Proof-readers as a clas ar, by the nature and demands of their calling, the best spellers of English. The training responsible for their expert skil in this particular has been gaind as craftsmen in printing-offices, and not as students in universities. The more intelligent the proof-reader, the les likely he would be to claim that his frequent occasion to correct the misspellings of eminent scolars, sientists, and authors, stampt him as their superior in information, education, or general culture.
Reasonable Spelling of Other Languages
If English spelling wer as nearly fonetic as Italian, Spanish, or even German, the scool-child would soon perciev that spelling was governd by certain laws, by observing which he could pronounce correctly the words he met in writing or print, and could spel correctly the words that he heard spoken. The spelling-lesson would thus encourage him to rely on reason rather than on memory in his other studies also.
It is not claimd that the simplifications so far proposed by the Simplified Spelling Board wil make English spelling comparable in simplicity and regularity with Italian, Spanish, or German; but the Board maintains that to introduce the teaching of simplified spelling, even at its present stage, into the public scools would, nevertheless, make the spelling-lesson an aid to the development of the child's reasoning powers.
The new spellings so greatly extend many of the simpler analogies, abolish so many of the complex analogies of the present spelling, and do away with so many misleading silent letters, as materially to reduce the existing irregularities, and to emfasize them as such.
