the nature of the term, and they express only the ideas which the writer or speaker puts into them. The same word, as is well known, has entirely different meanings in different passages or is employed in different senses by the speaker. Hence a prolific source of ambiguity in language. In the last analysis words are only conventional signs which mean whatever the speaker and hearer agree to make them mean. Striking illustration of this fact is furnished by our current social phrases, as Professor Kittredge points out in his “Words and their Ways in English Speech.”[1] Such conventional phrases as “Not at home,” “Delighted to see you,” “Sorry to have missed you when you called” are familiar everyday expressions which have no essential fixed meaning. To be sure, they mean what their face value imports, but they are generally regarded as merely polite forms--etiquette--nothing more.

Furthermore, the sounds which constitute words have to be learned by the tedious process of imitation, and in this very process the sounds are modified to a greater or less extent. In childhood--in fact, in infancy--we begin the slow and painful process of acquiring a vocabulary to express our ideas and we continue the work till death, ever imitating more or less closely the habits of speech of those about us. Thus language is modified perhaps without conscious effort, upon our part. By careful speakers the purity and the propriety of our speech are safeguarded. On the other hand, our language is corrupted and debased by those of careless and slipshod habits of utterance. In any case, however, whether upon the lips of the cultured and refined or upon the lips of the untutored and ignorant, the language is constantly undergoing modifications for better or for worse. Since it is true that a spoken language is ever changing and never remains fixed, how great and far-reaching must be the modification and change which our own English speech has undergone during the many generations of its history! Because our written language has experienced comparatively little alteration since the invention of printing, it does not follow that the spoken speech has remained constant and unchanged from century to century. Indeed, nothing is farther from the truth. But even our written language has been subjected to some minor alteration and slight modification since the days of Caxton, reputed the first English printer. Spoken English, which is the real, living language, has undergone infinite change during the last five centuries, and has diverged more and more from the idiom of Chaucer and Caxton, so that it is today almost an entirely different tongue. English orthography never has kept pace with the written language. Before the invention of printing our spelling failed to reflect the modifications which took place in the pronunciation of our tongue and the printing press served to establish and stereotype the conventional spelling then in vogue, which the characteristic conservatism of the Anglo-Saxon race has ever since preserved in its crystallized, fossilized form.

The printing press, therefore, is largely responsible for our inconsistent, archaic and unphonetic English orthography. When printing was introduced into England, such bewildering confusion and signal want of uniformity prevailed in writing and speaking the vernacular that expediency and business exigencies alike suggested a modification of our received spelling, and soon an imperative demand for simplicity and uniformity was felt among the printers. In response to this demand, and in order to facilitate the labor of the compositor and reader, a conventional mode of spelling was adopted and put into general use by the printers. Thus English orthography was taken from the direct control of the intellectual class who wrote books, and was turned over to a mechanical class who simply printed books. The intellectual class strove to make the spelling of our tongue conform to the pronunciation. With this object always in view English orthography was permitted a wide variation. A writer, therefore, enjoyed considerable latitude and freedom of choice and was untrammeled by the binding authority of tradition or convention. The mechanical class who undertook to establish our spelling for us at the same time that they printed our manuscripts experienced serious difficulty in their effort to represent an ever-varying orthography. Above all things they aimed to reduce English orthography to some uniform notation, and at length they achieved their purpose. Thus uniformity in our spelling was secured, but at the sacrifice of accuracy and precision; for the conventional orthography adopted by the early printers in England was by no means scientific or accurate even at the time of its adoption, and no attempt was made later to make the received orthography adequately reproduce the pronunciation. Consequently there arose a wide divergence between written and spoken English. Not the least important result is the loss of knowledge we have sustained as to how successive past generations of Englishmen spoke the vernacular. The result, which is obvious to everyone and frequently an embarrassment to some, is the innumerable obstacles which our archaic and inconsistent orthography necessarily places in the way of those of the present generation who have to learn English.

