St. Nicholas/Volume 32/Number 1/Papa's Way of Spelling

by Ida L. McIntosh

Papa’s Way of Spelling.

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By Ida McIntosh.

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I ’m having such a dreadful time  At learning how to spell! You see, I ’m just a little girl  And can’t do very well.I ’ve been lo school for two months now, And so some words I know;For teacher writes it on the board And says “g-o” spells “go.”

I ’ve learned that “r-a-t” spells “rat”  And “h-e-n” spells “hen”; That Rover is a “d-o-g”  And “B-e-n” is “ Ben.” My teacher says she thinks that I Am doing very well; But papa spells a different way,  And says, “Sh! Don’t you tell!”

You see, my names are Alice May,  And my last name is Hall, And yesterday I spelled them out  At school before them all. My teacher said, “That ’s nicely done!” And so at home last nightI spelled them out for my papa, And thought I had them right.

But papa said, “You ’re wrong, my pet; For ‘A-l-i-c-e’Spells ‘darling,’ dear, and ‘M-a-y’ Spells ‘sweetheart’—don’t you see?”I told him what my teacher said, But he declared: “Oh, no!That ’s not the way your papa spells; Your teacher does n’t know.”

My papa would n’t tell me wrong Or say what is n’t true,And yet my teacher says that she Spells just the way I do!I ’m afraid I ’ll never learn to spell— No matter how I try—If “darling” ’s “A-l-i-c-e” And “sweetheart” ’s “M-a-y ”!