Wichita eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1886-1890, 1889-03-02
/ UNIVERSAL TONGUE.
Introduction to Americ q Of VIOLA
puk, the Worlds I.al lguage.
The System on which 1t Is G instructed
Its Adoption by Merchan Is, diplomats
and Scientists Pred fcto with
Great Confide nee.


The study of Volapuk C IN now be prr.
sued 10 this country, VIOLA pukatid el"
having establi shed himsel in New York,
says the Boston 7ranscrif {. Full gram
mars and dictionaries have been published
abroad (or soon will be) in French, Ger
man, Italian and Spanish,a nd an abridged
grammar in English has also appeared.
Charies +. Sprague, of ew York (the
Volapukatidel already ref erred toy. all
nounces that he is at work on an fnstrv.c-
ton book in English viii n will be at
once grammar, exercise book, res.der
and glossary, which he opes to nave
ready very soon. Mr.. Spragl les defin ition
OF Volapuk is well worth quo ting because
OF It's succinctness. 1t reads
A scientific international |, mguags; not
to supersede any living Ian yuage, but to
be learned next to the mothe tongue, by
every educated person. Flo rmed on the
general model Of the Aryan f; smily' Of Ian
guages, selecting from each Inc true and
beautiful, discarding irregul aritiies, odd
tiles and difficulties. Mat eris1 taken
largely from English. Far ca sieI. to learn
than any existing language. Perfectly
regular and transparent nve nted by
Rev. Father Johann Martin SclIeyer, Of
Sohstdnce. baden, G6fInany.
And here are extracts from. an article
describing the system on which the Ian.
guage is constructed:
"Volapuk" is pronounced in tn, ee sylla.
bles with the accent on the las t, an in
variable rule in the language, an an ex-
cellent one; for the hearer thus kn )ws just
where the word ends. The great est diff
Guilty for person trying to under stand
foreign language fluently spoken is that
there seems to be no separation between
the words; it sounds like ''all q ne long
word" The is sounded as in stgo," the
as ia 'father," and the u as in German
or like the French u. The mea ming is
"World's Speech" or "The Lang uage of
the World" 1t is compound WI )rd, and
its eIemen IS are vol-world, an puk-
speech, con aected by the vowel a, the
sign of the possessive case; or, as it is
called ''Kim. ,fal," the "whos cease"
Kim (pronounc ed Heem) means " no? and
the cases are four-Kimfal, lAimafal,
Kimefal. KimifaNv deriving then' names
from the forms. Kim, who? Kima,
whose? of whon,? Kline, to whom?
Kimi, whom. The Kimfal Is the an
swers to the question "Who!" 1t is, there
fore, the nominative sase, or the subject.
1t is the simple root Orm, without vowel
ending. The other cast IS end in the three
novels, a, e, i, in regul sr order Every
body knows the vowe. y. therefore our
reader now knows how 70 decline any
noun or pronoun in the VIC rd speech, if he
will further remember tna It the plural is
always formed by adding 10 the singular.
Let US try it with the promo, N OF ''she:"
"Of, ola, ofe, of.
OFFS, ofas, ofes, of ="
The following sentence cont ANS all the
cases; Elem tidela esedom p ened1 rege.
(The teachers friend has sent letter to
the king) 1t will be noticed hat there
are no articles. F1en means fir lend, or a
friend, or the friend. 1t is fount by ac-
tual experience that the articles are I'M
necessary; in fact, many conside them
superfluous in English, as may be tested
by reading newspaper article, Sc tected
at random, emitting all 'the's." few
questions and answers will further i'm
press the relation of the cases with the in
terrogatives kim, kima, kline, kimi.
Kim esedom penedi? Who has sent be
letter? Elem esedom omi. A friend b. IS
sent it.
Kima fen esedom om? Whose friend
has sent it? Elem tidela. The teachers
friend.
Kline esedom omi? To whom has he sent
it? Rege To the king.
Kimi esedom Rege? What (objective)
has he sent to the king? Esedom penedi.
He has sent the letter.
We might easily evolve from these
phrases all the laws of Volapuk grammar.
We can give a suggestion of how verba
change their persons by intimating that,
as OBJ means l; oil, thou (or you addressed
TO one person.: obs, we: OILS, you (pluraD;
so eSedob signifies in one word, | have
sent; esedobs, we have sent: esedoms, they
have sent. w hen we state that isedom
means he had sent; osedom, he will send;
usedom, he will have sent; the reader may
make a guess that the vowel at the b
ginning of verb determines its tense,
while the indications of person and number
are at the end. When he studies the gram !
mar more thoroughly he will find that the
tense vowels are series, in regular order,
which makes it impossible to forget them:
n, a, e, i, 0, u. In the passive. pa, pa, pc,
pi, pc, pu. For example patidos, it is
taught; patidos, it was taught; petidos,
it had been taught; potidos, it will be
taught; putidos, il will have been taught.
The power of compromising words and
forming derivites is almost unlimited. ,
The vocabulary is capable of expansion ,
to meet any requirements of the future.
The use of Volapuk will be mostly for :
correspondence. As spoken language it
will have but limited currency. In ,
commercial correspondence it will first ,
come into general use, and this will al
WAYS be its widest, though perhaps not its
highest, sphere. 1t will next be applied
to scientific compositions. Science knows
no national boundaries and authors will
soon appreciate the advantage of world
wide audience. International treaties
and conventions will be drawn up in
Volapuk, which will become the language
of diplomacy, enabling both parties to
stand on equal footing.
CREOULOUS CHINESE.