Sometimes, indulging in a little persiflage, we point with pardonable pride to the great achievements of our race and descant upon the marvelous beauty and flexibility of our noble English speech. We glory in the fact that “we speak the tongue that Shakespeare spoke,” although we may not hold the faith and morals which Milton held. We look with leniency upon such an oratorical or poetic utterance as a harmless effusion of patriotic sentiment. Yet how few really are those who today know the tongue that Shakespeare spoke! Because we speak the vernacular we take it for granted, as a matter of course, that we speak the language and employ the idiom of Shakespeare, little reflecting how different our present-day English sounds from Elizabethan English. Very few persons, indeed, have an accurate knowledge of Shakespearean English. Our speech has taken a long step in advance since the halcyon days of Queen Elizabeth, and it is a far cry from the twentieth century to the sixteenth century English. Perhaps it is not wide of the mark to affirm that not one person in a thousand of those using English as their mother tongue could today understand a play of Shakespeare if read with the author’s own accent and pronunciation. Spoken with the original sound values, in accordance with authorized usage at the time of its production, the play of Hamlet would seem to us today a foreign tongue. With the words of Shakespeare’s plays according to our present fashion of pronunciation we are quite familiar, but we know no more how the master dramatist would have uttered them, as Ellis observes in his “Early English Pronunciation,”[2] than we know how to write a play in his idiom. The speech of Shakespeare has long since departed from us; and if acquired today, it must be acquired as a new tongue at the cost of untold study and unstinted toil. It would be necessary to delve into Elizabethan antiquities and consult contemporary authorities on English pronunciation in order to determine the accepted values of English sounds then in use and reproduce the vernacular of that remote age. This would involve a vast deal of patient labor and generous study, and even at this costly price we could only hope to ascertain Shakespeare’s speech with approximate accuracy of detail. So far has our spoken English today left behind the written English of the Elizabethan age.

Were it a physical possibility, it would be equally instructive and interesting to hear our English tongue uttered with the characteristic accents and sounds of each successive period of its history from the age of King Alfred to the Victorian era. What a vast and striking difference there must be registered between the received pronunciations of these several periods, embracing a lapse of time of well-nigh ten centuries! How they gradually shade into each other as the colors of the prism! History records a wide divergence of the speech of King Edward VII from that of King Alfred, and yet both of these are but extremes of the same English language which has enjoyed an unbroken continuity of development through so many centuries. How different our language must have sounded upon the lips of the leading English men of letters from Chaucer, Wickliffe, Langland, and Spenser, on down to Dryden, Milton, Pope, and Addison! When we speak of the English speech of a given period in the past, we naturally think of the pronunciation as being uniform all over England. We assume without sufficient warrant that there was a standard of pronunciation that prevailed throughout England in those remote times, just as there is a recognized standard, with but slight variation, that prevails in England and America at the present day. However, even today there is no absolute standard of pronunciation. An absolute, definite English orthoëpy does not exist in reality; it is only a phantom, a figment of a precisian imagination without a counterpart in nature. We use the phrase for convenience, to be sure, but there never has been any such thing as an absolute standard of pronunciation in English, and is not now. The nearest approach to it is a linguistic ideal to which the users of our English speech aim, with more or less conscious effort, to make their pronunciation conform.

Still, the educated pronunciation of England and America comes much nearer to a common standard today than was ever the case before in the history of the English language. In Elizabethan times the usage of London and the Court did not prevail throughout the various shires of England, where the pronunciation was somewhat provincial. The tendency of English pronunciation in modern times has been toward uniformity. But in the thirteenth, fourteenth, and fifteenth centuries it is almost a straining of the meaning of words, as Ellis truly remarks, to talk of a general English pronunciation. In those good old days there was no received standard of pronunciation in England, and every man was free to speak English according to his own sense of propriety. Indeed, prior to the age of Chaucer not only was there no standard of pronunciation, but there was no acknowledged standard of literary English. There were various provincial dialects and also a Court dialect, but none of these was of sufficient influence to triumph over the rest and to compel universal imitation and adoption. After the Elizabethan age local usage in the matter of English pronunciation declined steadily, and the standard of the metropolis gradually commended itself, with increasing influence, till it spread more or less completely over the entire country. Consequently at the time of the rise of the pronouncing dictionary, in the eighteenth century, when the great middle class had begun to attain to prominence, provincial pronunciation fell into disrepute, and people everywhere clamored for a guide to Court usage in the matter of English orthoëpy. From that time to the present there has been a close approach to uniformity of utterance in our English speech. But in the very nature of things there cannot, of course, be a standard pronunciation without absolute uniformity of utterance, and it need hardly be remarked that this does not exist. Nevertheless, the influence and dominance of the pronouncing dictionary are clearly in the direction of a standard pronunciation and have made possible the existing approach to that end. It is quite remarkable how potent the influence of the pronouncing dictionary is upon English pronunciation.[3] Despite the fact that such an orthoëpic authority is at best arbitrary, and somewhat artificial, it has enjoyed a kind of undisputed supremacy since the days of Dr. Johnson, the literary autocrat of the eighteenth century; and its tyranny seems not yet ended. For the English-speaking world still defers to the authority of the pronouncing dictionary and to that extent is under its thrall and has not the courage to challenge it and to assert its own independence in matters of orthoëpy.

