9274.45 1878, Oct. 7. Lane fund. HARVARD UNIVERSITY LIBRARY HARVARD UNIVERSITY LIBRARY MAY 0 3 1989 (The rights of translation and of reproduction are reserved) FORE-SAY. THIS little book was not written to win prize or praise; but it is put forth as one small trial, weak though it may be, towards the upholding of our own strong old AngloSaxon speech, and the ready teaching of it to purely English minds by their own tongue. Speech was shapen of the breath-sounds of speakers, for the ears of hearers, and not from speech-tokens (letters) in books, for men's eyes, though it is a great happiness that the words of man can be long holden and given over to the sight; and therefore I have shapen my teaching as that of a speech of breath-sounded words, and not of lettered ones; and though I have, of course, given my thoughts in a book, for those whom my voice cannot reach, I believe that the teaching matter of it may all be put forth to a learner's mind, and readily understood by him, without book or letters. So, for consonants and vowels, as letters, I put breathpennings and free-breathings, and these names would be good for any speech, of the lettering of which a learner might know nothing. On the grounds here given, I |