APPENDIX.

THE PRINCIPLES OF SPELLING REFORM.

Accent and Quantity.

The chief accent or stress in each word may be marked by (·) following the letter on which the accent begins:- genst (against), fg·iv (forgive). To indicate the secondary accent, when necessary, (:) may be used:- i:nknv·iinyns (inconvenience), dist:rktb·iliti (destructibility). These very convenient marks were introduced by Mr. Ellis. In practice the accent need only be marked when it is on some other than the first syllable. Thus it need not be marked in foutogræf (photograph).

Unaccented vowels are always shortened. Thus hii in hii gouz (he goes) is much shorter than in it iz hii (it is he), but its vowel is quite distinct from the regular short i in "hit." As this shortening is always implied by the want of accent, it need not be marked: hi gouz would imply that the i was pronounced as in "hit."

Emphasis, or the accent of a word in a sentence as distinguished from that of a syllable in a word, is marked by a (·) before the word. Such subordinate monosyllables as "he," "she," "it," "and," "if," "to," "for," &c., are assumed to be unaccented unless they are marked. We thus distinguish between hii gouz and it iz ·hii, between hii hæz mai buk (he has my book) and it iz ·mai buk not ·hiz (it is my book, not his). Principal words, such as nouns, non-auxiliary verbs and adjectives, which regularly receive a full accent, may be marked in the same way whenever they are made exceptionally emphatic, thus ai ·fg·iv yu indicates that the second syllable of fg·iv is uttered with extra emphasis.


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