Prior to the eighteenth century the pronouncing dictionary was unknown. It therefore cannot boast the authority of a long antiquity. There were, however, certain guides to correct orthoëpy even in those early times, at least in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. There are preserved to us certain records of contemporary orthoëpists which throw light upon English pronunciation in those remote times. We are not therefore left to conjecture simply in this matter. These authorities, to be sure, leave much to be desired in any disputed question of our early pronunciation. Their descriptions of the accepted orthoëpy of their respective centuries as well as their graphic representations of the English sounds are far from lucid, and they sometimes make confusion worse confounded. Some of the orthoëpists were content to refer to Latin, Greek, or Hebrew sounds as a standard of comparison for English pronunciation, sublimely unconscious of the fact that the older pronunciation of these languages is not yet established to the satisfaction of all scholars and that the modern pronunciation varies with different countries. Others of them used key words the value of which it is extremely difficult to determine definitely. Others again refer to such unstable standards of comparison as contemporary French and Italian. Yet, amid the endless confusion and apparent conflict of these incomplete records, that eminent authority on our English speech succeeded, by dint of his laborious erudition and untiring patience, in solving the numberless difficulties with which the question of our early pronunciation was beset. By this achievement Mr. Ellis placed the world of scholars under lasting obligation by determining for us, with approximate accuracy, the successive values of our early English sounds down to the age of the pronouncing dictionary. Let Mr. Ellis give us in his own words a summary of his arduous investigation. “The pronunciation of English during the sixteenth century,” says he, “was thus rendered tolerably clear, and the mode in which it broke into that of the seventeenth century became traceable. But the seventeenth century was, like the fifteenth, one of civil war, that is of extraordinary commingling of the population, and consequently one of marked linguistic change. Between the fourteenth and the sixteenth centuries our language was almost born anew. In the seventeenth century the idiomatic changes are by no means so evident, but the pronunciation altered distinctly in some remarkable points. These facts, and the breaking up of the seventeenth into the eighteenth century pronunciation, which when established scarcely differed from the present, are well brought to light by Wallis, Wilkins, Owen, Price, Cooper, Miege, and Jones, followed by Buchanan, Franklin, and Sheridan. It became, therefore, possible to assign with considerable accuracy the pronunciation of Spenser, Shakespeare, Milton, Dryden, and Pope, or rather of their contemporaries.”[4]

In the English language there is manifest a tendency for the pronunciation to conform to the orthography. Our pronunciation seems to be more a matter of the eye than of the ear. By this is meant that the spelling of an English word exerts an appreciable influence upon its pronunciation. We feel, somehow, instinctively that the spelling ought to be an index, perhaps a reasonably trustworthy guide to the pronunciation of a word. It seems not in keeping with the eternal fitness of things, certainly contrary to our linguistic instinct and opposed to the genius of our English speech, for pronunciation to be entirely dissociated from orthography. We feel that the sound should be forever and inseparably wedded to the writing, and our linguistic sense is more or less shocked when the two are divorced. Especially is this sentiment prevalent in America. What else could have prompted the slight modification in the writing of such words as _favor_, _honor_, _neighbor_,[5] etc., where American usage has seen fit to make a departure from the time-honored British usage in discarding the silent letter? Of course, as far as orthography is concerned, there is very little difference between American and British usage. In America we aim to pronounce more nearly as we spell. Yet even in American English the pronunciation is occasionally divorced from the spelling, particularly in proper names, but in British English this feature is still more noticeable, and, no doubt, American usage in this particular is simply to be regarded as a concession to British authority and custom.[6] For there appears to be no general principle governing the pronunciation of proper names, the same name being sometimes differently pronounced in different localities. Besides, many of our proper names are direct importations from the mother country and therefore have naturally retained their imported pronunciations. In British usage the pronunciation and spelling are not infrequently at glaring variance, as in _Pall Mall_ and _Cholmondeley_, which may serve as a type of this class of proper names. We might offer _Taliaferro_ as an American Roland for the British Oliver. But where should we find a parallel in American English to the characteristic British _clerk_ and _military_, to cite only two examples of a class of words of which the distinctive usage of the United States and Great Britain is at variance?

Perhaps the true explanation of this variation between British and American usage is found in the fact that America is a new country, and hence tradition here does not carry such binding authority as in the Old World. There the pronunciation has been handed down by word of mouth, from generation to generation, among a people “to the manner born.” Here conditions are much altered. America has a large foreign-born element, and consequently many of the people cannot claim English as their native tongue and are compelled to learn it as a foreign language. Hence they rely, in a measure, upon the spelling to indicate the pronunciation of English, making it a study for the eye quite as much as for the ear. If in democratic America the habits of speech were as thoroughly established as they are in aristocratic England then we should speak the English language without any reference to its orthography. But political conditions have modified our American English somewhat, causing it to vary slightly from British usage. A rise in social rank, which is quite common in the New World though rare in the Old, is frequently marked by a revision of one’s former mode of utterance, especially if your self-made man happens to have come of an obscure and unlettered family.

