The daily dispatch. [volume] (Richmond [Va.]) 1850-1884, 1871-04-15
,,,nr Of Foreign Nnrnes.

sp ,s,.,o.. 1T Boston Daily Adoest,see.r,:
To the E 1,tv we are told in Llppinsoss
JenS,S, mlD Dictionary, Is name ,t enae a -
B'og Sed more than twenty ways Wy , ra1;c
SPY, nsc the Roman aiphaoet' ~ ts,av AZ
there is probably but one way fg ,h s ss, ss
nome spel.ed three ways In Englisn ~
1n,,,,, Bornou. Bo,noo. Nor Is IL !incoIii,
49,, to coo iSou1on Born0o, or Soodda a.u
Pornou in the same sentence; ana GU 1W;1
IN the history of the English language VIZ
liam Shakespeare spelled ms own uI,nu vi; ~
several different ways in his autSstapa WILL VII.
The day for such careloSSncss Shouia nave
,,mr been past, and yet the principles on
, ,"n the decisions arc to be made have
hardly been discussed.
languages at this day should be conSlu-
,rci rather as ma lie up of letters than Oh
sound. The VOID grass has dincrcnt
vowel.sound in it when pronounced ny
Hoosier and Yankee, but the word con-
sists Of five .etters; gras-ot tour-s ,a
French word. -Four and fore are tWo on,
fcrent WORDS. Smyrna is so spelled IN
English be a,,se certain letters spelled its
Greek nan le, which sounds quite different.
The ru' .es for transfer differ in different
lanSuagr S. In Spanish Icon and Lyons are
spelled alike; so Boulogne and Bologna arc
Bolon 1. Our English rules for transfer
from Greek are taken from the Latin,
and are as old as our language. Our
rul IS for transfer OF Arabic, TURK
l>f and Persian words. arc more per-
f. ct than any other, having been dellber,,
.tclv made by convention OF learned
men at Beirut, among whom was Eli smith.
Several of these letters are nnutterable or
undistincuishable by us, as Hha. Il ha, hat,
and Ket. The Beirut system distinguishes
them all, and guides to rs good an approx
nation to The sounds as we can use. III, Inc
laws for transfer from the languages oil hin
dustan were, perhaps, settled fasI ss'tt
and we had the phenomenon OF an edttor
nf medical journal in English actually
changing three letters in bis name between
one months issue and the next. The rule
tor smelling Chinese words with Roman iet-
tors was quite lately settled by the Unlver-
sitv Of Pc King. Those for Russian alone
remain, except, perhaps, some 81 the re-
ro,er or circumScribcd languages OF the
East Indies.
The whole question, then, might be re-
rarded ms settled. were it not for one man
That man is J. Thomas, NJ. D., of Phila'
delphia. Unfortunately, after giving The
suhiect more consideration than perhaps
anv man ever did, he has come to different
conclusions. Ee considers arabic words
rs consisting of soundS-,ot oil lcttcTs.
These and all others he spells with the
utmost care and uniformity, and in two
works that altogether embrace almost Tue
whole of those known to English literature.
And these books are destined to enter every
considerable village in America, to lodge IN
every decent library, and to become a neceSS-
sitv TO every student. These are L'ppncottS
Gazetteer and Biographical Dictionary. 1t
is hard to see 80 much scholarly labor over
thrown forever by the cash and enterprise
Of a single philadelphia firm backing the
patient, careful, unremitting lahorS of q
mau distinguished only for doing perfectly
the work he undertakes. But we fear that
it is even so, and, like Adam in Paradise,
whatsoever he calls every person and place
that is the name thereof. If there Is nc
other remedy than to get up two better
books. we surrender in advance. But we
wait to see.