Assuredly English orthography is no criterion of received pronunciation, either in America or in England. It requires only a moment’s reflection to be convinced how misleading and deceptive is our orthography as a guide to orthoëpy. Foreigners who undertake to learn our tongue are naturally more forcibly impressed with the utter untrustworthiness of this guide. The status of our orthography has been correctly described by a prominent historian of our noble speech. He says, “English is now the most barbarously spelled of any cultivated tongue in Christendom. We are weltering in an orthographic chaos in which a multitude of signs are represented by the same sound and a multitude of sounds by the same sign.”[7] There is no doubt that our spelling is exceedingly unphonetic and unscientific. In our alphabet are only twenty-six characters to represent the multiplicity of sounds which exist in the English language. The utter inadequacy of our imperfect alphabet makes its strongest appeal--albeit mute--in its vowel notation. Here the many distinct vocalic sounds with their gradations in which English abounds must all be represented by five symbols. Add to this that we employ the same orthographic device to indicate quantity. The one vowel symbol _a_, for example, is written to indicate the various divergent sounds heard in the words _father_, _fate_, _fat_, _fall_, _ask_, and _fare_. Likewise the single letter _o_ is employed to represent the diverse gradations of that sound which we utter in the words _floor_, _room_, _frog_, _off_, _note_, and _not_. Again we use diagraphs, such as _ea_, _ee_, _oa_, _ei_, _ie_, etc., to represent a single vowel sound and diphthongs as well. As has been pointed out by Professor Lounsbury, one and the same sound is now represented by _e_ in _let_, by _ea_ in _head_, by _ei_ in _heifer_, by _eo_ in _leopard_, by _ay_ in _says_, by _ai_ in _said_, and by _a_ in _many_.

Furthermore, as a result of the change in the values of English vowel sounds, our vowel notation is no longer accurate. We use the character _a_ to indicate to the eye the vowel quality in _mate_, _sate_, _rate_, _date_, etc., where the sound value, far from being of an _a_ quality, is really a long phonetic _e_. The truth is, all the English vowels have undergone a radical alteration from their primitive values which they had in the early history of our speech, having passed through different stages in the successive periods. It is an interesting chapter in English phonology to trace the tortuous course of a given sound, say _a_, through its various mutations from the Anglo-Saxon period down to the present time. Our vowels, especially, have changed and interchanged to an extent which is simply astonishing. The average scholar who has not made a special study of our English language has absolutely no conception of the radical nature and vast extent of the change and development of English sounds. Take as an illustration our vowel _e_. The early English phonetic _e_ passed through several stages of development and about the seventeenth century came to have the value of a genuine long _i_, as in _ear_, _hear_, _year_, etc. Later, in the nineteenth century, this same sound developed into a diphthong which is its present phonetic value. Of course we speak now of the sound of this vowel, not of the symbol which we employ to represent it to the eye in writing. That is another story, and it illustrates the bungling work of our early English printers. In early times there were several characters in use to represent the vowel, _e_, to wit, _e_, _ee_, _eo_, _ea_, and _ae_. After the printing press was set up in England, for convenience and simplicity, _eo_ and _ae_ were not much employed. But _e_, _ee_, and _ea_ came into general favor, and were established by custom to indicate the vowel _e_ to the eye. However, these symbols were not consistently used in the beginning by the printers, and hence the present confusion in writing. Our consonantal notation shows evidence of as flagrant abuse of symbols and of glaring inaccuracy. Numerous examples might be cited to prove that errors on the part of our early scribes and printers have been stereotyped in our orthography and perpetuated to the present day.

But not all the inconsistencies in our spelling have sprung from the careless work of the early printers. Some are the result of our etymological spelling. For instance, the sound of _s_ in _sure_ we represent by the symbol _ti_ in _motion_, by _sci_ in _conscience_, by _ci_ in _suspicion_, by _xi_ in _anxious_, by _ce_ in _ocean_, and by _sh_ in _shepherd_. It is obviously not fair to charge such an inconsistency as this to the sins of our erring early printers. Still, the early English printers have enough to answer for in corrupting the orthography of our language. They were grossly careless and indifferent, and showed but slight regard for the propriety of English orthography. We are not at all surprised to learn, in view of the gross errors they committed, that they were, for the most part, foreigners--Germans and Dutchmen--who did not use English as their vernacular and who did not, for that reason, know the language thoroughly. “As foreigners,” comments Professor Lounsbury, “they had little or no knowledge of the proper spelling of our tongue”; and he adds that “in the general license that then prevailed they could venture to disregard where they did not care to understand.” The result was the printing press brought chaos into English orthography in the multitude of books which it sent broadcast over the land. Some of the errors, it is true, were corrected subsequently, at the beginning of the eighteenth century, when an effort was made to reform English orthography and adjust it anew to the pronunciation. But many of the incorrect spellings which had meanwhile crept in through the introduction of printing were too thoroughly established by usage to be eradicated. They continue still in English orthography as a lasting monument alike to the crass ignorance and negligence of our early printers and to the arrant pedantry of our early proof readers. Thus our English orthography now in its crystallized state preserves those glaring defects as the amber the insects which, entangled in the liquid, are encased for ever.

It must not be inferred, however, that as soon as Caxton set up his press, English spelling was immediately stereotyped and fixed for all time. It required fully two, if not three, centuries, according to Ellis, for the picturesque diversity and latitude permitted the early scribes to be reduced to the dull, rigid uniformity now established by convention. Experiment after experiment was made by the typographers whose constant and ultimate aim was simplicity. The last radical change was effected by the seventeenth century when the spellings _ee_, _oo_, and _oa_ were adopted by the printers. Even then a fierce struggle in orthography was waged, as, for example, that between _sope_ and _soap_, until the conventional spelling at last triumphed. In the seventeenth century the writing _ie_ for long _e_ as in _brief_, _believe_, _friend_, _chief_, and the like, was finally established after a long and doubtful contest. In early times the spelling vacillated between _frend_ and _freend_, _chef_, _cheef_, and _chefe_; and a scribe could take his choice. But of course the printing press sounded the knell of this orthographic liberty of the individual, and one must spell now according to convention. And if one does not know what this is, he must consult the dictionary.

The seventeenth century witnessed many important, yea, revolutionary, changes in our speech as a result of the social upheaval incident to the civil war. But there was very slight recognition of these in the contemporary orthography. The printers refused to alter the conventional orthography to suit the modifications in the spoken speech, and they threw the weight of all their mighty influence in favor of the traditional spelling and against any sweeping reform. They prevailed; and from that time down to the present they have resolutely discouraged any attempt at extensive revision of our traditional orthography. Hence our historic orthography with its teeming inconsistencies and absurdities has now come to be regarded with a feeling of reverence; and we naturally recoil from any far-reaching reform of it as we would from laying violent hands upon an heirloom which has passed down to us through many generations. We have become accustomed to associate a certain spelling with a certain word, and we do not desire to have this association broken up. We therefore feel like registering a strong and vigorous protest against any proposed reform of a sweeping nature which would disturb our present English orthography, however illogical, archaic, and arbitrary.

To be sure, some of our lexicographers have ventured to introduce a revised spelling here and there. Dr. Johnson essayed this in his epoch-making dictionary, published about the middle of the eighteenth century. Indeed, he foisted not a few absurd and arbitrary orthographies into our language, which have contributed to bring our spelling into disrepute with those who clamor for “fonetic reform.” Let us note some of these. Johnson threw the weight of his authority in favor of _comptroller_ against the older _controller_, although he gave both a place in his dictionary. He likewise harbored _foreign_ and _sovereign_ in his dictionary, leaving the older _forrain_ and _sovran_ to shift for themselves. He adopted _debt_ and _doubt_ with the epenthetic _b_, to the exclusion of the older and correct _dett_ and _dout_. He lent the weight of his influence to establish a misleading and useless _s_ in _island_, which used to be written _iland_. But perhaps he felt that the word was too closely associated in the popular mind with _isle_ for _iland_ to prevail. On the other hand, he retained the old spelling _ile_, which we have discarded for the etymological _aisle_, adding that _isle_ was in his judgment a corrupt writing for _aile_, then also current. His uncertainty as to the etymology of the early English _agast_ led him to write it also _aghast_, which has since triumphed over its quondam rival. He gives the precedence to _delight_, to the utter defeat of _delite_, its erstwhile competitor for popular favor. He rejected the simpler spelling _ake_ for the less familiar _ache_, out of deference to its Greek origin, yet he endeavored to preserve a useless _k_ in _almanack_ and _musick_ and similar words. He made a distinction without a difference in his spelling of the final syllables of such words as _accede_, _exceed_, _precede_, and _proceed_. But it is idle at this distant day to arraign Dr. Johnson on the score of his spelling. Let us therefore dismiss the indictment against his arbitrary orthography. Some of our present authorities on English spelling are not entirely free from reproach in this particular. The truth is, even yet our English dictionaries are not a unit as to approved spelling. We have not yet attained to absolute uniformity in the matter of our orthography. For, according to Ellis, there are still well-nigh twenty-five hundred words in the English language the spelling of which is unsettled and indeterminate. But we experience no serious inconvenience as a result, even if we have no preference as to what dictionary we should follow as a guide. In fact, any dictionary gives us a choice between _worshipped_ and _worshiped_, _traveller_ and _traveler_, _center_ and _centre_, and similar words, in the case of which usage still wavers and is divided almost equally. Some excellent authorities still cling to the etymological spelling of words of classic origin, such as _hæmorrhage_, _diarrhœa_, _æsthetics_, _œconomics_, and _æstivate_, to mention only a few of a large class the spelling of which vacillates. Others, again, sanction this spelling, but throw the weight of their influence on the side of the simpler form. This simply proves that there is some degree of variation even in our accepted orthography. After all there is no fixed standard of English orthography, just as there is no absolute standard of English pronunciation. And yet there is a narrower margin of variation in our accepted orthography than there is in our received pronunciation.

The movement for the reform of English spelling is beginning to engage the attention of the public. The Simplified Spelling Board has already entered upon a campaign which holds out some hope of success. It remains to be seen what practical results will be accomplished. Scholars of acknowledged eminence are lending the influence of their authority to the movement. But there is a mighty wall of bigoted conservatism, to be battered down before a movement so sweeping in its aim and scope as “spelling reform” can make much headway. The history of all similar attempts in the past is not such as to hold out great promise to the present reformers or inspire them with unbounded confidence. Still, intelligent, well-directed and untiring effort ought certainly to be rewarded with a reasonable degree of success, and surely there can be no question that there is room for improvement in our English spelling. If we had such an institution as the French Academy, no doubt the problem would be simplified. The outcome of the present campaign for the revision of our English spelling will be awaited with no little interest.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] See p. 219.

[2] Vol. I, p. 22.

[3] See Authority in English Pronunciation.

[4] Early English Pronunciation, I, p. 26.

[5] See A Question of Preference in English Spelling.

[6] See Briticisms vs. Americanisms.

[7] Professor T. R. Lounsbury, History of the English Language. p. 267.

A QUESTION OF PREFERENCE IN ENGLISH SPELLING.

We little think when we read or write that the words we employ are not precisely the same as those which have been in use in our mother-tongue from time immemorial. We are born into the language, so to say, and the words of our vocabulary we regard as part and parcel of our rich heritage of American liberty. Yet even the words of our English speech, like many of the institutions and customs of our Anglo-Saxon civilization, have a long history back of them, showing traces here and there of the various stages of development they have passed through. The words we use to-day are not identical in form or meaning with those employed by our forebears of the generation of Chaucer or even of the generation of Shakespeare. The forms of our English words have undergone considerable change since that remote period in the development of our mother-tongue. English spelling is far different from what it was in Alfred’s, or Chaucer’s time.

Before the invention of printing, those who spoke and wrote the English language seem to have been at liberty to spell as they chose. Their mental composure was not disturbed by the annoying suspicion that their spelling was not according to the norm prescribed by the dictionary. In those good old days there was no acknowledged criterion such as the “Century,” or “Webster,” or “Worcester”; and writers had no final appeal in the matter of orthography as present-day writers have. Since there was no standard authority on orthography to which all polite society had to conform, the authors of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries were untrammeled by tradition and were free to spell as they pleased. Every writer was a law unto himself and followed the dictates of his own orthographical conscience, with no dictionary to molest or make him afraid. We find an allusion to this delightful sense of freedom in the comment which a well-known American humorist made upon Chaucer, that well of English undefiled from which so many modern writers have drunk copious draughts of inspiration. “Chaucer,” said he quaintly, “may have been a fine poet, but he was a ---- poor speller.”

The diffusion of the art of printing and the consequent necessity for a uniform orthography gradually curtailed this liberty, and then the day of the dictionary dawned. The dictionary is a democratic invention called into being by the rise of the great middle class of society, which desired to become familiar with the practises of polite circles. Lexicographers came forward to supply the desired information. Authors not “to the mannor born,” and therefore unacquainted with courtly usage, when moved to write, felt that they must conform to the standards set up by the lexicographers, who claimed to give the received usage, the _jus et norma scribendi_. Before the epoch of dictionaries it appears not to have made the slightest difference whether a writer spelled the word _recede_, for example, according to the present accepted orthography, or whether he spelled it _receed_, _receede_, _recede_ or _recead_, all of which forms are found in manuscripts of a few centuries ago. Some of these orthographic variations lingered into the eighteenth century, though English spelling had probably become stereotyped at least a century before this date. Yet the establishment of the spelling was naturally a gradual process, and some words vacillated a long time and never really became fixed. Of this more anon. Proper names showed considerable latitude of spelling. Men of the eminence of Spenser, rare Ben Jonson and Shakespeare, for example, are said to have had no fixed practise of spelling their names, but wrote them in a variety of ways.

The lack of a standard authority of orthography necessarily gave rise to much confusion and disorder in English spelling. This confusion is reflected even yet in the present chaotic and unphonetic spelling of our language. Few tongues are more unphonetic than the English. This fact is recognized and efforts have been made to bring our spelling into closer conformity with our pronunciation. Philological societies on both sides of the Atlantic have been trying for the last quarter of a century, at least, to reform English spelling; but only meager success has been achieved thus far.

The proposed reforms have been of two kinds, and they have varying aims. One recommended by the extreme phonetists, is a reform which contemplates a revision and enlargement of our alphabet. This would result in a radical transformation of our written speech, and chiefly for this reason it has found few ardent advocates. It may be briefly described as a reform of the language. The other reform is less revolutionary and contemplates mainly a simplification of our present spelling, such as the omission of silent letters, the substitution of “f” for “ph” as in _phonetics_ (fonetics) and of “t” for final “d” as in _equipped_ (equipt) and similar emendations. Of the two kinds of reform the latter has, manifestly, more to commend it to popular favor. This kind of reform may be termed a reform in the language.

The public concedes the unphonetic character of English orthography, but the conservatism of the Anglo-Saxon race is so binding that the people are slow to adopt even the slightest recommendations of the philological societies. A few American journals have had the courage to adopt certain emended spellings, such as _thru_ (through), _tho_ (though), _catalog_ (catalogue) and the like, but the majority of our periodicals show by their practise very meager approval of spelling-reform. No publisher, so far as known to the writer, has ventured as yet to use the emended spelling in a book issued by his firm. Yet all admit the need of spelling-reform and believe that, if adopted, it would save the coming generation a vast deal of humdrum work in acquiring an accurate knowledge of English orthography.

We Americans, however, with our characteristic spirit of independence have made bold to break away from British tradition and custom in the writing of certain English words and have introduced a few minor reforms in our spelling. But the English people have not followed our lead in this matter, being content to allow our adopted American spelling, together with our distinctive pronunciation, serve as an earmark to distinguish American from British English. It is the practise of some reputable British journals to disparage our spelling, wherever it makes a departure from English traditions, and to refer to it by way of reproach as “American spelling.” Some few years ago the _St. James Gazette_, intending to express its disapproval of our spelling, deprecatingly remarked that “already newspapers in London are habitually using the ugliest forms of American spelling and those silly eccentricities do not make the slightest difference in their circulation.” Viewed in the light of subsequent events, perhaps this ought to be considered as the forerunner of “the American invasion.”

As every one knows who has visited the mother country, there is a perceptible difference not only in the spelling, but also in the pronunciation, between American English and British English. Of course the language is the same in America as in England; and yet there are some appreciable minor points of difference. For example, the Englishman gives the broad sound to the vowel _a_ as in _father_, when it is followed by such a combination of consonants as in the words _ask_, _fast_, _dance_, _can’t_, _answer_, _after_ and the like. In America, on the other hand, while this pronunciation is heard in some circles, it is clearly not the ordinary pronunciation and is not general, as in England. There is also a noticeable difference in the pronunciation of long _o_, the Englishman giving the vowel a distinctive utterance quite unlike that ordinarily heard in America. The pronunciation of the word _been_ is a shibboleth by which a man of British nationality may be almost unfailingly distinguished. The native Englishman pronounces the word so as to rhyme with _seen_, never _bin_. In addition to these points of pronunciation there are certain locutions which never fail to betray an Englishman. The English call an elevator _a lift_, overshoes _galoshes_, napkins _serviettes_, candy _sweets_. In England a baby-carriage is called a _perambulator_, which is generally abridged “_pram_” merely; a lamp-post is known as _lamp-pillar_ and a letter-box as a _pillar-box_. There no one would ask at a store for a wash-bowl and pitcher, however much he might need these useful household articles, but he would call at the shop for a _jug_ and _basin_. An American in London must not say street car, but _tram_ or _road car_; not engine (which is pronounced injin), but _locomotive-engine_; not engineer, but _engine-driver_. In England many ordinary household articles are known by names as different from those in our country as if the language there were altogether a foreign tongue. Small wonder, then, that a keen-witted American maid remarked, _à propos_ of the difference between British English and American English, that London was a delightful place if you only knew the language.

Nowhere is the difference between American English and British English more marked and interesting than in the varying practise of spelling on both sides of the Atlantic. Let us note some of the chief points of variation.

Our British cousins assume an exasperating air of superiority when they mention the matter of our spelling and, as self-appointed conservators of the language, point out what they are pleased to style the offensive eccentricities of American spelling. The British journals ever and anon draw attention to our manner of writing such words as _favor_, _honor_, _center_, _program_, _almanac_, _tire_, _curb_, _check_ and _criticize_ and the like, which they spell _favour_, _honour_, _centre_, _programme_, _almanack_, _tyre_, _kerb_, _cheque_ and _criticise_. Now, in the case of most of these words, we submit that the American spelling is nearer the historical spelling, simpler and more logical than the British method. As for the words typified by _honor_, our method is simpler and nearer to the ultimate etymology. These words, it hardly need be observed, are borrowed from the Latin through the French. The British maintain that for this reason the spelling ought to conform to the French fashion. But they overlook the fact that these words have not always been written in English according to the French manner of writing. Dr. Johnson, the eminent lexicographer of the eighteenth century, wrote _honor_ beside _honour_, _neighbor_ beside _neighbour_, _harbor_ beside _harbour_ and the like. Indeed, the great Cham allowed himself considerable latitude in the matter of English orthography. Moreover, the Norman-French forms of these words were written in a variety of ways, as _our_, _eur_, _ur_, and also _or_. Even on the historical ground, therefore, there is not lacking some authority for the American spelling. If the English were consistent, they would be forced by the logic of their argument to write uniformly _governour_, _errour_, _emperour_, _oratour_, _horrour_ and _dolour_ as well as _honour_ and _favour_. But practise shows their glaring lack of consistency, since they do not spell these words ordinarily with _u_. It ought not to be regarded as a reproach upon American spelling, because in our desire for simplicity and uniformity we have rejected the _u_ in this entire class of words like _honor_, thus making the spelling more in keeping with the Latin derivation. We can at least lay claim to simplicity and consistency. If we are provincial, we can not be charged with arbitrariness in our spelling.

As for the writing of _center_, _meter_, _meager_ and words of this kind, the American method has as much history and logic in its favor as the British spelling has. Analogy, too, if that may be cited as an argument, supports our spelling, for we all write _perimeter_, _diameter_, never otherwise, whether we be American or English. The word _center_, according to Lowell, who was no mean authority on matters pertaining to our speech, “is no Americanism; it entered the language in that shape and kept it at least as late as Defoe.” “In the sixteenth and in the first half of the seventeenth century,” declares Professor Lounsbury, in reference to the spelling of _center_ and similar words, “while both ways of writing these words existed side by side, the termination _er_ is far more common than _re_. The first complete edition of Shakespeare’s plays was published in 1624. In that work _sepulcher_ occurs thirteen times; it is spelled eleven times with _er_. _Scepter_ occurs thirty-seven times; it is not once spelled with _re_, but always with _er_. _Center_ occurs twelve times, and in nine instances out of the twelve it ends in _er_.” John Bellows, in the preface to his excellent French-English and English-French pocket dictionary, states that “the Act of Parliament legalizing the use of the metric system in this country [England] gives the words meter, liter, gram, etc., spelt on the American plan.” It is evident, then, that our way of writing these words is quite as logical and as much warranted by the history of our tongue as the British spelling.

The American orthography is clearly in advance of the British in the word _almanac_. This word is not rightly entitled to the final _k_, as the English spell it. This superfluous letter is a mere survival from a former way of writing, no longer in vogue. It has been rejected in _music_, _public_, _optic_ and similar words which are written alike on both sides of the Atlantic. In Johnson’s dictionary and also in our King James’s version of the Scriptures the old spelling generally occurs. Indeed, Johnson appended the excrescent _k_ to well-nigh all words of this class. Strange to say, there is one word of this class which preserves the _k_ even in American English, and that is _hammock_. This is but an exception which goes to prove that even American English with its revised orthography is still far from being phonetic.

In regard to words ending in _ize_, usage in Great Britain has established the writing _ise_, as in _civilise_. However, new formations even there are usually made to terminate in _ize_, which is generally adopted in America. Yet American spelling sometimes exhibits _ise_, after the English fashion. The British writing is derived from the French, whereas the American harks back to the original Greek suffix. The British spelling of _tyre_, _kerb_, _programme_ and _cheque_ perhaps has as much to commend it as the American _tire_, _curb_, _program_ and _check_. Usage in America varies in the case of _program_, the more conservative still clinging to _programme_. _Tyre_ and _kerb_ are but little employed here. These words are merely variant forms which British usage has adopted. The spelling _cheque_, in general use in Great Britain for our bank check, has resulted through the influence of the word _exchequer_ with which it is connected.

The usual American spelling of _wagon_ is held up to public obloquy by British journalists, who regard _waggon_ as the orthodox orthography. Skeat, who gives both forms in his etymological dictionary, asserts that the doubling of the _g_ is simply a device to show that the preceding vowel is short. In the early history of the language when the etymological spelling was in vogue, pedants had recourse to this method of changing the form of a word to make it phonetic, as they claimed. In point of fact, by their practise they made the language far less phonetic. Spenser and other early English authors write the word after the American fashion. Horace Greeley once made a departure from our American usage and wrote _waggon_, saying by way of apology, when his attention was called to it, that “they used to build wagons heavier in the good old times when he learned to spell.”

It is not to be supposed for a moment, however, that our utilitarian disregard of tradition is so strong as to have eliminated all useless letters in our American spelling. There is many a word in which an epenthetic letter is still retained merely because the traditional spelling shows it. _Sovereign_, _comptroller_, _island_ and _rhyme_ may be cited as examples in point. Perhaps it ought to be added that the emended spelling _rime_ for _rhyme_ appears to be meeting with favor in certain philological circles.